By Leo Valiquette
It can sometimes be a thankless job, this eat-what-you-kill world of marketing and PR guns for hire.
As I wrote about last week, poorly managed expectations can torpedo any client engagement. So too can penny-wise-and-pound-foolish budget decisions that all but guarantee the failure of a marketing program by starving it of the resources it needs.
Word of mouth is crucial to bring new business in the door. We rely on referrals from happy clients, and we prize positive and meaningful testimonials that give us credibility with prospects and illustrate what is required for a marketing or PR effort to be successful.
We judge ourselves by the results we achieve for our clients, and hold ourselves accountable to that.
What we don’t do is attempt to ride our clients’ coattails and crowd into their time in the spotlight
Read More
By Hailley Griffis
This week’s article roundup is all about marketing, courtesy of Huffington Post, CopyBlogger, Forbes and ClickZ.
First up, why marketing campaigns are bound to failure and the mistakes you might be making. Next, we see the importance of providing relevant content to your audience and look at the winning difference this content can provide. We follow that with the lessons one founder learned going from the corporate world to the startup world and how he has improved his marketing. Finally a very detailed post goes over how to create an inbound marketing strategy.
Why your marketing campaigns are destined to fail
Jun Loayza is very familiar with the classic mistakes a lot of marketers make. Drawing on the hundreds of marketing campaigns he has implemented, Loayza recaps what he’s learned from his failures. The first is being too focused on traffic, and not giving enough thought to conversion. He then talks about properly pitching the product and whether or not people can talk about you with ease. Read More
By Francis Moran
Angel investors, that group of high-net-worth individuals who are often the first source of external funding for new companies, were a great deal more active in Canada in 2012, making nearly twice as many investments as the year before. However, the total value of those investments rose by only 13 percent, suggesting that individual investments, while perhaps easier to secure, are getting smaller.
That was one conclusion to be drawn from the annual report on angel investing published earlier this week by Canada’s National Angel Capital Organization. The survey of 20 out of NACO’s 24 angel group members revealed that a total of 139 investments were made last year, up 96 percent from the year previous. Just over 100 of these were new investments, 30 were follow-on and the balance were not specifically categorised. However, the total amount invested in 2012 was $40.5-million (all values in Canadian dollars), up only 13 percent over the $35.7-million that angels put into young companies in 2011.
Read More
This is the next entry in our “Best of” series, in which we venture deep into the vault to replay blog opinion and insight that has withstood the test of time. Today’s post hails from November 2007. We welcome your feedback.
By Francis Moran
Canada’s national broadcaster, the CBC, is airing a special series on its national radio news programs called, “How may I help you?” I caught the first in-depth piece yesterday evening and I so badly wanted to call in and share my endless stack of customer service horror stories. Many fellow listeners obviously felt the same way; as of late this morning, fully 279 (!) individual stories of lament had been posted to CBC’s web site.
The issue put me in mind of an article, authored by Graham Technology’s Frank Kirwan, that we secured in Customer Management magazine earlier this year.
As I was listening to the radio piece last evening and reading some of the horror stories posted online this morning, the key point that kept coming back to me from Kirwan’s article was “Dissatisfaction is a greater driver of (customer) defection than satisfaction is of retention.” And judging from the number of CBC listeners who wrote that they would never again do business with that bank, telephone company, travel agency or whatever, clearly it takes just a single outrageous example of lousy customer service to trigger that defection.
It really doesn’t have to be that way.
Read More
By Leo Valiquette
A beloved alumnus of our shop, Danny Sullivan, once wrote on the subject of managing client expectations:
“Every story has a natural news value and, while it’s important for PR people to understand what this value is, it’s even more important that the client understands it too. Without mutual agreement about what level of media traction can be expected, you’re flying blind and all too likely to crash.”
And our namesake tells this story:
“One of the first of what I like to call ‘Francis’s favourite fictions,’ or ‘Everything I know that’s wrong about PR I learned from technology company executives,’ was a line from the CEO of one of the very first tech companies I pitched when I originally ventured out on my own in the early 1990s.
“‘I want to be on the front page of the Ottawa Citizen tomorrow morning,’ he said.
‘I was a lot younger, thinner and more intemperate in those days, so I replied, ‘Okay. Go home and shoot your wife tonight.’”
Read More
-
Purposeful customer service
September 09, 2013 by Chamber of Commerce
By Shep Hyken I recently posed the following question to a group of business owners at the International Franchise Association convention: “How do you ensure a great customer service experience for your customers?” There were some commonalities among the answers. Even with the diverse collection of businesses, from quick-serve restaurants to online businesses, most of […]
Read more... -
Great articles roundup: Be an entrepreneur now, startup hiring, online media and marketing that doesn’t sound like sales.
September 06, 2013 by Hailley Griffis
This week’s articles start off with more great pieces about entrepreneurship and startups. First off we have a post from Entrepreneur that talks about why right now is the perfect time to be an entrepreneur, next a post in the Huffington Post’s Small Business section talks about startup hiring and more specifically, the kind of people that you do not want working at a startup. […]
Read more... -
-
The eternal struggle to balance process with results
September 04, 2013 by Leo Valiquette
Back in the day when I was a full-time journalist, I would often rouse the ire of hired PR guns by daring to contact their clients directly. I mean, the sheer gall I displayed by responding with such enthusiasm to whatever pitch or media release they had sent my way […]
Read more... -
August roundup: What does it take to get technology to market?
September 03, 2013 by Hailley Griffis
By Hailley Griffis Last month’s lineup featured dueling posts from Francis Moran and Leo Valiquette about Ottawa’s future innovation complex and how the thing just needs to get done. And as always, we had excellent content from our associates and contributors on effective and engaging presentations, getting an app to market, entrepreneurship, and marketing and customer service lessons that are […]
Read more... -
-
Happy Labour Day long weekend!
September 02, 2013 by Hailley Griffis
From all of us at Francis Moran and Associates, we hope you have a relaxing and safe Labour Day long weekend. Regular posting will resume tomorrow. Image: McEwan Group
Read more... -
Great articles roundup: Startup press mentions, investor pitching, startup tips and comments
August 30, 2013 by Hailley Griffis
This week there were a plethora of amazing startup articles that we are excited to share with you. One huge struggle that startups often face is getting media coverage, the post we have lined up today addresses this issue for startups […]
Read more... -
-
The youth unemployment problem needs more than R&D
August 29, 2013 by Denzil Doyle
Judging by the amount of student unrest that occurred last year, ostensibly focused on high tuition fees, our politicians at all three levels of government would be wise to brace for more of the same in the coming academic year. […]
Read more... -
Empowerment is the core of superior customer service
August 28, 2013 by Francis Moran
We have a bit of a preoccupation with customer service here at Francis Moran and Associates, and we write about it a lot. It stems from my conviction that superior customer service is the only truly sustainable competitive advantage available to most companies. […]
Read more... -
Twitter
Tweets by @FrancisMoranRecent Comments
The Future of A&R – Walabe : [...] http://francis-moran.com/marketing-strategy/top-10-questions-every-strategic-communicator-should-ask... [...]
Traditional Marketing is Dead – Long Live Bikini Waxer Marketing | Scalexl : [...] pointed out by Alexandra Reid on the Francis Moran website content marketing is becoming more and more like journalism. So, it is not just about the content, [...]
It’s Summertime…and the Networking is Easy? | THE MERRAINE BRAIN : [...] In fact, summer is perhaps one of the times least used to network, yet at the same time has shown to be the most productive time to network. People tend to be in a brighter mood compared to during the gloomy winters-especially where I am from in England! Networking needs to be fun and not approached as another chore, like mowing the lawn. (http://francis-moran.com/marketing-strategy/social-media-strategy-why-meeting-in-the-real-world-matt...) [...]