Axxis Buzz

Axxis Buzz is real marketing for real people in real companies.

New companies, established companies, companies just like yours that want to be better at marketing themselves. And grow.

The idea is to answer questions, get you started, make you think about marketing as an integral part of what you do in your business.

Axxis Buzz is the interactive part of the Axxis Design Group website.

If you have comments, questions, or insights, please share! Great marketing is always evolving, new ideas happen every day. This is the place to share them.

Happy Marketing!

Karri Hill

From David Hughes and Mike Contino of On Target Performance Group. A great overview of how they help companies survive this economy, other challenges, and help them grow.

www.OnTargetPG.com call 866-933-8730 On Target Performance Group is a management consulting firm that excels in providing creative and flexible business solutions that address the critical needs of todays business executives, owners and key stakeholders.

If you’re like me, you probably get several emails a week offering lists of leads you can purchase. Lists of hundreds or thousands of people and companies you can presumably add to your email and phone campaigns. Tempting?

I may take some heat for this, but I have to tell you to just say “no” to the list. Why?

The quality of the contacts may not be all it’s cracked up to be. It may be years out of date, it may contain hundreds of dead ends, and it may even be crammed with decent contacts that are good for someone, but not for your business. I can’t tell you how many times I have heard my customers tell me that they purchased a list, created an email campaign and got zero response.

I’m never surprised.

You must realize that direct mail and email have low response rates to begin with. Maybe you do, and maybe that’s why you purchased the list of thousands of names in the first place, playing the numbers game. You’re hoping to generate some instant responses and jumpstart your marketing efforts. Unless you stop to think about a few things, your success is going to be very limited.

First things first:

The first thing you absolutely must do when generating leads is to define who your best customers are. Who is an ideal fit for what you provide? Who pays on time and is a dream to work for? Who do you want to work for? Why?

You can’t and shouldn’t be all things to all people. Targeting your products and services to meet a narrower audience, while seeming counter-productive, actually gives you an edge with the market you seek. It’s called niche marketing, and it works. It is better to be an expert and a perfect fit for a few hundred than to be one of the many who promise something for everyone.

A perfect example of this concept is a young man I met at a networking event a few months ago. He is a disc jockey: weddings, private parties, graduations, etc. So are a lot of other people. His hook? He specializes in Indian music. As he said to me, “I may have a smaller pool of prospects, but there are plenty of people who want Indian music for their special events. It is hard to find someone who has what they want. I not only have it, but I understand what they want.  I am a perfect fit for them, and I can actually charge more because I specialize. A lot of my jobs are referrals.”

This young man has a bright future.

Second things second:

Not only did my young friend define a niche market, he understood their needs and wants. Do you understand what your best customers want? Are you tailoring your products and services to meet their needs? If so, you’ll be more successful. Effective marketing and sales is always about them, not you. Even if you don’t change anything that you offer, you must learn to market what you offer so that it speaks to your customer’s needs that aren’t met elsewhere. Find their pain, meet it, speak to it.

Good things come in threes:

Now that you’ve defined your best customer and figured out how to best meet their needs or tailored your marketing to speak to them, how do you go about building the list you wanted in the first place?

Find out where your prospects are, of course!

Where to they go, where do they network, what do they have in common? Who else provides services to them? Network with those people too! Sure, it takes a little longer than sending off an email or a direct mail campaign to thousands with the click of a button, but you’ll enjoy more actual warm leads by employing this process.

Happy, effective marketing!

•    Paper Stock:
The higher the number, the thicker the stock.

100lb. paper stock is heavier than 80lb, and so on.
13-14pt stock is where business card or post card stock should start, as it gives a higher-quality feel to the hand.

•    Paper Finish:
A GLOSSY finish is great for many reasons; graphics pop, it’s practically impervious to dirt and oily fingerprints, but glossy finishes will not take an ink pen unless it is a permanent marker. If you choose this finish, you may want to consider carrying a fine-point Sharpie just in case you need to jot a note.

A MATTE finish has a nice feel to the hand, graphics print very well, it resists staining, and it’s writable. Hands down, this is my favorite business card finish.

UNCOATED stock is perfect for those who need a very conservative and traditional business card. It is the easiest to write on. Graphics and photos won’t appear quite as brilliant on this stock. If you’re producing a piece you want to last, consider a coated stock.

•    Bleed:
A “bleed” in any kind of printing is when the graphics or photos extend right to the edge of the piece. When designing, the artist works with a slightly larger artboard, and the final piece is trimmed by the printer.

•    Photos and Graphics:
For best printing results, graphics should be 300 dpi (dots per inch). Lower quality graphics may appear blurry. Ideally, it is best to provide original vector graphics to your graphics person for things like your logo, but they may be able to work with a PDF, JPG, or TIFF.

Have any questions? Feel free to email or call!
khill@axxisdesign.com 614.507.0705

How to improve the performance of  the hardest working tool in your arsenal!

•    Your business card should be quality stuff.
It does NOT have to cost you an arm and a leg. Cards printed on your computer on sheet-fed stock are too thin. Every attempt I have made in the past ended up with cards that are warped just from peeling them off of the backing paper. This will not do. Quality cards, printed on quality stock, bought in bulk (500 or more) cost less in the long run.

The same goes for the free cards offered by companies that print their logo on the back. Do you really want your customers and prospects thinking you can’t afford to buy decent business cards? The quality of the card you hand out reflects directly on you.

•    Your card should contain your contact information.
This sounds pretty obvious, but you and I both have cards that don’t contain enough contact information. I have a card passed on as a referral that only contains a company name, a phone number, and a website address. I would like to have the name of the person I am contacting at the very least. In this case, my philosophy of “Less is More” just doesn’t cut it.

In the same breath, I will also tell you that you don’t have to list every single way of contacting you if it isn’t relevant. For instance, if you work from a home office and you don’t see clients there, don’t list your address. If you are the kind of person that checks your email once a week whether you need to or not, either join the computer age, or don’t list an email address. You don’t want to be thought of as unresponsive if it takes you a week to read and respond.

•    Your card should clearly represent what you sell, provide, do, or are capable of.
This is your mini-brochure! Whether you are networking for a job or new clients, if someone can’t tell what you do, you are not going to get a call. It is easier and faster to find another person or company than to find out if you are a good fit. Provide a tool that works effectively.

This is vitally important if your card is passed along to someone else. The information on your card is all they have.

•    Don’t try to cram everything into a few inches.
Business cards have two sides, and many printers don’t charge a penny more to print on both. Use the extra real estate, keep it concise, and provide links to fuller information, like a website or a LinkedIn profile.

•    If a logo is applicable, include it!
This is your first brand impression, so integrate it. If your company is fully branded, use the fonts, colors, and wording that communicates your brand.

•     Handing out more than one is a referral waiting to happen.
Make referrals easy!

3 reasons to simplify your marketing designs.

 I stood by my client as he proudly showed me the two-page spread he’d bought in the local yellow page directory, and cringed. He’d allowed the yellow page salesperson to turn the design and messaging over to their graphics department. He’d given them a laundry list of things to include, and they had dutifully followed his instructions. I was looking at the result: a very expensive, semi-permanent representation of his business that was so full of “stars” proclaiming “Call NOW,” Lowest Rates,” “First-Time Buyer Programs,” that it was impossible to read the core message. Was there a core message???

It’s tempting. You buy space for an advertisement, you’re sending out a mailer; you want to get the most bang for your buck.

Your designer comes back with something that’s good, but you want more. It doesn’t tell the whole story of what you do, how well you do it, or why your customers should buy from you. You send the designer back to the drawing board to add more content. Maybe you send the designer back more than once. You’re happy when there isn’t  a snippet of empty space waiting to be filled with a sales pitch, and sign the order.

Your results are less than stellar, and here is why:

1. You assaulted and confused your audience with so much information and so many sales pitches that they couldn’t make sense of it, or they felt pushed and tuned out all of your message.Solution: Sticking to ONE major message in an advertisement or marketing piece allows that message to shine. Instead of throwing in the ‘kitchen sink’ of reasons why your prospects should do business with you, give them one GREAT message, make it memorable, and back it up.
2.  Too many visuals. Remember the saying “a picture paints a thousand words?”Solution: Pick your graphics carefully. They should engage your audience immediately, while providing a strong relationship to your written message. Chosen well, the thousand words don’t need to be included!  Limit the number of graphics: use only one main graphic to reinforce your point, if possible. Additional graphics may include your logo and other visual cues that convey information instantly, such as the credit cards you accept, or BBB membership.
3. You overdid the call to action. While many marketing pieces seem to forget that a call to action is essential, your piece is so full of them that your audience can’t decide what to do, or what to do first, and they abandon your message completely.  Solution: DO have a call to action, but don’t expect your viewers to commit the next week of their lives deciding which action they need to take or which action they should do first.

The old KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) method works best when you’re marketing, both visually and in copy.

Have a well-defined goal and stick to it.

Use your website (you do have one, don’t you?) to give the whole story, and make sure your marketing piece directs your audience there. Your website should be used to expand on your message, tell the rest of the story, convert browsers into buyers, so use different marketing channels for the purpose that makes each most effective.

Remember, people don’t want to be sold, they want someone to make it easy to buy.