Zephyr Marketing

Seth Godin wonders how much it should cost to receive “nice” service. It seems to me the fundamental issue has to do with how you deliver service. Is it because you feel you “have to”? The pizza delivery was 25 minutes late last night. The delivery guy came to the door with no apologies, just with the bill - and the food. I know he felt this was a job he had to do. But what if he had the attitude to look at it like it’s something he “gets to” do? How much better could his service be? Could he have called ahead to say he was running late? Could he have offered a discount or something of value to me on my next order? Could he have tried to take his service to the next level - beyond have to and more towards this is something I get to do, and I’m going to do it better than average, better than minimum standards, better than the next guy?

When we stop doing things with a “have to” and start performing a service with a “get to” we might be on to something - extraordinary.

Listening to NFL football via the NFL Field Pass Audio service kind of sucks for a couple of reasons. There’s been a bunch of unexplained audio drop outs right in the middle of a play-by-play call. Also, because they don’t broadcast commercials, they pipe in insidious musac. I swear there’s more breaks, timeouts, commercials than there is actual game.

I do have to give them credit though for the web interface that shows play-by-play and stats as it happens. The visual is pretty much in synch with the audio too. Nice. Ooops, here we go again, another break in the action, another replay of the musac. Argggghhh!

My email got spammed today by Promotion-N-Motion…picture this. Your business is now on fire with all the “traffic” you’re getting by sign peddlers. I can’t figure out if this is remarkable or just plain annoying! If I saw one barreling by I’d probably give it  look, and a laugh? Would I be grinning at the remarkable ingenuity or how ridiculous this seems? Yeah…I think I’ll pass.

 Are you curious about how stuff works? Interested in how best to leverage and get the most out of the tools, applications and solutions that are out there? If so, you may find this feature useful.

I want to tell you about a very cool and cost effective feature Constant Contact has recently added to their email marketing service called, Email Campaign Archive. For just $5 more a month you can add this service to your email marketing program. Email Campaign Archive allows you to essentially save a copy of your published eNewsletters, Announcements, Press Releases - or whatever you send out from Constant Contact, and archive them on a page you can integrate in with your website!With a little effort in customizing the look and feel of your archive menu page, you can have it look like it’s part of your website’s design. To see an example of this, click on the link below which will take you to a page on a website I created for a community service organization:

Click to view an example Email Campaign Archive solution integrated with an organization’s website.

 Email Campaign Archive is a great way to give your communications a longer life and make them available long after their initial release.

Are you thinking about building a new website - or launching a new company, service or product line but don’t know how to go about it? We typically start by brainstorming a list of names. We hope to stumble upon something as clever, catchy and successful as “Google”, or “Coca-Cola.” We gravitate to names that are intensely personal or meaningful - to us. But, will it have meaning to the niche market we hope to attract?Harry Beckwith wrote a book called, “The Invisible Touch.” In it he outlines what he calls, “The Four Keys to Modern Marketing.” Key #2: Brand. Here’s a list of some concepts we can think about when it comes time to picking a name, a brand:

• A brand does not merely attract clients, it convinces clients that they got just what the brand promised.
• What attractive and desirable qualities should my brand embody?
• Choose a name that is unique, sensory, creative and outstanding (e.g. Red Pepper).
• Look for a name that makes the prospect, not you, sound important.
• The more commonplace you sound, the less interest you will attract.
• Say your name out loud, and listen very carefully.
• Keep your name short - eleven letters or four syllables max.

One more thing to add to Mr. Beckwith’s discussion: Look for a name you’d like to see at the top of the search engine results. Learn to think like your ideal customer thinks. What’s important to them? What are their needs? What are they looking for? Have keyword research done that will show you how effective your name can potentially be in being visible in the Search Engine results, AND your target market. Now, your domain name alone won’t bring you to the top, but it’s a great starting point from which to build everything else upon: Title and Description Tags, Web Content, File Names, etc. 

I recently completed some Search Engine Optimization (SEO) training. One short statement in the course stood out with respect to the site URL: “Include the keywords (that your target market is searching for) in the URL, short and meaningful.” Think about making your URL part of, or the same as your company name, your brand. And, as we learn from Mr. Beckwith: Make it your domain. Own it. Be it.

Related Link: Search Engine Optimization: Four Vital Steps for Optimizing Your Website