Focus on a Goal

Survey the Right Number of People

Craft Your Invitation

Order Questions Logically

Write Objective Questions

Shorten the Survey

Close the Feedback Loop

Focus on a Goal

Be precise about what information you need to gather and what you plan on doing with it. A narrow goal will help you to simplify the survey.

Survey the Right Number of People

Some might consider a “census approach” to surveying, attempting to gather feedback from 100% of the population. Others take a “sampling approach”. If you are thinking of taking a census approach with your survey, consider:

• The census approach works best for populations under 1,000 individuals
• It may require you to utilize incentives to boost response to the appropriate level
• Make sure you invite all respondents
• Use reminders and deadlines to ensure highest response rates among your population

A sampling approach may be more effective for populations over 1,000 individuals. This allows you to obtain information on particular subgroups. If you are going to take the sampling approach, be mindful of the number of responses required to get a solid indication of how the target population overall would respond to your questions. To ensure good sampling, make sure your selection of population is as random as possible.

Craft Your Invitation

It is critical that your invitation is designed to minimize the likelihood of being flagged as spam. Avoid spam-filter trigger words (“Free, “$”, “act now”). Use a compelling subject line, such as “Help us improve our products” and send from an individual person’s e-mail address as opposed to a general corporate e-mail address.

Once someone clicks on the invitation, you have less than eight seconds to make a good first impression. Tell recipients what you want them to do as soon as possible in the invitation. Let them know how long the survey will be.

Consider using a combination of incentives and deadlines to gain rapid response. For example, “The first 100 people to submit a completed survey by May 31 will receive….” You can limit your financial liability by putting a cap on the number of incentives offered. A deadline creates sense of urgency, and relevant incentives motivate invitees.

Order Questions Logically

Begin with screening questions. These questions will ensure you are surveying a good candidate. After your screening questions, open-ended questions are a good next step. Capture their views in their own words before biasing them with your later questions.

When you get to general questions, use them as the basis for branching off into specific questions dependent upon how they respond. This requires using skip patterns.

After specific questions, you can delve into demographics. Use demographic questions to profile respondents. This will enable you to cross-tabulate and compare subgroups. Place these near the end of the survey as they are tedious and intrusive.

Finally, ask for any final comments about any aspect of the survey or its topic. Ask for permission to follow-up with them about their answers, and prompt them if they have an issue they want to be contacted about.

Write Objective Questions

Poorly worded questions will lead to suspect results and erroneous conclusions. Respondents should not be able to determine where you stand on any topic, so use nonjudgmental wording and choose neutral terms. Don’t ask leading questions such as “What do you like about your service?” but instead ask, “What, if anything, do you like…?”

Shorten the Survey

The shorter the survey, the better the response rate. To simplify surveys, remove questions that don’t directly address the goal of the survey. And ask only the most important questions. A common research tactic is to have three similar questions on a similar topic; just use one.

Close the Feedback Loop

Your respondents contribute because they value their relationship with you and they want to see you improve. Explain what you’re using the data for and share your data with the relevant communities. Identify actions you’re taking as a result of survey. Consider using web seminars, video conferences and meetings to share data. Use this approach to stimulate additional participation and ongoing feedback. 

It feels good to win. And with a solid customer loyalty program, both you and your customers will win. Whether you are looking to create or enhance your own loyalty program, consider the following:

What’s your objective?

The first step in building your loyalty strategy is determining your objectives. Know the business outcome you expect to create. Then, translate that into something customer-centric. Find the ties between your business objective and your customers’ priorities. Those direct ties will likely become the foundation of how your loyalty program will grow and thrive.

Focus on the customer

The best programs, whether aimed at businesses or consumers, are those that engage their customers emotionally. Your customers want to be recognized and rewarded. Rewards can vary from money savings or giveaways to VIP treatment with exclusive offers or privileges.

The better you understand your customer and what ultimately motivates them, the more incentives you can develop (besides money) to drive their behavior. And many of those cost next to nothing.

Keep it simple

Think about the programs you like the best. They don’t require a lot of work. You simply continue to shop, as you normally would, while accumulating points and perks. Problems with loyalty programs arise when 1) you make the customer think too much, 2) you add too many steps to collect the motivation, or 3) you require either math or memory. Keep it simple.

Test your program

Identify a subset of customers to test your program. Don’t just tell them about the program, but try and actually roll it out with the test group. Feedback you get in a focus group or survey will help improve the quality of your program and correct any mistakes before you introduce it to your entire market.

Promote your program

Once tested and approved, you’ll need a stand-alone marketing campaign to build awareness and participation. First, introduce the campaign internally so that every customer-facing team member knows about it and can help promote it. Then, begin your external rollout. Eventually, ongoing marketing of the program to existing customers should become less frequent, less interruptive, and largely via existing communication channels.

Don’t let your existing customers slip away. Call Patterson/Bach Communications today at 407-645-1880 and let us help you get your customer loyalty program underway.

Internet, cable, and phone. Flight, hotel, and car rental. Whopper, fries, and a drink. What do these products and services have in common? They are all among the most recognized examples of product bundling.

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Originally, the Top 10 Scenic Drives in the Northern Rockies existed only as a dream to brand and promote one of the world’s most beautiful destinations. A consortium of area businesses, along with civic and governmental organizations, joined together to make this dream a reality. Patterson/Bach was selected to build the Top 10 Scenic Drives brand identity.

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Internet, cable, and phone. Flight, hotel, and car rental. Whopper, fries, and a drink. What do these products and services have in common? They are all among the most recognized examples of product bundling.

What is Product Bundling?

In marketing, bundling is commonly defined as a selling strategy where two or more products are sold at one price, often at a discount to the customer.

For example, a communications company may choose to offer a cable TV bundle that allows the subscriber to enjoy cable television, local telephone service, and Internet access as a single product offering, rather than having to purchase three different services at a cumulative higher rate.

Benefits of Bundling

Product bundling can save your customers time and money. Rather than having to deal with multiple vendors in order to have access to multiple products, the customer has one central vendor for all his or her needs. This concept of one-stop shopping means the client spends less time keeping up with various vendors, and has one central pipeline when there is a need for customer support.

Companies also benefit from providing various types of bundled packages to their clients. In many cases, the cost and convenience created by product bundling go a long way toward promoting customer loyalty. This makes the client less likely to switch to another company for any of the products or services, especially if the price for the bundle is competitive. Product bundling also gives you more latitude when it comes to pricing. Anytime you eliminate pricing by line item, people can’t shop your price as easily.

How to Bundle

What are some of the considerations that go into developing a product bundling strategy? First, look at unique ways to bundle complementary products. Then, identify customers that would be good candidates, determine product configurations and set a pricing strategy. Also, think about how to advertise the bundling program. Get your sales staff involved and consult your advertising agency early on.

After developing a pricing strategy, you should test it on a sample group to determine whether it has appeal for a wide range of customers.

A company that can provide its customers with hard-to-resist ‘package deals’ will move more product, bring in more money, and attract loyal customers. Contact us today to build your own bundling strategy.

For decades, the only way to spread the news about our products and services was through advertising and public relations. But now our organizations have a tremendous opportunity to publish great content online—content that people want to consume and that they are eager to share with their friends, family, and colleagues.

Whatever you call it—viral, buzz, word-of-mouse, or word-of-blog marketing—having other people tell your story drives action. One person sends it to another, then that person sends it to yet another, and on and on.

The formula for success includes a combination of some great—and cost effective—Web content (a video, blog entry, or interactive tool) that provides valuable information (or is groundbreaking or amazing or hilarious or involves a celebrity), plus a network of people to light the fire and links that make your content very easy to share.

How to launch your own viral marketing campaign using videos and interactive tools:

Tips for Producing & Sharing Video
Ready to try out your production skills and post some hopefully buzz-generating content on YouTube? Here are some things to keep in mind:
• Your video should be no more than three minutes (preferably shorter)
• Go with homemade-quality video to help bring out your personality
• Make it easy for people to share your video with friends, colleagues and family
• Give the video a descriptive and unique title
• Create an accurate and interesting text blurb with keywords and language that people will use when searching for videos like yours
• Try a series of similar videos to build interest (Example: Will It Blend?)
• Develop a contest in which users submit their own video

Tips for Developing Interactive Tools
Widgets Rock! And if you can come up with one that will help people calculate something useful, or makes their lives a little better, or simply entertain them, then you’re on your way. Here are some guidelines that you can apply to your industry-related tools:
• Interactive tools must always be FREE
• Consider building an interactive tool around a specific holiday or promotion
• Allow people to share your widget with others
• Avoid excessive exposure of your company name, product or brand as this may be a turnoff to those viewers who try to avoid advertisements

Tips for Building an Audience
It takes time to build an audience. Here are some tips to speed up the process:
• Create links to your video or interactive tool from your home page, product pages, e-mail or online media room
• Send bloggers a link to the video or interactive tool
• Post comments on other people’s blogs, including a link to your video (make sure you’re on topic and genuinely contributing to the conversation in addition to linking to your video or interactive tool)
• Get your partners to post a link from their existing Web sites or e-newsletters.
• Make the link available on all your active social networking sites like Facebook or Twitter.

Bottom line, successful viral marketing campaigns, along with traditional advertising, can help sell your ideas in a creative way that people want to share with their friends, colleagues, and family members. If you’d like to receive more tips on launching a viral campaign that resonates, please contact us.

Mobile phone use for services beyond voice is at the tipping point of exponential growth in the Unites States. What does this mean for the mobile marketing framework?

The reality is that mobile marketing is not a one-hit wonder, but rather a robust pyramid comprised of several layers that individually and collectively can elevate a brand’s awareness and drive positive consumer action.

SMS Text Messaging
According to CTIA, more than 160 million people in the U.S. are on a text plan and the average age of a “texter” is 38. Taking these numbers into account it should surprise no one to discover that SMS gives brands the greatest reach and taps into the behaviors and interests of millions, all through a simple 160-character message. SMS is a proven mobile-marketing weapon that is driving brand awareness right now.

Mobile Web/WAP Sites
There are more than a billion web sites on the Internet, but only a small percentage has been optimized for viewing on a mobile phone with wireless access protocol (WAP). With more than 172 million phones now capable of browsing the Web, it’s easy to see the value WAP sites bring to your brand. Some of the more popular WAP mobile web sites include USA Today, The Weather Channel, and Yahoo. WAP sites typically focus on news highlights, calendar events, and the like.

Social Networking on a Mobile Phone
Did you know that in one-month alone, comScore reported more than 27 million people accessed a social networking site from their mobile phone? By creating a branded Facebook page or Twitter account, companies can connect with this audience, giving them a chance to engage with the brands they care about, all from their mobile phone.

Mobile Banner Ads
The banner ad has been a core component of online advertising campaigns for years and now is making its mark in the mobile world. Verizon found its mobile banner ad click-though rates to be 2 percent, compared to the .3 percent achieved from the online counterparts.

Mobile Applications (Apps)
Mobile applications will continue to become more pervasive and influential in 2010. As the iPhone App Store continues to grow, others will follow suit. With the BlackBerry App Store, the Google Android Application Store and the upcoming release of the Windows Marketplace for Mobile, mobile applications will have the ability to reach more than the average iPhone user.

Whether your brand taps into one layer or all layers, the opportunities exist to drive your brand to new heights through mobile marketing.

Give us a call and take advantage of our own value-added offer: a free marketing consultation, coffee and bagels on us. Call Tim Bach at 407-645-1880.

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Some believe that the beginning of a great marketing campaign begins with design. Some think it is a great strategy. Others think it is a great offer. I believe that all of these can be part of a truly successful marketing campaign. But one thing I know for sure, without measurable goals and a testing plan, all these beliefs will just be good guesses.

Why should I Test My Marketing Campaigns?

The primary reason for testing is to determine the effectiveness of a campaign. The more you understand what your target audience is responding to, and acting on, the better you will be in developing effective campaigns. However there are many variables that can change what your target audience will react to, therefore ongoing testing is recommended to help predict and develop campaigns that will yield greater results.

How do I test my Marketing Campaigns?

There are many ways to test your marketing campaign from focus groups, keyword based ads to unique URL’s, landing pages and 800 numbers. This should be determined during the development of your marketing strategy and goals.

Example 1 – E-mail Campaign

You are running an e-mail campaign. Split your e-mail list in half and send the same e-mail with two different subject lines, or two different offers, or two different calls-to-action. After a few days look at the data and figure out which subject line, offer, or call-to-action produced the best results. In the next e-mail, split your list again and try two variations of the version that won the last time.

Example 2 – Pay-Per-Click Campaign

You are running a pay-per-click campaign. Each keyword you’re bidding on should have at least two different ad variations going at all times. Get creative and once you see that one of your variations is getting more clicks, turn off the other one and add a new one that varies on the better performing version.

Example 3 – Online Banner Ads

You are running a banner campaign. The campaign will consist of multiple banner designs, on multiple sites, in multiple sections of each site. Tag each banner with a unique ID, drive them to a specific landing page, and measure the click performance all the way through to the goal.

What Type of Marketing Campaigns Should I Test?

With the current tools and technologies you can test just about every type of traditional or non-traditional marketing campaign to determine the effectiveness and return on your investment. The following is a list of some campaign types you can test:

TV Ads

Print Ads

Radio Ads

Direct Mail

Online (PPC/Banners/E-mail)

Coupons

Videos

Web sites

Billboards

Give Patterson/Bach a Test

If you would like improve the effectiveness of your marketing campaign, contact Patterson/Bach.