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Keep – Modify – Trash? Give your marketing strategy a spring cleaning

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For many of us, April is a time of starting fresh and shaking off the winter blues by cleaning the house. Why not use that same approach to spruce up your business marketing strategy?

The marketing and advertising classes we took in college taught us about reach and frequency. The idea was that if you tell as many people as possible as many times as possible about your business, eventually they will buy from you. While some tactics are worth keeping, some approaches need to be modified and others discarded altogether.

Past their prime

Yellow Pages: While there are exceptional cases that may benefit from advertising here, the primary audience is rather niche and simply not where people think to look. Make sure your phone number is up to date in the Yellow Pages directory and direct the bulk of your marketing efforts elsewhere.

Slogans: While slogans for big brands may still work, don’t create a slogan just to have one. Consider promoting your mission statement instead. Modern brands can also convey their values in more meaningful ways, such as typography, color palettes, diversity initiatives, cultural values and corporate social responsibility.

Evolving strategies

Cross-Media Campaigns: To keep your business or organization competitive, you need a marketing strategy with a firm foundation and the ability to take advantage of the latest tools, channels and resources. Integrated, cross-media marketing campaigns are the perfect way to deliver your message and call to action for retention and acquisition programs. West Press has the experience, knowledge and ideas to help you plan and implement a winning cross-media campaign or collaborate with your marketing department to fit into your existing strategy. In addition to traditional print media marketing, we can build and distribute emails and develop and host landing pages or micro-sites to communicate your message throughout multiple touches.

Large Format Signage: Large when it comes to advertising isn’t just billboards. From floor graphics and window clings to trade show signs and point of purchase displays, large format graphics and signage can be a great way to boost the visibility of your business or special event. West Press offers a variety of indoor and outdoor products to meet your large format needs and our signage experts can direct you to the most economical and durable solution for your project. Our blog on Tips for Creating Effective Large Format Signage is a good place to start.

Newsletters: Brands use newsletters to share company news, useful information and customer stories and they help promote interaction, build credibility and establish trust. While many still print and mail their newsletters to their customer base, email newsletters are an effective tool. For an overview, check out our blog on Producing an Email Newsletter.

Personalizing the conversation

Pushing out the same message to everyone without personalization in an attempt to communicate value about your product or service isn’t a sound marketing plan. Your customers are getting better at ignoring these sorts of advertising messages every day. There are an increasing number of tools available to help them tune it out. With the advent of spam folders, Do Not Call lists and DVR, for instance, customers are able to filter these ads and, in some cases, eliminate them.

Personalized-URLs (PURLs): A personalized URL, or PURL, is a special URL with a customer’s first and last name attached to your domain name. The customers each get a marketing piece greeting them with their names and a personalized URL to their own landing page. The PURL landing page usually contains a questionnaire form to collect information from the customer that will be useful for future marketing campaigns. One of the advantages of using PURL campaigns is that you can track the progress of each individual customer. Read our Personalize Your Marketing Campaign with PURLs blog and then contact the web development team at West Press to help take your PURL campaign where it needs to go.

Online presence: Instead of shoving unwanted messages in the customer’s face, engage them in a conversation using digital technology (blogs, social media and your website) that communicate a valuable message. This appeal to the customer at a deeper level, personalizing the conversation on their own terms. Our Necessary Elements of a Great Website blog is a good starting point and our skilled staff can help you revamp an existing website or take your website ideas and make them into reality.

From cross-media marketing and web development to PURLs and large format, West Press’ talented staff is here to help your business achieve its marketing goals. Contact West Press or your Account Executive at 520-624-4939 today.