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March 23, 2022March 23, 2022

Spring Cleaning Your Business Marketing

Spring Cleaning Your Business Marketing focuses on how to clean up your business marketing to make it more efficient. Spring is here! Usually this means more cleaning and getting rid of some unwanted items. For the most part, this is also applicable for a business.

Spring Cleaning Your Business Marketing

If you want to make the most of your marketing, occasionally you need to do a little clean up. Likewise, you’ll have to consistently monitor all of it. Think of it as caring for a pet. Websites, social media, printed materials, and even your company image should be reviewed yearly. Yearly isn’t that bad! Not quite as much as pet care.

A little cleaning or updating is likely necessary. This keeps things fresh. So, let’s get into Spring Cleaning Your Business Marketing a little deeper.

Website Updates

You have a business website. Maybe it’s new or just a few years old. No need to make drastic changes. You like what you have. Ok, great! As much as you are happy with it, there’s always ways to improve!

Therefore, small changes can make a BIG difference. If there isn’t anybody updating the site regularly, plug-ins probably are out of date. New keywords can be added. You can update the images on it. Add new employee bio’s or products. Additionally, what about revising the menu and content? Taking time for these changes will keep it fresh and Google happy. However, there’s also a lot more to it than can be thoroughly explained here.

Social, Social, Social

Further, let’s get into social media. This type of marketing typically can be fruitful. That is to say, IF it’s being used properly and consistently.

Time to spring clean. For example, ask yourself, “when is the last time you invited new contacts to follow or like your page?” Have you acquired any new products or equipment? Heck, when is the last time you even posted to the page? By the same token, it’s time to clean these social media pages up. Below is a list of new and improved items you can start doing on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, or whatever pages you have:

New photography
Add videos
Update any new services or products
Do a “History of your company” post or series
Highlight wonderful recent projects
Employee bios
Spotlight new or long time customers. The list can go on…

In fact, the uses for social media are endless. Perhaps we will create a future blog on this topic alone.

Conclusion

Finally, along with the above mentioned, analyze what worked in the last year. At this point you can figure out where leads, messages, and calls came from.

Perhaps you are just looking to create brand recognition. Just being visible and not intentionally seeking out leads is fine too. For example, during the pandemic you just wanted your company to be helpful. Admirable. Many company’s did just that.

If leads and referrals are what you want though, time to clean. Subsequently, whatever isn’t working you may want to drop. Or, at least change. Some marketing avenues don’t work for all. Print direct mail may be better for a home improvement company than, say, a niche manufacturer. Likewise, social media may produce more for a restaurant than an auto repair shop. Drop the useless marketing or make some necessary changes after trying a while.

All of this is sort of like cleaning out the gutters. It doesn’t happen often. But, when it does things flow much smoother.

Analyze. Create. Achieve.

March 1, 2022March 1, 2022

Nothing To Do With Business

Nothing To Do With Business is an article different from any of our other blogs. We’ve been writing marketing blogs (hopefully insightful ones) for years now. Additionally, almost every blog we’ve done centers around better marketing and business.

So, we’ve decided to change it up this time around. At any rate, with baseball season (hopefully) around the corner, we’ve decided to do a baseball card style info blog. As a result, we’ll have a little fun with this particular article and share a few fun facts about the characters of 77 Design Co.

Nothing To Do With Business. An image of the orange and gray 77 Design Co business cards on a textured orange background.

Rob Hoffman-Founder/Owner

Position: Head coffee maker

Bats: Doesn’t

Throws: Left

Wins: Some

Losses: Some

Competitiveness level: Not

Western Astrological Sign: Leo, the Lion

Chinese Astrological Sign: Snake

Favorite food: Yes, all of the foods

Favorite drink: Coffee, followed by whiskey

Favorite movie: Back to the Future or Ghostbusters. (Note: TV and movies aren’t a real big deal. He tends to read more or do something else)

Favorite movie genre: Comedies, thrillers, or crime

Favorite TV series: Whatever series he is binge watching at the time. He usually reads over TV or watches how to YouTube videos

Favorite actor/actress: None

Favorite album: Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd or Abbey Road by the Beatles

Hobbies/Interests: Playing music/guitar, writing music, recording music, shooting, antiques, and refinishing old furniture

Favorite sport: Doesn’t care, may watch some college football

Office pet(s): Elsa (cat,) Starla (cat,) and Molly (dog)

Dislikes: Red Hot Chili Peppers

Bobby Drakulic-Co Owner

Position: 3rd Base

Bats: Right and Left (ambidextrous)

Throws: Right

Wins: As much as possible

Losses: As least as possible

Competitiveness level: Ultra high

Western Astrological Sign: Aries, the Ram

Chinese Astrological Sign: Dragon

Favorite food: Crab legs

Favorite drink: Coors Original or Jefferson’s Bourbon (depending on the mood)

Favorite movie: Empire Strikes Back

Favorite movie genre: Spaghetti westerns or sci-fi (depending on the mood)

Favorite TV series: Cheers

Favorite actor/actress: Clint Eastwood

Favorite album: L.A. Woman by the Doors

Hobbies/Interests: Fishing/hunting, martial arts, watching Red Sox baseball, Corvettes & muscle cars, relaxing, gardening, art, and playing catch or coaching baseball with his son

Favorite sport: Baseball and martial arts

Office pet(s): Voodoo (lab/Pitt Bull mix) and Maya (Bearded Dragon)

Dislikes: Pretentious people, mushrooms, the Yankees, and Tom Brady

We hope you enjoyed this goofy blog, Nothing To Do With Business. After all, fun and humor is a major part of our personalities. Even though it’s important to talk business, its also important have fun too. Additionally, we’d love to see your comments or thoughts. At last, if you don’t enjoy what you do…why do it?

Analyze. Create. Achieve.

February 1, 2022February 1, 2022

Monitoring & Measuring Your Marketing

Monitoring & measuring your marketing is an article we’ve wanted to talk through for a while now. In the past we’ve discussed the importance of knowing your customer. This is still true. In fact, they can sometimes be combined. However, if you aren’t monitoring and measuring your marketing, how do you know what’s working? This could be just about as important.

A 100% authentic insights stat from a page we recently took over.

Check this stuff…often!

Let’s use Facebook as our main social media example here for this blog. The demographics, reaches, likes, and other analytics will vary from platform to platform. Comparatively, the audiences differ greatly. LinkedIn will differ from Facebook. Instagram will be different from LinkedIn, and so on.

The above statistic is a screenshot directly from a Facebook page we recently took over managing. As a matter of fact, all stats in this blog are authentic. In other words, no numbers are skewed here in any way. This (above) was their page insights roughly two weeks after 77 Design Co started posting.

How to improve.

By all means, there is more to this statistic than what it seems. This is not a “puff our chest out” type of post though. We’ll discuss a few things we did that you can simply do to improve your page. Sure, we are proud of creating numbers like this. It’s kind of crazy when you really look at it though!

What happened to this Facebook page before we took over? We don’t know. They were posting consistently. The page was mostly optimized. It’s our belief that the messaging may have been off though. Believe it or not, even the typefaces and fonts used in some of the earlier posts likely mattered. The bubbly and vivacious styles that were used in previous posts likely threw off the audience. Given that the page is geared towards outdoorsy men and women, this undoubtedly affected the messages. Content, visuals, and messaging are extremely important. They absolutely need to be tailored specifically to the pages audience.

What we do know is that it was our intent to build an audience right from the start. Looking over this statistic, we are confident that has begun. We’ll do our best to continue that trend.

The insights tool gives you a lot of data that is relevant to what you are doing…marketing your business! Use it. Monitor it. Measure it. These tools help when deciding who you are writing content to. In addition, you can use these insights to tailor your message, the tags you use, post times, and other aspects to see what works and what doesn’t. This HubSpot blog gets a little deeper into understanding FB insights. Have a look and learn more: https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/facebook-insights

More…

Along with monitoring & measuring your social media marketing through available stats, as mentioned above, knowing your customer is one of the most difficult tasks for a business. The given statistics from your social media pages can help with this. That is to say, if you monitor the stats closely it will give some ideas. Additionally, you will need to consider that these are social media numbers. They may vary slightly from other sources of marketing. Either way those statistics will give you a starting point.

Summing up, monitoring your social stats can be applicable for other forms of marketing as well. If you check over the ages, genders, and locations, for example, these could help drastically with a direct mail program. Or, they can be applicable to narrowing down what services/products to promote for other digital marketing strategies. Again, in the end these are social media stats. Monitoring & measuring your marketing has to be done across the board to get a true analysis on who your customer really is.

Audience stats.

As always if you need help tracking or attracting customers…certainly, 77 Design Co will give you a hand. Feel free to reach out.

Analyze. Create. Achieve.

January 4, 2022January 4, 2022

Marketing Myths-Volume Three

Marketing myths-volume three covers an important topic. The type of content in marketing. Above all, first we’d like to say, Happy New Years! Before we touch on the details of marketing myths-volume three, a new year brings new optimism. It also brings new challenges. There’s an unexplored road in front of all of us. Make the best of your situation in 2022!

Too Long.

By and large one of the most common issues we run into is making content too long. Sure, we get it, you want to tell customers ALL about your business. One myth is that you have to tell the full story. Not true though. Often times marketing is much more effective when simplified. We work together with clients to shorten the message. This makes the content more impactful.

Instead of creating posts, billboards, or web content explaining all kinds of details about your service or product, try narrowing it down. For instance, we like to advise clients on keeping things short and to the point. So, don’t think that you have to explain everything right out of the gate. Giving customers just enough but not too much will create an interest. This in return creates calls, email, and messages for you to interact with potential customers.

Confusing.

Don’t confuse customers or potential customers. It’s a turn off. Using industry specific acronyms in marketing can hurt the message. These will often create confusion. Unless it is about something obvious and well known, we advise against using them in marketing messaging.

Additionally, keep the sales you run clear and concise. For example, do not try to stuff several sale items into one mixed marketing message package. That is of course if the items can be separated.

Pics/Designs/Videos.

Oh boy! Another myth is, “we don’t really need any photography/video.” We have discussed these at great lengths over the years. One of the most powerful elements of marketing is the creative visuals. We’d love to hear the argument against this. There isn’t one.

Want the message to stand out? Make it look brilliant! Clean, clear, highly detailed, colorful, or even humorous pics, videos, and designs will get the job done. It sends a message that your business utilizes creativity and imagination in its marketing. This is a point often overlooked. This makes you stand out from other boring marketing. Read more here from the great Neil Patel : https://neilpatel.com/blog/visual-content-you-need-to-use-in-your-marketing-campaign/

Anything else you’d add to Marketing Myths-Volume Three? Need a hand formulating a 2022 marketing game plan that works? Hit us up for a free consultation: https://77designco.com/contact-us-2/

Make 2022 ROCK!

Analyze. Create. Achieve.

December 14, 2021December 14, 2021

Marketing Myths-Volume Two

“Marketing Myths-Volume Two.” This blog discusses bringing your business up to date with newer marketing strategies. We’ll debunk some marketing myths if you manage or own an older business. It always makes sense to better your marketability.

Despite how long your business has been around, there’s always ways to improve. How old is your business? What’s more, which marketing efforts have you tried over those years? Read on further and we’ll explore some common misconceptions we’ve experienced.

No matter how long you’ve been in business, marketing can improve your brand!

No Social!

“All things considered, we don’t need social media.” Yep. We’ve heard it. Likewise, we’ve met some more seasoned business owners that actually get upset at the very mention of it! Perhaps it’s fear of the unknown. There are times we’ve basically had to talk them down from the ledge. Look, we don’t LOVE social media either. There’s a lot of craziness on social. However, it is a super helpful tool for businesses. There’s no denying that.

Explaining how social can help in a thorough manner is important. Particularly for those that hate it. Here’s a blog from Hootsuite to read more on: https://blog.hootsuite.com/social-media-for-business/ .

Believe it or not, there are ways just about every business can benefit from social media. For example, you can build brand recognition/awareness, increase traffic to your website, or just personalize your brand. These are just a few ways social helps. Social media is a great way to give your business a voice and personality. Additionally, this leads to more calls, emails, and visibility. If your business has been around for decades or longer, it’s high time to step into the 2000’s.

Having a Facebook, LinkedIn, or even Instagram page is necessary. Like it or not. There are so many ways your business can attract the followers you want on all of these platforms. Facebook, for instance, has many professional group pages. It doesn’t really matter what industry you are in. Sharing stories, industry news, or products with these groups will create a personality for your business and make you an expert in your industry. Potential customers and partners will see, like, and share these posts. You can build relationships from there. Community groups help to grow your page too. Get going with it and make new connections.

No Web!

“We don’t necessarily need a website.” Really? Even if you have been in business for 100 years and bring in $10,000,000 per month, not having a website makes you look bad. If this is you, we apologize in advance because making $10,000,000 per month is crazy! Maybe you are satisfied with this. However, we’ll still state that you should have a website.

Likewise, if you are just starting out and only make $100 per month, you need a site. Your customers expect it. New prospective customers definitely expect it.

Without a website the legitimacy of your business is in question. We aren’t saying you need to go out and spend $10,000 on a new site. What we are saying though is that there needs to be an online presence to point people to. Websites are a digital “home” for your business. Additionally, having a site set up poorly (broken links, bad photos, inaccurate or outdated info, etc) can have negative consequences. See to it that your business has an accurate and operable professional looking website you can direct customers to.

We’ve Tried That!

Often we’ll hear, “We’ve tried that. It didn’t work.” Whether it was a printed direct mail program, digital marketing tactic, or social media strategy, you have to look deeper. What were you offering? Was the effort clearly creative and interesting? Who was the ideal customer you tried to reach? All of this and way more matters!

For instance, direct mail HAS to be eye catching. The offer HAS to be bold, useful, and draw attention to the piece. If not, buh bye! Straight to the garbage it goes.

We receive direct mail pieces ourselves from time to time. If it’s interesting we’ll carefully take note at what caught our attention. Some are great. Some not so much. The creativity and offer are what will make this program succeed or fail. The same can be said about digital marketing and social media.

Meanwhile, a few newer digital marketing options can truly be beneficial. In brief, strategies like geofencing or retargeting can be hugely successful. If you haven’t, it’s time to look into these. Questions about these? Contact us.

Finally, with all three of the above, you don’t want it to be all sales. People get irritated when they are sold to continuously. We’ll argue that any effective marketing campaign needs to be creative, informative, and helpful. This is when you will see the rewards of an effective marketing plan.

In conclusion, we hope you enjoyed Marketing Myths-Volume Two. Have you struggled in the past with any marketing efforts? Business been around for a long time? Unsure of how to create the right message? Give us a call. Of course, with a free consultation, we’ll be happy to discuss how to improve your marketing! Have a great Christmas and New Year!

Analyze. Create. Achieve.

November 17, 2021November 17, 2021

Marketing Myths-Volume One

Marketing Myths-Volume One. The first in a series of blogs where we’ll discuss topics that some (not all) believe about marketing. In short, we’ll get straight to the point. Marketing myths volume one tackles the age old myth…marketing is an expense. Wrong! Marketing is your answer to those pesky expenses! Read on and we’ll explain how.

An expense? Most certainly not!

Marketing and advertising is the right arm of your business. It draws attention to your brand. By all means marketing done correctly not only raises awareness but in some cases acts as an additional sales tool. Heck, further, creative marketing even makes the sale on its own sometimes! To clarify a bit, the money you spend on marketing services will (and should) pay for itself exponentially.

Marketing is an investment. Period. Comparatively, you look at high-yield savings accounts, properties, or certain stocks as investments. These are expected to bring value. It’s no different with marketing.

Marketing= the right arm of your business.

Obviously, some marketing tactics will work better than others. Although this may be true, it must also be noted, other strategies may fall flat. In order to avoid this as much as possible, you’ll need to know who your customer is. Don’t know who your customer is? Not sure how to go about narrowing down your ideal customer? Read this SCORE article to learn how to identify them: https://www.score.org/resource/how-identify-your-ideal-customers-and-get-more-them

SCORE is an organization we volunteer to. It is a nonprofit organization made up of mostly retired professionals who help new entrepreneurs get started. We’re honored to be a part of the helpful organization. They also help existing business owners fine tune their business growth as well as offer free mentoring, webinars, and courses. As I have noted, the above link is a great starting resource. It will help you identify the characteristics of your ideal customers much better.

Why does this matter?

Marketing myths-volume one is all about why marketing is NOT an expense. At its core, marketing revolves around who you are specifically targeting. When you truly find who your correct customer is, the game changes significantly. Then and only then is when you’ll start to see it as investment versus an expense. Likewise, then and only then can you tailor a successful marketing plan.

But…I pay X amount for marketing!

Is your business on a current marketing plan? What does that include? I will break it down. Firstly, if your business is paying X amount on a marketing strategy, what is coming back? Visibility. Brand recognition. Increased exposure to alternate audiences. More calls/emails/leads. All of these should be occurring. Additionally, these should lead to more moolah!

Next, have you ever truly tracked the marketing efforts? If the answer is no then how do you know what is working? Track your leads, analytics, visibility, etc. It is critical to keep track of these things.

Lastly, ALL of your marketing tools must be branded. By branded we mean the same or similar in design, logo usage, color, and look or feel. The website, business card, and social pages are the tools that make up your marketing. Anything with your business name on it simply must offer the same look and message.

At 77 Design Co, we welcome conversations in regards to previous marketing objectives that failed. Why did it fail? How do we correct these issues to ensure success? If you believe marketing is an expense and are reading this…let’s talk.

Have a great Thanksgiving!

Analyze. Create. Achieve.