3 Last Minute Tips to Turbo-Boost Your Business Leads and Sales

Many companies use the calendar year (January to December) as their business year end. But even if your company’s fiscal year ends during a mid-point within the calendar year, it’s still beneficial to take advantage of some last minute marketing strategies for December (and extend them into January) that are sure to turbo boost your year end leads and sales.

As this year draws to a close, consumers are opening up their wallets and purses more than any other time of the year. Businesses are also looking for ways to use up the last of their budgeting allowance, for fear that if they don’t use it, they could potentially lose it when next year’s budget is developed and “unnecessary” – meaning unused funds are reallocated elsewhere. In other words, both B2B and B2C scenarios are looking to spend right now. That means you’ll want to locate any additional funds you can spare to pour into effective marketing campaigns now, to escalate your sales and give your company one final boost for higher year end results. Last year in the USA alone, Christmas shoppers spent more than $8 billion dollars in sales during the holiday season. Canada wasn’t far behind. Wouldn’t it be nice if your company could capitalize on some of that juicy spending?

If you are a savvy business owner or manager, you already have a marketing plan in place that ramps up during the Christmas and holiday season (and if you don’t, then you’d better watch out! You may even get added to the naughty list for having missed such a critical, income generating season). If you do have a marketing plan in place, then good for you. Keep doing what you’re doing. That still doesn’t mean that enhancing your current marketing plan through leveraging some additional, proven digital marketing tactics won’t skyrocket your sales from good > to great > to amazing during this buying frenzy season.
Start by reviewing your budgets and spends across your departments to identify any unused funds that may be reallocated towards additional year-end marketing. Once you locate any unspent funds you have floating around other departments, use them on additional campaigns to pump up your marketing efforts during December and January.

Tip 1: the gift that keeps on giving (while increasing your bottom line profits)

Think about ways you can offer gift certificates or gift cards with pre-paid dollar amounts. ABC News reported that only 85% of gift cards are redeemed within the first 60 days, while Marketwatch stated that $1 BILLION of gift cards go un-redeemed each year. Therefore, offering gift cards is not only an excellent way to spike year-end sales, but making gift cards available to your clients as gift-giving options has proven to be a lucrative way to actually increase the bottom-line profit margin of your profits. Why? Because there is never a case where 100% of all gift cards old are redeemed. Some are lost, others stolen, and others just don’t get used for no reason at all. And, those customers who do choose to redeem their gift cards present an excellent opportunity for cross-sells and up-sells. Of course, if you do decide to use gift cards, be sure you have a strong marketing plan in place that gets those cards in front of your target market quickly. The old ‘build it and they will come’ mentality does not work for marketing websites, products or services. You have to know who your customers are and study their buying habits to understand where they shop, what they buy, and their price points. Only then can you position your gift cards as convenient, irresistible offers that they cannot refuse.

Tip 2: Irresistible offers – Be the bargain they can’t resist!

Consumers are always looking for bargains. Whether your organization is business to consumer model (B2C) or business to business (B2B), this is the time of you to offer special incentives to get them in the door. Think about how you can package samples or trials of your products or services at a lesser cost than the full option.  It’s important to note however that, unless you are in the travel industry that typically offloads unused, last minute vacation packages, this marketing tactic is something that your company should only be using sparingly, once or twice a year. This will allow you to maintain the exclusiveness of the offer and the integrity of the business. You can ever offer a limited time deal with “last year’s prices”, a free gift with purchase, “Free Shipping” or another incentive to help entice buying.

Tip 3: Don’t provide the solution – BE a part of the solution!

For companies with fiscal year ends in December, this is the time to begin developing new budgets for the oncoming year. But you don’t have to lie down and wait a month or two (or more) for those budgets to be developed before you can start selling your awesome products and services to them. The budget planning stage is the perfect time to get in the door. Offer your expertise in helping potential new clients to develop their budget from the ground up, by looking at the current state of the organization and identifying any gaps that your products and services can help to fill in the new year. Not only can you consult your way into gaining new business, this strategy will also insure that your costs will be covered because they will be worked into the budget.

Bonus Tip – a juicy marketing morsel to start your new year off right!

One final note… when looking ahead to the new year, be sure to take a look at your overall marketing spend for the current year. You will want to assess your plan to determine whether or not you have received adequate return on your investment. When done correctly, marketing should not be a cost to your business but rather, an investment. In other words, the revenue generated from your marketing should be higher than your marketing spend. You will also want to review each marketing tactic in the plan to see which tactics reaped the highest ROI, so you know which tactics to replace or pump up in the year ahead.
Using these 3 simple tips – and the bonus tip will surely TURBO-BOOST your year-end sales and help you start your new year off, on the right foot.

8 Simple Rules of Marketing Psychology

Which boat would you buy – and why?

When it comes to marketing your products or services, knowing what makes people buy and why can have a monumental impact on the success of your marketing and advertising campaigns. Here are 8 simple rules that you can incorporate into your sales and marketing strategy to improve customer engagement and increase your total sales.

1. FACE IT! Pareidolia is the psychological term that describes seeing a human face in a random object or image (like seeing the man in the moon or the image of Virgin Mary burned into a grilled cheese sandwich that scored $28,000 on eBay). Ads showing people’s faces outperform product-only ads better than 3:1 because we’re hardwired for it.

2. Getting to know your target customer (who they are: age, sex, profession, education, hobbies, interests, dreams, fears) allows you to align and focus your campaigns exclusively that speak to them. People want to feel like you know them, like them, and are talking to them. That’s how Cosmo took a dead magazine into a billion dollar enterprise.

3. People buy for emotional reasons (joy, happiness, envy, lust, greed, fear, etc.); so your ads must trigger an emotional response in them. Use visuals (pictures and videos, preferably that show the faces of people enjoying your products) to help stir up that emotion. You want them to SEE the emotions of other people who are loving your products (refer to #1).

4. Functional specs (height, size, capacity, etc.) are needed in your sales arsenal but it’s the benefits (prestige, fun with friends, wind in your hair, “chick magnet”) that will sell the product.  Professional copywriters should know how to incorporate both into a successful ad.

5. Make it personal (say “you” instead of “it”, “them” or “they”) and use words like ‘imagine’ that puts them behind the steering wheel in their own mind.  “Imagine the wind blowing through your hair as your soak in the warmth of the hot sun, cooled only by a light spray of ocean mist…” can you feel it?

6. Knowing their objections up front (ie: no place to store it) allows you to proactively solve any doubts (6 months free boat storage with every purchase) before they arise. The more time they have to object to buying, the more likely they will talk themselves out of the purchase. However, if their objections are addressed right within the marketing itself, they won’t be able to come up with any reasons not to buy from you. This is why the “impulse buy philosophy” (like the chocolate bars, gum and magazines we add onto our orders while in line at the grocery store) is so successful.

7. Add-ons (which can lead to up-sells) can be less expensive and more effective than knocking a few dollars off the listed price of the main sale. The bottom line here is that your customers want to walk away feeling like they are special and have scored the best deal of the day – so make them feel like they are and give them a deal you’ll both be happy with.

8. Don’t take it personally. Sometimes what you think is a great ad will flop. Your marketing needs feel like it’s personal; at least to your customers but the recipe for a successful campaign is not made of hopes and feel-goods. A successful marketing campaign is a combination of research, analytics, and skill using the science of persuasion.  Targeted market research, combined with split tests, along with polls, focus groups and surveys can save you thousands of dollars by reducing advertising duds while increasing the overall effectiveness of your ads.

Social Media Marketing Roadmap

Infographics – what they are, where to use them and why you should

What they are: An infographic (or infograph) is simply a term used for information that is depicted in a visual, graphical way.

Similarly to catalogues, which are necessary for retail driven companies to showcase the products they sell, infographics are a great way to showcase services and processes in an “at a glance” manner.

Leveraging Content Management

If you’ve been working on the internet for any length of time, you must have heard the expression that “content is king”. This is true because having fresh content posted regularly to your website and social media channels will improve your page rank (PR) and subsequently, your chances of being found on the internet. But continuously trying to create original content can be challenging.

So let’s make it simple! If you’ve written a great article, interview, have a great sales PowerPoint presentation deck, or other piece of marketing, sales or communications information, there is no reason why you shouldn’t re-purpose your content. In fact, doing so will save you time, energy, and cost, as well as support your brand with a common look, feel and message across all your online channels.

The infographic here details how you can take one piece of great content and leverage it across other social media and internet channels (and print too!).

And when you are creating your various marketing collateral from your one great piece of information, don’t forget to create an infographic too!

Until next time, stay social.

Sally