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#MarketingTitbits – Lego, blogging, Marc Jacobs

lego-blog-marcjacobs-smaller1. Lego to co-create marketing campaign with UK fansLego is calling upon all UK fans to help create a marketing campaign by suggesting new product ideas for a global market. Lego’s head of global community co-creation said despite the fact the company is not expecting the new products to be the next Ninjango or Lego Movie, it is hoping to build on the trust it already has within its UK community of fans. Lego are also encouraging the fans to promote this new marketing campaign via their own social media profiles.

Similarly, in the past, Lego have invited fans to give input to their marketing. For example, students in Canada sent a balloon with a Lego figure attached to the edge of space and scenes in the Lego Movie have been created by fans. To read more, click here. 

 

2. Blogger vs. Word Press: which is better for beginners?

If you’ve never written or had a blog before and you’d like to but don’t know how to get started, this is a great article for you. The two most widely used blogging platforms out there are Blogger and WordPress but it can be difficult to decide which one is best for you.

They differ in terms of ease of use, aesthetics and how easy they are to integrate to social media channels but really it all comes down to what type of blogger you are. If you’re looking for a blog that is simple, without much room for customisation, then blogger may be the one for you. However, if you’re more serious about blogging in the long term and want your blog to be totally unique, WordPress is probably the platform for you.

To read the full article, click here. 

 

3. Marc Jacobs takes to Twitter to find face of new campaign

Last week, Marc Jacobs made a controversial decision to find the face of their campaign not by the traditional method of model agencies, but through Twitter. The designer brand asked fans to post a selfie with the hashtag #CastMeMarc.

This is not the first time the company have taken to Twitter; during London Fashion Week they opened a ‘tweet shop’ allowing customers to make purchases simply by tweeting about the brand! To read more, click here.

 

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LinkedIn Changes: April 2014

blog-imageSince its launch in May 2003, LinkedIn has become an essential tool for business professionals and companies. As well as being a networking tool and virtual CV for users, the Company Pages have developed hugely over the years and now enable significant brand development potential. They allow your company to connect and engage with followers interested in your brand.
Currently, if you have a Company page on LinkedIn, you have the ability to display the products and services that your company has to offer. Alongside the specific products and services images, links and descriptions can be added. However, as of April 14th 2014 this will change. LinkedIn have announced that they will be removing all “Products and Services” sections from company pages. To help overcome this, LinkedIn have recommended ways of conveying the same information to your followers. 

Company Updates

Company updates can be seen both on your Company Page as well as on the newsfeeds of your followers; they can be added to and updated on a daily basis. Not only this, but they give you a chance to engage with your followers and the people who are interested in your brand. To take advantage of this, it is important to ensure that the information you are sharing is appropriate for your brand and target audience. Remember it is your Company not you or your individual employees speaking.

Showcase Pages

Similar to the soon-to-be defunct “Products and Services” section, these are subpages of the Company Page. Here, companies can showcase the specific services they offer and post regular updates to their followers.  Contrastingly to the “Products and Services” pages, these can be followed by users in the same way they would follow an individual Company Page.

Other features include:

  • Analytics are available so that you can track what content your followers are interested in and engaging with. This is separate to the Company Page as a whole.
  • Groups can be featured on the page, allowing you to promote networks that you are part of or are linked to your company.
  • Just like the Company Pages, you can add the Showcase Pages to your Hootsuite account, making sharing content that little bit easier.
  • If an individual is following one of your Showcase Pages this does not mean they will automatically be following the Company Page. This means users can be segmented and only be informed of the news that specifically interests them.

Company Recommendations

Company Recommendations are currently a part of “Products and Services” pages. When these disappear there will be nothing to replace them, or if there is LinkedIn have given no indication as to what this might be yet.

If you are an admin for a Company page, you can easily save the recommendations by copying them into a document. If you’re not able to do this before the 14th April deadline, you can still request a copy of the recommendations direct from LinkedIn through their Customer Support Centre until 30th May.

Although the section of the Company Page dedicated to recommendations will be gone, there is nothing stopping you from creating a Showcase Page dedicated to these testimonials, keeping them all in one place and easy to find for your followers.

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#MarketingTitbits – Budget 2014, content marketing, Growth Vouchers

Budget-contentmarketing-growthvouchers-smaller1. Budget 2014: the key marketing takeaways
Less than two weeks ago the Chancellor George Osborne delivered the 2014 budget. The statement nodded heavily towards businesses and pensioners and Marketing Week have written an article highlighting some of the main benefits to marketers.

Some of the points that the article bring to light include “savings overhaul could spark ISA marketing bonanza” and “big data is a big deal for the Government”. To read the rest, click here.

 

2. Introducing the periodic table of content marketing

Chris Lake, the Director of Content at Econsultancy is the first person to ever create a periodic table of content marketing. The table was created to stand out against an ever growing sea of questionable infographics.

Along with the ingenious table comes an explanation of his thinking along the way. The main areas he focuses on are strategy, format, content type, platform, metrics, goals, sharing triggers and checklists. To take a look, click here. 

 

3. 10 ways to grow your business with a Growth Voucher

Growth Vouchers were introduced in January 2014. They were designed to help SMEs grow their businesses by providing match funding of up to £2000 in the form of a voucher. The vouchers can be spent on strategic advice in one of five different categories:

  • Improving leadership and management;
  • Making the most of digital technology;
  • Managing cash flow, late payments and negotiating finance;
  • Marketing, attracting and keeping customers;
  • Developing skills and taking on staff.

Enterprisenation have created a blog explaining the different ways each of the advice offered can help to grow your business. To read more, click here.

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#MarketingTitbits – Amazon, MAS#TAGS, curling

books-mashtags-curling-smaller-11. Amazon’s 100 books everyone should read in their lifetime
Amazon Book editors have recently published a “bucket list of books to create a well-read life” that “over many months, the team passionately debated and defended.” They decided that the list should be in alphabetical order “because our assumption is that no book is more important than another.”

The list encompasses books old and new, the oldest being Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice of 1813. From Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone toGreat Expectations and everything in between, look at the complete list here.

 

2. Birdseye creates Mashtags – the new social media potato snack

As we’re sure you are already aware, social media is a hot topic. Millions of people, young and old, use social networking sites all over the world and along with the use of social media, has come a change in the vocabulary we use. Last year the word “Selfie” was announced as The Oxford Dictionary’s word of the year, alongside this, “hashtag” has also become an increasingly prominent word in today’s society.

Many businesses have welcomed social media with open arms and have used it to their advantage, but Birdseye have come up with a whole new spin on it. They have released a brand new potato snack called Mashtags, essentially potato smileys in the shape of social media icons. To read more, click here. 

 

3. Sir David Attenborough provides curling’s best description yet

In recognition of British Curling Olympic success, we thought we’d point you in the direction of this. If you listen to the Radio 1 weekday drive time show you might have already heard the charming description of curling from Sir David Attenborough. The English broadcaster was a guest on Greg James’ show last week and Greg asked him to read a description of curling, the result was both hilarious and enchanting and we recommend giving it a listen here.

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#MarketingTitbits – Twitter, Alzheimer’s, advertising

twitter-alzheimers-advertising-smaller1. Tips to help your business gain more followers on Twitter
 If you’re using Twitter the chances are you will be tweeting content as often as you can – and if you’re not you really should be. With this in mind, you don’t want to be tweeting to an absent audience; no one wants their tweets to get lost somewhere in cyberspace.

But do not fret, there are a few things you can do to help your business gain new followers. Ensuring that you have some personality is a great way to entice people into following you, tweeting Christmas party images and news about the team is a great way to make things a bit more personal! Searching for people in your industry is another great way to find relevant Twitter followers – not only are they more likely to follow you, they’re more likely to retweet and favourite your posts.

To have a look at more tips for helping your business to gain new followers on Twitter, click here.

 

2. The Facebook campaign that simulated Alzheimer’s disease

 If you’ve ever had anyone close to you suffer the misfortune of Alzheimer’s disease, you might have a better understanding of how terrifying it is to lose your memory of where you’ve been, who you’ve been with or even who the people are around you.

However, it can still be hard to understand what it really is like for those suffering. For that reason Alzheimer Nederland set up a Facebook campaign to give people a taster of what it can be like for Alzheimer’s suffers. They created images of people, who hadn’t even liked their Facebook page, in places where they had never been and tagged them in the images. The image captions read “Confusing right? You’re now experiencing what it’s like to have Alzheimer’s disease” and then prompted the Facebook user to send the app to a friend.

To have a look at the heart-warming campaign, click here.

 

3. Six trends in advertising you need to know for 2014

Are you ready for the New Year ahead and the trends that have been predicted for advertising? If not, we’ve found a great article that highlights the six key trends that are likely to affect advertising this year, predicted by the Chief Executive of Econsultacy, Ashley Friedlein.

From real time bidding trends, video advertising and mobile advertising, to read the full article, click here.

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#MarketingTitbits – social media, Anchorman, Google

socialmedia-anchorman-google-smaller1. 9 ways social media marketing will change in 2014
 Social media is one of the fastest developing industries out there today. New social networking sites can grow almost overnight and can fizzle away before you’ve even noticed them, for this reason it is essential that marketers keep up!

This week, we saw an interesting article from Mashable that outlines how 9 successful entrepreneurs plan to change their social media marketing in the coming year based on their predictions.

These predictions include “Social won’t be used for sales.” And “LinkedIn will become the most important publisher” but to have a look at the full list and the basis on which they have been predicted, click here.

 

2. What Anchorman 2 taught us about content marketing

During the run up to the release of Anchorman 2, Ron Burgundy and the Channel 4 News Team were everywhere. Not only did Ron himself feature in a series of Chrysler adverts – his presence lead a 40% increase in Durango Dodge sales. Mr Burgundy appeared on radio stations, collected an award at the MTV Movie Awards (on behalf of an absent Will Ferrell) and released an autobiography.

Clearly – there are many lessons that can be learnt from Anchorman 2’s marketing, especially for content marketing. To have a look at what these lessons are, click here.

 

3. 12 inspiring marketing campaigns from Google

It is arguable that Google doesn’t need to market itself, with 2,161,530,000,000 searches in 2013 alone. However, whether or not this is necessary, they still do. Like many things they do, Google do their marketing well. From email marketing, billboards, Google+ marketing and TV ads, we’ve found an article the showcases Google’s most inspiring marketing campaigns.

To take a look at them and read more, click here.

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Free ‘Effective Marketing for SMEs’ seminar

eventimagefinal
We are hosting our annual free marketing event at The University of Southampton Science Park on Thursday 21st Nov from 12pm – 2pm.

Working lunch

Join us for a working lunch, as we help SME businesses identify how to make the most of their marketing and generate the biggest bang for their buck.

Marketing for SMEs in 2014

The interactive session will give you insights into how marketing is changing for SMEs and outline what you need to know to enable you to get the results you need in 2014.

We will address a variety of topics, including:

  • Top marketing tips all SMEs should know
  • Is digital marketing rendering traditional methods redundant?
  • Search engine optimisation – the rules have changed
  • Why isn’t our marketing working?
  • How marketing for SMEs is changing and how to move with the times

Places are limited, so reserve yours today to avoid disappointment.

To book your place and for more details, click here.

If you have any questions, please contact Connie on 01962 600 147 or email connie@tlc-business.co.uk.

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#MarketingTitbits – Evian, 2014, resolutions

evian-2014-resolutions-smaller1. Evian launch their January marketing campaign
Yesterday, Evian launched their new marketing campaign for 2014. The month long campaign has launched on Facebook and Twitter asking fans to act young and banish the back to work blues. The slogan ‘This new year, ask your inner child out to play’ is teamed with ideas of how to live young; for example asking for a piggy back and playing sleeping lions.

To read more, click here. 

 

2. 12 simple ways to be happier and healthier in 2014

As is customary each New Year, once the hangover has worn off and the silly string has been removed from the light fittings, one’s thoughts turn to New Year’s resolutions and how to make the forthcoming year better than the last. From breaking a bad habit, to trying something new, be sure to have a look at these simple ways to be happier and healthier in the forthcoming year. 

 

3. The 36 resolutions that actually matter for 2014

Keeping with the theme, if you are anything like us, your New Year’s resolutions will be forgotten within a week! This might be because the resolutions we set ourselves are unrealistic or maybe because they aren’t changes that we really want deep down. We saw an article this week which highlights 36 resolutions that actually matter for 2014. We’re not suggesting you commit to all of them but maybe pick out the few that are most relevant to you and give it a go, don’t forget to let us know how you get on.

Click here to have a look at the resolutions.

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What SMEs need to know to market effectively in 2014 – seminar summary

Image3-2Last week, TLC Business hosted our annual marketing seminar at Southampton Science Centre. This year we focused on ‘Marketing for SMEs in 2014’. The guests were treated to a working lunch, tackling a range of hot topics on marketing for SMEs. As promised, we have created a blog outlining some of the main themes we explored on the day, so you don’t miss out!
Digital vs. traditional marketing

15 years ago the term ‘digital marketing’ did not even exist showing just how fast technology is moving and how important it is for marketers to keep up. The debate of which type of marketing is more important has been around for just as long and every marketing professional will have their own opinion.

The statistics around digital marketing channels are compelling. B2B companies that blog generate 67% more leads than those that don’t. So if you’re not already blogging, perhaps you should be thinking about it. Regarding social media, 52% of marketers said they have found a customer on Facebook and 43% on LinkedIn.  In terms of influence, surveys have found 63% of readers are more likely to be influenced by blogs over magazines. These are just 3 examples from a plethora of impressive statistics as to the effectiveness of ‘digital marketing’.

However, despite all the focus on digital marketing, in 2013 digital budgets are forecast to account for just 20% of overall marketing spends and TV, press and outdoor advertising was up 3.4% in the third quarter of 2013.

So what did we conclude? Two main points:

1. If you’re not at least planning on how to use ‘digital marketing’ in your business you should be, because your competitors are likely to already be reaping the rewards.

2. We would argue that the term ‘digital marketing’ has become extinct in any case. So intrinsic are digital channels in one’s overall marketing mix that to imply it is somehow distinct from ‘marketing’ in general is outdated. Digital is so important that it cannot be left out!

The rules of SEO

Over the last few years Google have released a number of different algorithms that enable you or I to find what we are searching for on Google. Famously coy about what companies need to do to enhance their search engine rankings, Google has worked hard with its algorithm updates to eradicate the contrived methods of SEO practitioners to artificially inflate a website’s search engine rankings.

First came Panda. Panda dealt with dubious content pages and demoted websites that attempted to dupe Google about the relevance of pages. Next came Penguin. Penguin came down hard on iffy link building, resulting in a number of big names plummeting down the rankings . And now to Hummingbird. Released towards the end of the summer this year, Hummingbird (birds famed for being precise and quick) moved the goal posts (albeit slightly) once again. Hummingbird has responded to the change in the way that Google’s users now search. It seems we are asking questions more rather than searching for terms that might link to information they want to find. Put simply, Hummingbird ‘thinks’ and ‘acts’ more like a human and recognises the intent (semantic meaning) behind the search phrase.

The best way we have heard the subtle shift in intent from Google described is the following; currently we have ‘search’ engines – Google wants to become an ‘Answer ‘engine.

It is helpful to keep this in mind when creating your content. Consider creating tutorials, ‘how-to’ guides, explanations and general content that provides solutions to challenges in your industry or that your target audience might be experiencing.

How to make your marketing work more effectively

The first rule for making your marketing work more effectively is to know your market. Do you know what competitors are out there and what they are doing.

What about your target audience? Have you established they actually want and value what your business provides? Have you reviewed the demographics; where are they located, what segments exist, what type of marketing is most influential to them. For instance, a 20 year old might find social media marketing a lot more influential than a 70 year old.

The future is never clear and forecasts, even from experts, might never come true. Despite this, it is still important to look to the future when thinking about your marketing. What changes are taking place in the marketplace? How are consumer purchasing habits changing? What technology is becoming available to utilise in your business or your marketing? A lot of the time the information you are looking for is already out there, it is just a question of finding it!

Moving with the times

The pace of change in the marketing sector can feel daunting at times, leaving some to cling to old familiar channels and ignore potentially effective ones in the process. Making an effort to ensure you move with the times is very important. It might not always be appropriate for your sector or audience but the very nature of establishing that is a useful process in itself to better understand your audience.

The annual B2B Buyersphere Report was reviewed and illustrated the different types of social media that are being used by B2B buyers currently. Somewhat surprisingly, Google + came out on top, indicating that perhaps Google’s social media offering is beginning to gain traction.

The presentation looked at the rise of ‘Moment Marketing’, where marketers respond to real life events, in real time. Nestle, Nandos and Paddy Power demonstrated great examples of mastering this. Most importantly, SMEs, through leveraging their social media networks, can compete on an equal footing with corporate giants in the ‘Moment Marketing’ arena.

Mobile marketing was a hot topic; with staggering statistics about the adoption of smartphone – by the end of 2013 there will be more smartphones on the planet than people.

The significance of this for marketers is that more and more interactions between companies and their target audience are taking place on mobiles.

The knock on effect of this is that it is imperative that businesses design their website and content (such as emails) to be mobile friendly.

Equally significant is the rise of ‘People Power’. Mirroring the rise of social media, the likes of Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter now give the average Joe in the street a platform to reach a global audience. Marketers need to accept and embrace this rather than fear it. Businesses might not be able to exert the same control that they are used to in more traditional marketing channels but they are able to reach a far wider audience and engage in ways previously unheard of. Social media represents a massive opportunity for businesses and can no longer be ignored.

Top tips all SMEs should know

The event was rounded off with a few key tips that all marketers or those running a business should take away with them. These encompassed:

1. Knowing your audience and the market research tools you can use to do this

2. If you read two books, we recommend ‘The Psychology of Persuasion’ and ‘The E Myth Revisited’

3. Embrace email – the stats all show it works

4. Make sure your content is up to scratch

5. Get yourself on social media – whether you’re there or not we guarantee your competitors and customers will or soon will be

6. Go mobile

 

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