Category Archive :Integrated Marketing

What happens to all those professionals who lose their jobs as marketing services teams disappear?

It’s something I thought about as I reread a post of mine from last year. I wrote then about how companies, particularly CPG companies, are getting rid of their in-house marketing services teams, and I recommended ways for companies to better manage without those teams.  This time I want to focus on all of those marketing services professionals who find themselves looking in the mirror and wondering where their careers went.

Read More

This is Part One of a two-part post.

The phone rings.  You look at the number and don’t recognize it.  You are desperately trying to finish a presentation your boss wants by tomorrow.  You decide to let the call go to voicemail.  At 5:35 p.m., you finally find time to listen to all 12 messages, but really are ready to go home.

Read More

Keys to Developing a Successful Sampling Campaign

Sampling is an important tactic within marketing and there are a variety of sampling types and vehicles you can use to distribute your product to a target audience.  Additionally, there are many times within a product’s lifecycle that you may want to sample, including a new product launch, trial to a new or expanded target audience, as a sales incentive with a retailer, to name just a few.  However, sampling programs are a not one-size-fits-all proposition and each brand team should approach their plan through a customized lens that looks at who is your target, where do you find them, how big is your budget and how are you measuring success?  Sampling also should be approached as an integrated effort and not just a standalone tactic.  It works best when supported by a larger marketing communications plan.

Read More

Recently I was catching up with a former agency partner and we got into a conversation revolving around two specific points:  1) The ability of midsize agencies to survive in these tough times; and 2) How to grow the business at a particular client who has never retained an agency or spent consistently.  In my friend’s case, it was the area of PR.  This conversation made me realize that often agencies do not understand how their clients think.  The answers to both of his concerns lay in better understanding client motivations and spending.

Read More

Making Lemonade Out of Lemons” Turning a Potential PR Disaster into a Great Consumer Promotion

In my previous post (click here to read Part I) I talked about the perils of a celebrity endorsement, using Gilbert Gottfried as the voice of the Aflac duck as a jumping off point.  In this post I am going to look at how Aflac found a way to create a terrific consumer promotion in the aftermath of the PR problems Mr. Gottfried created by his horrendous comments following the Japan earthquake and tsunami.

Read More