Online Strategy

Online marketing is exploding. When I was going up, I loved spending as much as time as I could at the mall shopping and hanging out with my friends. Today, I spend around 75% of my time online and now less than 1% at the mall. It’s amazing how quickly the internet has changed life for everyone. Have you ever stopped to think about it? I do most of my errands, research and shopping as well as get caught up with my friends and family - all online. And for the most part, I am satisfied. Why? Because I save money and stay connected. Don’t get me wrong; I make time for the face-to-face, quality time with friends and family when possible and I use the internet to help me orchestrate those moments.

With over 3.2 billion internet users today, having an online strategy is essential. Having a company website is not enough anymore. Your brand is being shared through conversations all across the web. Think about Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and so on. People are sharing their perceptions and experiences all around the world. If you are listening and participating online, you’ll be able to identify net promoters to help bolster your brand and you’ll also be able to help shape any negative perceptions and offer remedies for any shortcomings.

So how do you break through the clutter? At a high-level, first and foremost, it’s important that your value proposition and brand promise is clear. More importantly, you deliver on it. Then, you need to make sure you optimize your website daily, participate in conversations while monitoring what is being said, make sure you have a backlink strategy and identify online evangelists to help spread the word. Building your online community is essential nowadays. They will be your brand champions. They will extend your reach for you organically. They will sell your products and services for you. I want to emphasize the importance of search engine optimization (SEO). The most qualified leads will come to you through SEO. Why? Because they are the users who find your site based on relevancy. They are also the ones you’ve most likely spent the least amount of money on thus giving you the highest return. Google is still the number one search engine in the world and the main search tool to focus on. The changes that came from Google rolling out Panda, Penguin and Hummingbird over the past couple of years were all around quality information, site structure, backlinks and content structure based on how people talk – I’ll go more in depth into this later. The takeaway is that Google is trying to build a better search tool to connect users to more relevant information based on how people talk and what devices they are using.

There are many different strategies, tools and channels to drive demand for new, repeat and referral business. Understanding your audience and budget you have to work with along with identifying the metrics to measure your return will drive which tools to tap into. Over the past 15 years, I have worked with many different online tools, social and email marketing efforts. I will be adding some of the programs and results I’ve generated soon.

Creative Direction

Creativity is second nature to me. What’s interesting this strength didn’t not truly reveal itself until I began working at Jenny Craig. In fact during my interview, the Senior Vice President of Marketing for Jenny Craig voiced his concern that I had no formal creative training at the time. Prior to Jenny Craig, I was an account executive for an ad agency and what caught their eye was some of the ads I had in my portfolio for the California Avocado Commission and Choice Meat Company. That Senior Vice President of Marketing for Jenny Craig saw the potential in me and became my mentor over the years. At Jenny Craig, I directed the print creative, packaging, in-store POS, video productions, events and program materials. Before my departure, I was assisting in building their first ecommerce website. I learn so much and Jenny Craig and it was one of my favorite jobs in my career.

The next journey in my career after Jenny Craig was in Silicon Valley where learned all about online marketing. Since then, I have been directing, managing and guiding creative teams on integrated marketing. Creative strategy and developing ideas comes relatively easy to me. This is definitely my wheelhouse if you like my style. Here’s my approach:

Determine the objective
✓ Define your audience/personas
✓ Understand the audience’s pain points
✓ Identify the main message in response to the pain points
✓ Know your competitive edge
✓ Identify the offer(s)
✓ Set the budget with a target ROI
✓ Specify the mediums used to get the message out
✓ Look at how you can test and iterate to dial in performance
✓ Set up the metrics to measure your performance

Once your framework is in place, then you can write a simple brief and begin to conceptually develop the theme, write the headline, payoff and call to action. I have done creative direction and development for print, trade shows and events, videos and animation, websites, social, environmental design of retail stores and corporate offices, direct mail and email, remarketing and banners, software UIs along with product designs, branding elements such as core values, mission statements, visions along with branding standards, email marketing and so on. I will be adding samples of work shortly.

Event Management

Trade shows and events give organizations the opportunity to meet with customers face-to-face and build share of mind. From industry events to user conferences to race marketing and sales events, designing the right experience is essential.

The investment to hosts and even attend events is mostly likely high and making sure you accomplish your goals and have a measurable return is important. I have handle event logistics, written storylines to set up the experience, developed promotions as well as pre and post show communications, directed the design and overseen the production of animation to drive home messaging. In addition, I have secured keynotes for organizations including celebrity keynotes as well as hosted press conferences during events. Below are types of events I’ve orchestrated:

✓ Industry Trade Shows
✓ Race Marketing Events
✓ International and National Sales Events
✓ User Conferences
✓ Round Tables & Focus Groups
✓ Press Conferences

Click here to see samples of events that I have directed, managed, coordinated and developed the experience around.

Video Production

Did you know that over a billion people use YouTube today? 85% of online adults (excluding China) consider themselves regular visitors. When you break the data down further, it’s pretty clear the value video brings to your marketing mix.

If you want to get a better idea of who is using YouTube in the US, view the stats published by DMR below:

✓ 82% Teens between the ages of 14-17
✓ 72% Millennials
✓ 58% Gen X
✓ 43% Baby Boomers

Video allows you to tell your story in a more engaging way and depending on your objectives, you don’t necessarily need to spend a lot of money on production. Take the Millennials for example; they place more value on authenticity and companies who serve a higher purpose that they can connect with and believe in. There is a motorcycle dealership I am working with whose purpose is to inspire freedom, happiness and connectedness. What better way to demonstrate the value of freedom and connectedness than through filming one of their social outings. To really capture the emotion, we're going to use a GoPro attached to the helmet of a guide (the owner of the dealership who not only sales the promise that riding brings, but also lives it) and film a desert excursion to put up on their site and push through their social channels.

Since the early 90s, I have worked with video companies writing scripts, shooting and directing, editing out takes and promoting online. I have also begun shooting more of my own stuff for social media. See some of the videos I have directed from start to finish. Click here.

Promotions

Promotions are a great way to drive more leads, convert more prospects into customers and retain existing customers. Depending on your goals, promotions can give you an immediate lift. I was asked to put together a counter-seasonal promotion for Jenny Craig (summer and winter). The goal was to increase sales during the off period when consumers were not focused on weight-loss. We develop a Winterfest and Summerfest promotion. In this promotion, we encouraged customers to come into the Centres weekly to earn points. Points were earned based on meeting their goals whether it was weight loss, exercise or adding more balance into their life. The points could be used for discounts on food or other products. Within the 13-week period, we were able to increase sales YOY by 10%.

With online at Spireon, we have been looking at a range of offers to test during various stages of our customer cycle. We are testing offers for sitting to watch a demo versus purchasing products along with a robust referral program. Last year, we launched our CDMA campaign designed to move customers from 2G to CDMA. Our objective was to create a push pull strategy with sales. They had “big” sales incentives for total number of units and number of new customers captured; and then, we included spontaneous daily or weekly incentives. The spontaneous incentive was to keep the team engaged even if they could not win the “big” prize. At the same time, we rolled out a customer facing trade-in promo focused on acquiring new customers and strategically knocking out our competitors. And we implemented a “try it and buy it” campaign targeting lost customers in an effort to get them to switch back. This campaign was so successful that we exceeded our goals. I will share examples with results for some of the promotional campaigns I have implemented over the next few weeks.

Other

I really believe I have been fortunate to work with so many great people, mentors and talented coworkers over the years. Because of this, I have built my skill set in so many different areas outside of what I listed above:

✓ Managing marketing, campaign, creative and development teams
✓ Working with and optimizing budgets over $8M
✓ Setting up marketing automation systems
✓ Designing eCommerce sites
✓ Heading up environmental designs for retail and corporate buildings
✓ Managing IVR systems
✓ Developing podcasts and webinars
✓ Designing mobile apps
✓ Designing and animating ecards and emailers

I will showcase some of these skills in the next couple of weeks so make sure you come back!