Follow-up: An Essential Touch Point to Building Your Business

I recently was featured as a guest blogger on Legal Sonar.  Wanted to share with you!  Enjoy.

One of my favorite words in marketing is “touch point.”  Why?  Touch points are reasons for clients/prospects to learn more about how you can help them meet their objectives, as well as a way to provide value-add information with follow-up.

It is common for professional service marketing and business development efforts to fall flat based on the lack of powerful follow-up (use of touch points).  Lawyers build business based on relationships.  The efforts of your marketing team can drive brand recognition, but the trust and rapport that is built during the “business development” process is what sells.  Having your clients keep you top of mind is essential for success and an easy way to do that is consistent follow-up to keep your name in front of them.  Look at these general statistics (from a study from McGraw Hill):

• 48% of sales people never follow-up with a prospect
• 25% of sales people make a second contact and stop
• 12% of sales people only make 3 contacts and stop
• Only 10% of sales people make more than 3 contacts
• 2% of sales are made on the first contact
• 3% of sales are made on the second contact
• 5% of sales are made on the third contact
• 10% of sales are made on the fourth contact
• 80% of sales are made on the fifth to twelfth contact

Now, with that said, follow-up is not just something you do after a meeting.  Follow-up, as defined by Dictionary.com is an action or thing that serves to increase the effectiveness of a previous one, as a second or subsequent letter, phone call, or visit. Follow-up is often as important as the initial contact in gaining new clients. Here are a few ways that you can effectively follow-up and add value:

o   After a meeting, send a thank you e-mail with next steps (demonstrates your interest in helping meet their needs). 

o   For positive press (client/prospect), send a congratulation note on the news.

o   Inform clients/prospects about a book, article, industry reports or website that might help to them based on conversations they have had with them.

o   Reach out to see if a client/prospect would like to grab a coffee/lunch to chat about a new trend your firm is seeing in the industry (this is a great opportunity to bring along another lawyer to chat about the trend and introduce them to another area of the firm.

o   Ask clients/prospects if they would like to be added to pertinent e-mail/newsletter lists.

o   At firm events, for your clients or prospects that attended, send them an article that expands their knowledge of the topic of the event.  The key here is to send a piece that’s adds value (not a product slip – an article, checklist, etc.)

o   At firm events, get with your marketing team to see who RSVP but did not show.  Contact key individuals to see if they would like to set a meeting to discuss the topic in more detail.  Send the slide presentation to those that did not attend and see if they would like to set a meeting to discuss key points of the presentation.

o   For those you met during networking portion before or after an event, send a “nice to meet you” or “great seeing you again” e-mail; send pertinent article/information on areas of interest they mentioned to you (to keep the doors open); ask for a lunch/coffee meeting to continue discussions and build relationships.

o    Inform them of an upcoming event/webinar that may be of interest to them.

o    If your firm has news that can be of interest to your clients/prospect, share it with them (press in reputable publications, new hires of the firm they might be interested in meeting (especially if industry focused or have a niche specialty), new location that is in alignment with their footprint, etc.).

o   Reach out to them to refer a prospect to their business.

We know that the sales process can take a considerable amount of time to complete.  It’s important to stay in front of clients/prospects consistently so that when they’re ready to buy you’ll be there.  Another reason to stay top of mind with your prospects and clients is that they may not be ready to purchase today, but they may know someone else who is.

Here’s to taking time to execute touch points and build your business. 

Skate Where the Puck Will Be

Hockey great Wayne Gretsky was once quoted as saying "I don't skate to where the puck is; I skate to where the puck will be." It's become a bit of a cliche, but talks about what marketing is all about - understanding your customer and where their needs are taking them.

As marketers continue to look at where customer needs are trending, keep these trends in mind:

• Social Media:  In 2011 companies began to take social media marketing seriously and it exploded as a marketing tool. Now companies are heavily integrating social media into their overall marketing plans, creating more leverage for a company's brand.  Social media will be used to collect customer data and enable better target marketing of products and services that those customer are interested.
• Mobile Web Strategy. Nearly half of all U.S. mobile phone subscribers own a Smartphone. By 2015, more people will access the Web via a mobile device than through traditional desktop Internet access. You must optimize your website for viewing on an iPhone or other mobile device or risk brand irrelevancy.
• Video. Video communication connects with viewers from a multi-sensory perspective - sound and sight - while speaking to all our senses.  More than any other medium, video alters our paradigms, and changes the way we see things. YouTube generates more than 2 billion views a day; that’s double the prime-time audience of all three major U.S. networks combined. Gather video testimonials from your customers; feature your team conducting online educational demonstrations; and use video to bring your product or service to life.
• Referral Generation Program. We are in a referral economy where consumers are increasingly relying more heavily on third-party reviews – from friends or online review sites – to make decisions about brand selection. This is a terrific low-cost solution for driving new business.

Thinking about ways to connect with your clients in new ways is important for keeping top-of-mind.  Here's to keeping up with the trends in marketing and technology that can add more value to our cusomters.


Kathryn_anastasioyahoo.com

Right + Left Brain Marketing

We've all taken the psychology class in college, so understand that there are differences in how people think.  We know right brain personalities are more creative (interprets information intuitively, visually and emotionally), where left brainers are more analytical (logical, rational, sequential, verbal and textual).  Why is this important in marketing?  How a marketer thinks will impact the type of campaign he/she develops.

The emotional part of the brain and the rational part of the brain work together, and it is this commingling of emotions and reasons that marketers need to understand in order to position their brands and build messages for greater success.  For a marketer to succeed, both sides the brain needs to be "exercised" to be effective.

Marketo recently posted an interesting infographic on the differences in how marketers think.  I enjoyed this and wanted to share with you.

Click Right Brain/Left Brain Marketers to see the full graphic.

To read more visit :

Left/Right Brain in Direct Mail

Left/Right Brain in Content Creation

Changing the Marketing Mix

2012 is finally here and marketers are using a combination of innovative efforts to impact their target base.  We know that when crafting and executing marketing strategies, we need to keep in mind the changing PR, media and market landscapes and their relationship to human behavior.  With this in mind, new and time-tested marketing initiatives are taking the forefront in this years marketing mix:

Photo from luigi diamanti

Direct mail is making a comeback. We have seen a steady decline in direct efforts in the realty and credit card areas over the last 12 to 18 months. However, effective direct mail (for the right products) will once again take an active place in the marketing mix.  Consumers are being inundated with electronic communications so marketers are trending to use direct mail in strategic ways to increase visibility.

Digital takes new front role in the marketing mix. While direct mail may be making a comeback for targeted efforts, marketers are seeing a big shift happening – a shift that will most likely continue throughout next year. Companies and organizations are now, finally, giving digital marketing channels precedence over traditional, analog media. Of course an integrated marketing approach remains key, but digital comes first, both in strategy and in budget.  Social media will continue to increase in importance, and the use of items such as QR codes will continue to be explored as venues to target digital.

Bundling will increase as marketers get smarter about pre-packaging products and services based on customer needs and problem-solving opportunities.



Video usage among B2B companies will increase, with far more value-added content and fewer boring demos. Cisco predicts that 80% of all Internet traffic will be video by 2015.   If you’re not learning about how to use video to grow your business online, it’s time to get started.  Consider video presentations about your business and services.  Go for quality and differentiate yourself from your competition early in the game.  Video brochures, video newsletters, and regular video communications on your web site will identify your business as progressive and “in touch.”  

 Mobile continues to impact how people interact with companies.  Over the past year, mobile devices have led both technological and marketing innovation. Google states that 79% of smartphone owners use their mobiles to aid in shopping and 74% make a purchase as a result. Smartphones have revolutionised how we interact with content on-the-go and in 2012 the mobile device will continue to play a significant role. In particular, mobile devices could reinvent the remote control for connected TVs.

Inforgraphics is becoming more important in strategy formation.  Infographics is the way we consume information.  Analysis of consumer segments is becoming forefront in creating marketing strategies that are more efficient.

Here's to pushing our efforts forward and becoming more valuable to our organizations.

Other Resources 

15 Business and Marketing Trends that Matter by

2012 Technology trends in Marketing

Kathryn_anastasio@yahoo.com



Think Outside the Box: Help Drive the Next Big Idea

As marketers, we know there are many things that we need to work on to assist our companies with meeting their objectives: traditional marketing, interactive, public relations and business development activities. Marketing injects the customer insight and creative thinking that gives business its edge.  We combine these with analytical data to drive strategy, innovation and profitable/sustainable growth.  With this, it is our job to help our firms keep on-top of the next big idea that resonates with our clients/targets. This can be both from a pure marketing standpoint or helping our leaders with the next area for growth (development of new or enhanced products/services).

Photo from Jannoon028

Tips for brainstorming:  In a series of interviews with highly successful creative people, Peter Sims, author of Little Bets: How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge from Small Discoveries, writes that most innovators don’t begin with brilliant ideas – they discover them through experimentation. Here are lessons learned from some of those top doers:

• Get Out of the Office – One of the best ways to identify creative insights and develop ideas is to get out into the world, like an anthropologist might. Steve Blank, a retired Silicon Valley entrepreneur who is also a professor at Stanford, routinely challenges students to defy their assumptions by immersing themselves in the world. “No facts exist inside the building,” he says. “Only opinions.”
• Unleash Your Imagination – Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin didn’t set out to revolutionize the way we search for information. Their goal, as collaborators on the Stanford Digital Library Technologies Project, was to prioritize online library searches. But their small discoveries led to the famous “PageRank” algorithm. Amazon.com also embraces the experimental discovery approach. “Many efforts turn out to be dead ends,” says founder and CEO Jeff Bezos. “But every once in a while, you go down an alley and it opens up into this huge, broad avenue.”
• Change Your Course – Acclaimed architect Frank Gehry designed conventional buildings like tract housing and shopping malls for much of his career. Inspired by how artists manipulate materials, he performed a series of experiments on his own house in Santa Monica in the late ‘70s. Soon after, he closed his firm and started a new, using his own style and voice. He was 50 years old. This wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t broken free from the realm of what he was used to.
• Take An Experimental Approach – Chris Rock, the Google founders and Jeff Bezos are examples of what University of Chicago economist David Galenson has dubbed “experimental innovators” – those who use iterative, trial-and-error approaches to gradually reach breakthroughs. They don’t try to hit narrow targets on unknown horizons, analyze new ideas too much too soon, or put their hopes into one big bet. They’ve all reached extraordinary success by making a series of “small bets.”

Now with all of this, we have to keep in mind what our business objectives are, where we want to grow our business and always keep on top of demo/psychographics of our customers.  Thinking outside the box, while we may not get to execute there all the time, is how we can help our companies stay competitive and innovative.

Here's to helping our companies anticipate the next idea that resonates with their clients/targets!

kathryn_anastasio@yahoo.com

Targeting: Don't Forget Generational Impacts

Photo from Sheelamohan

As we know, the key to successful marketing is understanding how we can help achieve a firms business objective.  As marketers, we must identify who we are marketing to and what channels/messages resonates with them.  Part of this analysis takes into consideration how generational differences impact our marketing efforts.

Each generation has their own characteristics and understanding these can be of value in our execution of marketing tactics that lead to an increase in successful outcomes.  Generational marketing involves identifying and understanding how the beliefs, attitudes, emotions, needs, and interests of each generation influence their decisions and behavior. And effective implementation of generational marketing practices is key for targeting member segments of all ages.

• Traditionalists/Silent Generation (born before 1946) survived the Great Depression, WW2, Korea, Gandhi’s assassination and the rise of labor unions.  They are loyal, desire to leave a legacy, value personal relationships, follow rules and have faith in institutions.  Values of company are important.
• Baby Boomers (born between 1946 and 1964) are just beginning to move out of midlife and into the early stages of elderhood. The broad generational personality that Boomers experience orients toward vision, values and spiritual discovery.  They are hard working, competitive and desire to put their own stamp on institutions (are free thinkers).  Image is important and they also put weight in value (not price sensitivity).
• GenXers (born between 1965 and 1981) are just beginning to move out of young adulthood and into midlife. The broad generational personality that GenXers experience orients toward liberty, survival and honor. They are resourceful, highly adaptive, self-reliant, skeptical of institutions and independent.
• GenY/Millenials (born between 1982 and 2000) are just beginning to arrive as young adults in the American landscape. The broad generational personality that Millennials experience orients toward community, affluence and technology. They are globally concerned and aware, cyber-literate, collaborative/group oriented, and vocal.
• Homeland Gen (born after 2000) are just arriving as a new generation. They share the same broad traits with the elders, currently 67-84 years old. This generational personality orients toward pluralism, expertise and due process.  They are tech-native, media-smart, artistically inclined, integrated and pan-cultural.

In order to market effectively to a generation you must find a way to grab their attention in channels that they use and with key messages that hit their core values.  Generational determined lifestyles and social values exercise as much influence on buying and purchasing as more commonly understood demographic factors like income, education, and gender do--perhaps even more.

Marketers that take generational impacts into consideration are more successful in their channel marketing efforts and contributing to more bottom line results.

Read more at:

• General Article on Generational Marketing
• Business News Daily - Bridging the gap between Gen X and Y
• Bloomberg BusinessWeek - Generation Y
• Tips on Generational Marketing (video)

Kathryn_anastasio@yahoo.com