marketing company Archives - Page 8 of 10 - Analyze. Create. Achieve.

August 11, 2020August 11, 2020

Marketing Success Stories

Marketing success stories. How about some optimism? Because racial tensions, increased Covid cases, stupid politics, government mandates, business closures, riots, and everything else in the news is usually bad. So, let’s talk positivity.

Marketing helps!

In this uncertain and crippled economic climate, some businesses have managed success. Despite the difficulties now your business needs to stay relevant. Marketing does that! On a micro level, a few places locally have seen an uptick in business due to continued marketing. We’ll share a few stories with you this week.

Story 1

One of the marketing success stories we’ll share is a local brewery. As a result of a social media training program, this local brewery is seeing a surge in engagement. Consequently, this has improved sales.

Customers consistently come in and say, “Hey, we follow you on Facebook.” Likewise, they’ll hear “we love your Facebook videos” or share similar comments. Awesome! We love to hear it!

Brewery: We were never open to retail before. Recently, we opened a pop up beer garden and we went from 0% retail to selling about the same as wholesale. Our business is selling more merchandise too. Social media is keeping us going. For instance, our engagement is now between 800-1200 per post versus the 60-200 we’d get before. That’s a big increase! It’s growing daily too. Likes and shares have increased as well. This varies post to post.

Another success we’ve seen is brand awareness. Most people didn’t know about us before. As a result of our consistent social media posting many people tell us they know all about our beers now. Facebook and Instagram are really helping. We’re more informed and educated about what we are doing now. http://www.sobbrews.com

Story 2

Food is essential. We all know that. Everyone needs food to survive. A local food service company that we work with has taken the pitfalls of this pandemic and turned it into a way to increase business while also taking better care of their customers. They have utilized their customizable food packages to ensure the safety of their customers simultaneously. How? Offer great food, have it delivered, and never leave home for it.

Food Service Company: Our current success directly correlates with our social media program. Before the pandemic we did our best, but now its more tightened. Our pages are fun AND informative now. Creative photos and videos help tremendously. New likes and shares are common on a daily basis.

Messages come in multiple times daily. It’s sometimes overwhelming how many we get. Existing customers want to order more food. New customers want to learn more about our products.

Facebook and Instagram have been huge. Sales have increased 50-60% over last year. That’s the trend so far, though it may be higher by years end. That has translated into a massive increase in revenue, but we’d rather not state an exact dollar amount. https://proniosfoods.com

Story 3

We won’t get too deep into this marketing success story, but a few parishes in the local area that we work with have also seen improvements. Pre COVID numbers had increased giving, but more importantly to them, more member engagement.

These churches wanted ways of reaching their parishioners better to pass along the Word of God and they’ve been utilizing social media and user friendly website updates to do that. Email marketing (or as one church official says, “email evangelization”) has helped them reach those who cannot attend masses. It has also kept their parishes up to date on all the happenings. All of these are great ways to spread their message and stay in front of their beloved members.

If you need marketing help, drop us a line. We’ll help any way we can. https://77designco.com

Analyze. Create. Achieve.

January 30, 2020January 30, 2020

Importance of Updating Your Website

Our topic this week is the importance of updating your website regularly. What’s the first thing you do before you buy a product or need more information on a company? You check their website. The website is often the first impression of your business. The importance of updating your website can affect many aspects of your business too. Therefore, it needs to be respected at the highest level.

77 Design Co business card, keyboard, and flash drive. — Keep it simple.

Have you ever been to a company’s website where they don’t have links working? Perhaps it takes you to the wrong page, the pictures aren’t updated, or company information isn’t updated either? Yuck. We don’t want that for you and you shouldn’t want that for yourself. Whether you are doing it on your own, or you have a marketing company doing this for you, here are a few things to make sure you are keeping up to date.

1. Update the information.

This is probably the most important thing to keep track of. If you have new events you would like people to come to, make sure you are adding them to the site. Hired some awesome new people? Make sure their faces are on there and take off the faces of former employees. If you have new photos of your products, these need to be the center of the website. People are very visual, and they like seeing clean and crisp websites. This also includes a good design that is mobile friendly.

2. Security.

You do not want your site to get hacked, that is a no no! We won’t go too deep into this, but hackers can use your website as a spam server. This, in the end, will block people from actually viewing your website. There are smarter people than us that can talk to you more about this.

3. Analytics.

If you have an ecommerce site and you see a huge percentage of people adding to the cart, but nobody going through the checkout, MAYBE something is wrong with your site. This is crucial for your business. Make sure you have a great user experience and continue to make updates.

4. SEO.

Search Engine Optimization. Optimize the words people are searching in Google, to ultimately find you. This is very important and a necessity for your business. As a result, customers can find you more easily.

5. Usability.

Is your website loading slow? That is so painful for the young generations. Certainly, you don’t want to irritate them. So, resize images, update plug ins, or do whatever you need to do to make it quicker. We are a microwave society and need information in just a few seconds. If your website is loading slow, there is a good chance they will just close their browser and move on to a different source of information. Likewise, make sure links are working and sending the user to the right page. For that reason, and many others, user experience is a big deal. Above all keep it simple, easy, or even fun for your customers.

Two business cards on a white background. — Call or email us for help.

Analyze. Create. Achieve.

December 6, 2019December 6, 2019

The Importance of a Professional Email

One thing that always befuddles me is when I see a professional business with a @gmail.com, @comcast.net, or some other NOT “@yourbusiness.com” email address.

Side view of laptop with e-mail interface on blurry background. Email marketing concept. — Emails

Customers Expect More.

Customers expect your business to have a domain name and website. An email address like name@yourbusiness.com oozes professionalism. Professional email’s are important. Much more so than a generic email.

Free email services, such as Gmail and Yahoo, are great for personal use. However, when you use a free email account for business purposes, people start to doubt your professionalism and credibility.

For example, say that you are in the process of planning to build a home. You are meeting with several builders. One builder has a name@businessname.com and the other builder has a tony129_builder@gmail.com. As a result, tony129_builder…probably doesn’t get the job. Maybe he’s less expensive. Maybe he’s a better quality builder. Doesn’t matter.

For many people, that can be a first clue that something is wrong. That is to say, they would start to question the integrity of the builder. We all know trust goes a long way in business.

Why doesn’t this builder have his own domain email address? Does he have a website? Is this business legitimate or am I going to be taken? These are some of the questions that you might start to have. Would you take a business with a Hotmail.com email address seriously?

We mean no disrespect here. Maybe, there’s a reason for this. On the other hand, we’re not sure why.

Consequently, a domain, logo, and business card are the minimum requirements for any business. Even new ones. Yourname@yourdomain.com looks a lot better than yourname@comcast.net or yourname@gmail.com. In conclusion, we’d love to hear from you on this. Prove us wrong!

Analyze. Create. Achieve.

June 14, 2018

We Want Your Marketing Problems

We want your marketing problems. Yep, you heard that correctly. Bold…but true.

When Rob and I started this venture together, we identified a host of issues that both of us, individually, have ran across over the years that we have been in business. I will not say we’ve seen it all, but we have definitely seen our fair share of problems in the creative/marketing world. Everything from web designers bailing on their clients never to be heard of again, to improperly designed logos, to incorrect photo files delivered to customers, and a whole lot in between. Too many times creatives take the money, create sub par products then disappear or never correct the problems. This is unprofessional and irritating to the clients that have come to us with these issues, but it also annoys the hell out of us too. It’s a black eye on the industry.

Let me also say that this is not completely across the board. There are amazing graphics, photographers, and web creatives out there that do top notch artwork and understand that they need to give clients the highest quality of work and service. We love meeting these people! If you are reading this and feel like you are a highly creative, responsive, and responsible professional in one of these fields…drop us a line. We’d be excited to chat with you and see how we could work together.

If you are a business owner that has fell into one of these traps…we are sorry. If you spent way too much money on something that didn’t work or didn’t work very well, again, we are sorry. We are also here to help find the solution.

Is your website outdated or not designed to your liking? Do you only have web sized files that a photographer delivered to you and are unable to use any images for print? Are the photos not very well focused or even eye catching? Is your logo pixelating and distorting when you try to add it to a larger sign, or even on the web? Did the person who made your website make it and then never return calls or emails? Not sure what to do with your business social media pages, or how to operate them to maximum efficiency? Was the cost associated with any of your marketing efforts beyond what you wanted to spend? Need a way to get customers to see what your product or service is REALLY all about? Don’t feel that the marketing company you used in the past completely understood your industry and business?

If you answered yes to any of the above or similar questions give us a call. We’d love to help with a free consultation.

We listen. We offer free advice. We dig deep into your business to learn as much as we can about it. We act quickly. We are not your typical marketing service. We have all the tools and know how to fix your marketing problems!

Analyze. Create. Achieve.

June 4, 2018

Let a Fresh Set of Eyes Take a Look

Crossword puzzles are frustrating. You get your first few words with ease, but soon you cannot see any new words at all. Your eyes have adjusted to the random letters and fail to see obvious words. The solution you ask? A fresh pair of eyes, a professional crossword solver. At 77 Design Company in Murrysville, we are your professional crossword solvers.

Okay, maybe not the greatest analogy, but crossword puzzles are a lot like small businesses; someone who runs the business day to day can easily and understandably miss small mistakes. That may cause his or her business to fall short of expectations. At 77 Design, we offer business consultations to help improve those small, but powerful, pieces of your business. We’ll come in and visualize the business with a fresh set of eyes and offer suggestions for improvement. Increasing awareness of employee activity is also another great example of what a business consultation with 77 Design can do for your company.

One example would be when an employee answers the phone. If you do not put an emphasis on phone training your employees…you may want to start! They are the first impression of your business given to a potential customer. It could happen that unbeknownst to you, or your employee, they may answer your business’s phone 70% of the time with a monotone or less than enthusiastic tone. They may answer the other 30% of the time with a happy and excited voice, depending on the day they are having or even the time of day. You could potentially lose 70% of those possible sales because potential customers talked to a more enthusiastic and excited employee at the business across the street who they liked better. Happy employees=happy clientele. Positivity, enthusiasm, optimism, and helpfulness are all contagious within your organization and that spreads to your customer base.

We can not only help to visually market your business better, but also advise you and your staff on best practices that will improve the quality of your brand, employee morale, and its sales.

If you’re unaware that you’re losing these clients, because that 30% of the time is the only thing you see then, 77 Design Company in Murrysville, PA will spot these issues immediately and find solutions that work for your individual business. We are in the business of helping business!

Analyze. Create. Achieve.

May 25, 2018

Introducing Our New Project Manager, Gabriella!

Hi! I am Gabriella Hatch, the new Project Manager at 77 Design Company. I wanted to tell you a little bit about myself, where I come from, and hopefully where I am going. I was born and raised 19 years, just outside Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in a little town called Oakdale. It’s actually “America’s Hometown”, at least that’s what our sign says.

I was surely an “oops” child, my mother was 45 years old with no previous child when I came along. My parent’s previous retirement plan quickly turned into my love of the outrageously expensive equestrian sport and 8

years of college. With that said, my parents’ support has given me motivation and confidence to put my best foot forward in everything I do as well as creating a strong work ethic and a desire to learn.

Recently, I finished my first year at Duquesne University, where I am majoring in Psychology with a minor in political science. For as long as I can remember I have always had a fascination with the brain. When I was young I struggled with panic attacks, controlling the way I breathed in order to control the irrational fear I felt was intriguing to me even as a kid. Therefore when asked as a child what I wanted to be when I grew up, I only had two choices, a

rockstar or a psychologist. The rockstar thing hasn’t worked out for me just yet, so psychology is plan B. As for the future I envision for myself now; my end goal is to receive my PhD. in Psychology, take over my mother’s private christian psychology practice and possibly grow the business with horse therapy. What better way to learn how to run a business and market yourself effectively than to learn from a marketing company itself?

Officially as project manager, my duties include keeping up with social media accounts, billing, research, and everyday administrative duties. More than my official duties, I am thrilled to grow with this company and bring a new perspective to the table.

Analyze. Create. Achieve.