Category Archives: Integrated Marketing

Digital Marketing, Industry News, Integrated Marketing, Traditional Advertising

Establishing a Company Voice

June 24, 2019 glintadv Leave a comment

Speak Your Company Voice There are about 1.7 billion websites on the internet. That is about 1.7 billion businesses that are constantly talking online. However, only about 200 million of those websites are active and many of them are saying the same thing in the same way. That’s why it is so important that companies establish a unique voice and utilize every resource that they can to shout it from the rooftops.

One of the best resources for companies to gain an advantage over the competition is the use of a company voice. This is a term that seems to get thrown around a lot, yet many companies do not fully understand what it means, how to identify one, or how to build their own.

More Than Just Words
A company voice obviously involves the words that are said, but it is so much more than that. The tone of what is said is arguably just as important as the words themselves. Although the words are what delivers the message, the tone is what is used to establish intent and set a company apart from its competitors.

In fact, it was first established by Albert Mehrabian in 1967 that the words that are being said are actually a significantly small portion of communication. He proposed that the act of communication was comprised of three distinct parts: the words being spoken, the tone of the words, and the body language accompanying it. In his system, the words spoken accounted for only 7 percent of meaning, while tone accounted for 30 percent, and the remaining 55 percent was body language.

While this is not a perfect comparison for business today, considering the internet did not exist in 1967, it is still a relatively accurate model of communication. Taking this model into account, trying to base a company voice strictly off of words is not going to get you anywhere. It takes so much more than that, which is why so many companies fail to develop a signature voice.

Identifying a Company Voice
There are many professionals who are likely reading this right now and thinking that it does not apply to them. That might be entirely true, but there is a better chance that your company does not have the voice that you think it does. Here is a great test to figure out whether your company has its own distinct voice or not.

If you go on to your website or social media accounts and cover up the logo of the page and posts, you should be able to show these to someone familiar with the company, and they should immediately be able to tell what company these belong to based on the voice of the content. If they struggle to figure it out or are not able to identify it at all, then there is a good chance that your company is lacking the voice that you thought it had.

Almost just as bad as not having a company voice is having multiple, often conflicting, company voices. This can occur when the company voice is being portrayed by various employees and takes on their own voice rather than the overall company’s. For example, if the tone of the content that can be found on the company website dramatically varies from the tone of content that can be found on its social pages, there is a good chance that the company voice is really just the voices of various employees. This will once again make it hard for people to identify your company based on the voice of the content since there will be no consistency throughout the company’s various online channels.

Finding Yourself
There is a common cliche that you have to learn to love yourself before you can learn to let others love you. Well, a similar thing can be said for the world of business and finding a company voice. There is no way that a company can share a voice with the public if they do not first sit down amongst themselves, and figure out exactly what their voice is.

This process starts with an internal reflection of what makes your company unique and embracing that fact to establish a company voice. This goes far beyond how your company’s products are different from your competitor’s products. It should include things like what is different about the office culture that you have created at your company, how your employees are unique, and how your business practices set you apart. All of these things are part of who your company is and should, therefore, be an integral part of your company’s voice.

When completing this evaluation of your company, it is important to come away with things that are not cliche. After all, this is not someone interviewing for a job, it is a company attempting to establish its unique voice. So it is wise to try and stay away from typical descriptors such as honest, dependable, cutting edge, and revolutionary. Ironically, using these words is anything but cutting edge, since a large portion of businesses will integrate this as part of their voice.

Once your company has completed this exercise and has come away with several important indicators of what makes you unique, it is essential that you write these down and keep them handy for future use. After all, in most companies, the communications will be handled by a designated communications worker, which is likely to see some turnover throughout the years.

As new employees or multiple employees become tasked with handling certain sections of corporate communication, they need to have the tools necessary to be able to display a consistent voice across all platforms. So by having a physical, or rather digital, copy of this voice style guide, these employees can work to make sure that what they are writing up falls in line with the company voice.

Shout It From the Rooftops
Once a company has a concrete idea of what they want their voice to be, it is time to start shouting it from the rooftops so that the public can be introduced to their new voice. Companies should then begin including this voice in everything — the about page on their website, product descriptions, email subscription confirmation messages, voicemail greetings, face to face communication, and more.

Nothing is too small to fall in line with the company voice, since anything that does not match up with this established voice can be confusing to customers. If you need help establishing your voice and aligning it with your brand, Glint is here to help. For more information, email us at agency@glintadv.com or give us a call at 817-616-0320.

Digital Marketing, Industry News, Integrated Marketing, Traditional Advertising, Uncategorized

The Evolution of Consumer Purchase Behavior

April 15, 2019 glintadv Leave a comment

Way back in the year 2010, smartphones had only just started gaining popularity, and the first tablets were being unveiled. The stores that were scattered all across the country were regularly filled with motivated shoppers looking to spend some of their hard earned money. Nowadays, this is a sight that is usually only seen during special events like Black Friday with more and more purchases being made without ever stepping foot inside of a retail store.

While this is not necessarily a bad thing, it is worth taking a look at how consumer purchase behavior has shifted over the last decade.

How Consumers Found Companies a Decade Ago
There were a couple of valuable marketing insights known as the first moment of truth and the second moment of truth. These terms were first coined by P&G almost 15 years ago and were groundbreaking concepts when they first emerged. They referred to the process in which a consumer forms opinions regarding which companies they will develop loyalty towards.

In the world of business, brand loyalty is everything and accounts for an average of 65% of the business that a company gets. Therefore, if a company is not able to develop a close enough link to its customers, then its amount of repeat business will sharply decline.

This first moment of truth occurred when a consumer first encounters a product on a store shelf. They would use their senses to analyze the product and then decide whether or not to purchase it. Once they purchased it and brought it home, they would arrive at the second moment of truth which was determined when the consumer used the product and evaluated its effectiveness.

These two moments of truth would combine to form an opinion of the product, and therefore the brand, in the mind of the consumer. They would then use this opinion to judge whether or not they would continue to use the company’s products or not. With the rise of digital technology, these moments of truth no longer exist in this order.

How Consumers Find Companies Today
Although the first and second moments of truth are still more or less relevant, there is now a moment that occurs before either of those begins. It is what Google deemed the zero moment of truth. Instead of the first experience that a consumer has with a product being when they engage with it in a store, it now starts by looking at a screen.

It is estimated that about 81% of all purchases begin with the consumer doing an online search, which is the zero moment of truth. This means that consumers are researching a product before the retailer even knows they are in the market for it, and they have to evaluate it on a picture and information alone. However, convincing a consumer to consider a product based off of only a picture and some basic information is only a small part of the challenge. The bigger struggle is getting the consumer to engage further with the product your company is offering.

When a consumer does an online search, they are using keywords to try and come up with the results that best relate to what they are interested in. The search engine results page is then presented to them with a list of different companies. If someone’s company is near the bottom of that first page of results, or on another page entirely, then it is very unlikely that it will be considered by the consumer. So even before a company has to worry about winning over the loyalty of a consumer, they have to worry about getting in front of a consumer.

How Consumers Decide Which Company to Choose
As previously mentioned, the end goal of a company is to get the consumer to form loyalty to their brand. A significant component of developing loyalty is being able to trust the company. If a consumer feels like they cannot trust a company in any way, then chances are that they will never have loyalty towards them.

Trust is something that exists on a multitude of levels, so much so that even most consumers do not fully understand how they decide whether or not to trust a company. When it comes to doing anything that is at all risky, such as deciding which company to give their business to, consumers tend to rely more on their intuition than anything else. This can make it tricky for companies to figure out how to best display their website, products, and overall company image.

That does not mean that all hope is lost when it comes to knowing how to develop trust between the company and its consumers. It just means that it will likely require a bit of trial and error. Companies should be putting effort into the obvious factors, such as website security certification and detailed return policies, but they should also be paying attention to less obvious factors as well.

While we have all been told as kids not to judge a book by its cover, that is exactly what many consumers are doing. They took a look at a company’s website for a few seconds and might read a couple of lines of text but are mostly just taking in the aesthetics of it before clicking away. So while having descriptive company and product information is important, the font type, background color, and images used tend to be even more critical.

The Consumerism Power Shift
A decade ago, companies had a much stronger influence over whether or not consumers bought their products and services. Simply plastering their name and image everywhere was usually enough to get a lot of sales. However, in the age of digital technology, that power dynamic has shifted, and it is now in the hands of consumers. Showing up with a decent product is no longer enough to win over the hearts of consumers.

Companies now have to be active about engaging with consumers and finding out what it is that they want to see in a company and product. They should then do their best to reflect those desires in their operations. Consumers are also becoming more able to assess whether or not a company cares about its customers or what it is doing. Therefore, a company cannot be trying to fake passion because consumers will see right through that.

Overcoming this may require making changes to a company’s staff, culture, and brand that can be reinforced by the majority of employees portraying passion around what they do. When an employee is miserable at their job, then it is bound to show up in the work they do. Once that work is put out into a product for consumers to see, they will be able to sense that lack of passion, and it will hurt a company’s chances of getting the sale. So in many ways, earning the business of consumers starts with developing a healthy workplace where employees are happy and have a passion for what they do.

The world of consumerism is an ever-changing one, and just like it has changed over the last decade, it will continue to do so in years to come. If you have questions or need help positioning your product or business, please contact Glint by emailing us at agency@glintadv.com or better yet, give us a call at 817-616-0320.

Digital Marketing, Integrated Marketing

Why Marketing Matters For Co-op Success

October 1, 2018 roman Leave a comment

Co-op Marketing Fort Worth

For many businesspeople, marketing is one of the scariest parts of actually running things on their own. A lot of people become entrepreneurs or rise in a larger business due to their dedication to the niche or type of work, not marketing itself. As a result, there are a lot of unknowns, and as we can see, there are many high-profile marketing blunders that can not only drain your wallet, but cut into your customer base.

But what if there was a way to try and minimize this risk, and find a way to pool resources for advertising that can stand up against the larger names in your niche? What if there was a way to potentially use the audience and name of one of those larger niches to increase your own chances of success? This is the basic principle behind co-op marketing, something that may help get your business to the next level.

The Basics on Co-op Marketing

In essence, the idea behind co-op marketing is a smaller company putting money into an advertising budget, and having that money matched by a corporate partner. One of the biggest examples of this is car dealerships. If a car specializes in a certain carmaker’s offerings, they may get some advertising money from the carmaker themselves. The reasoning from the carmaker is that they have someone out there supporting their brand, so it makes sense to try and put some money their way.

Think of it this way: it’s been proven statistically that there is a growing interest in local advertising as opposed to massive corporate advertising. This is for a number of reasons, from cynicism on the part of the consumers to a basic interest in supporting local businesses. From the larger advertising partner’s perspective, it makes sense to try and financially support a smaller company’s advertising efforts. They still get the sale they want, but target a consumer who may tune out their commercials or radio ads.

There are other common examples of co-op marketing you may see every day without thinking. For example, in a shopping center or mall, you’re likely to see advertisements for each retailer in said center. In addition, they may also put out advertisements in the local newspaper for popular holidays or other times where there’s a significant spike in shopping. Again, this works to the benefit of the larger company. It’s a lot easier to advertise your product to certain groups in certain regions if you have first-hand knowledge of what they like. No one knows this better than local retailers.

Digital Marketing Dallas

Why Bother With Co-op Marketing?

Co-op marketing is a very versatile option, but at this point, we’ve only covered the benefit to the larger companies working with smaller ones. However, the smaller company also sees a variety of different benefits from entering a co-op marketing partnership.

The major benefit, especially for small businesses, is how co-op marketing can drastically reduce the potential money you need to set aside for marketing endeavors. On average, a manufacturer will pay anywhere from 50% to 100% of the cost of placing a local ad. Not only does this allow you to reap the benefits of exposure to a larger audience, but also not have to worry about affecting your cash flow to do so.

Speaking of exposure, this tends to work in two different positive ways for the smaller company. For one, there’s the sheer matter of volume and reach, the fact that more advertising dollars mean that you can put together a more extensive and effective campaign. However, working with a larger brand and having your name associated with theirs also lends an air of legitimacy to your business. The sight of your business’s name next to an internationally known manufacturer is a clear sign of success.

Another way that the smaller businesses benefit is from knowledge and osmosis. Large, global companies pour massive amounts of money into studying advertising and their consumer base in order to get an idea of what they respond to most. This allows the smaller companies a chance to learn some effective strategies for a fraction of the cost.

As a final add-on point, while these are the most common co-op marketing relationships you see, it’s also possible for multiple small businesses to try and band together to do something similar. For example, two non-competitive businesses with a history of working together may pool together advertising money for a campaign which highlights both. The trade is that you don’t have the benefits of the resources of a larger company, but there is more freedom in what you can do, which we will get to in a moment.

Co-op Marketing

The Key To Effective Co-op Marketing

When it comes to co-op marketing, what many people describe as a drawback is the fact that you’ve committed to the advertising standards of whatever entity you choose to work with. This can play out in terms of:

Having a certain standard of advertising quality
Utilizing only a specific type of advertising
Hidden requirements
Limits on what the advertising money provided by the larger entity can be used for

This isn’t always a bad thing. Remember, larger companies make a lot of investment in understanding what works in advertising, so it may behoove you to try and follow their lead. However, no one wants to be caught off-guard, so the first thing you want to do in co-op advertising is getting a clear understanding of the rules with an attorney.

The other important piece of this is making sure that your company’s internal structure is ready to take on the added workload of a proper advertising campaign. Many smaller companies may have a small ad here or there, but it’s a big step up to regularly produce print or web advertising, even if you have the money. Make sure you have the marketing personnel either on staff or hired to do the bulk of the actual planning and formulation.

Another important key is making sure that you have open lines of communication with all the members of your co-op. This is going to be essential for a variety of reasons. For one, you need to be able to understand quickly whether or not your partner approves or does not approve of any advertising material before you send it out. In addition, communication makes it easier for them to give you general advice as needed. However, don’t think that you’re bound to whatever they say. For example, digital marketing is essential for advertising success. If you read or learn about a concept that you think makes sense to use, bring it up. Remember, larger companies want to use the up-close experience their smaller partners have as well.

Because there are several different companies or entities putting their money together for co-op advertising, it’s that much more important that you put together a proper formal strategy that allows everyone to benefit. This means not just recruiting professional help for putting together branding materials, but also at the thought stage. This is where Glint Advertising is so helpful. We understand how advertising has evolved, as well as the mechanisms that drive consumer response. Whether you’re ready to start a campaign or just want a consultation, we are here to help guide you down a path of successful marketing and advertising strategies.

Digital Marketing, Integrated Marketing, Traditional Advertising, Uncategorized

Creative Messaging Is Key To Success

July 3, 2018 glintadv Leave a comment

When it comes to marketing in the online space, it can be easy to get lost in a pile. Think of the digital environment as a community of brick and mortar stores, not unlike what you see outside in the real world every day. In fact, the online shopping industry alone is growing 3x faster than traditional storefronts. Unsurprising, now that about 51% of the population prefer to shop online over visiting a store in-person.

This means we can apply a lot of the same tactics to both areas. A key difference to keep in mind though is that there is a lot more business in the digital community of stores then there are on a street and it is a lot harder to see all the business available in an online environment. This serves as a strong reminder that your competition is a lot larger than may you perceive when you just think of your local competition.

What tends to be the biggest factor of change when moving from physical to digital is not how we engage, but where. This is why you can find so many digital marketing agencies focused on things like behavioral targeting, banner ads, and automation. What most fail to take into account is that these companies are only providing you with where you’ll be shouting your message from, but if your message isn’t engaging, it won’t matter how many places you are displaying it.

The success of your marketing efforts, be it traditional or digital, will come down mostly to the strength of your message, creatives, and content.

Your Key Message and Why It’s So Important
Your key message is one of the most important aspects to consider. The first question you should be asking yourself is what your key message is. Organizations of all types have key messages intended to help them get across why you should use their product or service. While you likely could form a pretty long list around this, it’s best to whittle it down to one key message you want to use to define your business.

Essentially, your key message is what you want to be known for, and this message needs to be consistent across all your marketing materials and brand.

This will provide a certain level of control over how people talk about you, as we give them one simple thing to focus on. Having control of the conversation about your products or services can be invaluable if you push forward a clear and effective message about what you provide.

Tone and Style
As part of a consistent brand and key message, we need to make sure we have established a consistent tone and style. Your tone and style should fit in closely with your key message.

Writing is arguably the most shared form of content. Even if you are running image-heavy campaigns, you will likely find yourself in need of some written work for captions and social media posts. Whether you are writing for your company blog or just updating Twitter, you need to be sure you have the same style and tone all throughout.

Contrary to popular belief, tone and style are not the same things. A style is best applied to short, catchy sentences, great for social media posts. A tone conveys authority, it’s the vibe you give off and the feeling you get when you read something written by someone who knows their stuff. These two things intertwine and will eventually end up creating what we call your voice.

So, does it all matter? Absolutely. We are trying to convey a consistent message and to do that we need a consistent style, tone, and voice as well. They key to a great brand voice is first and foremost consistency, but being creative and different is key to standing out amongst the competition.

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words
If you take a moment to consider what actually makes you click an article, pick a video game, or buy a certain food item, you’ll likely come up with two answers, convincing written copy, like an article headline or catchy phrase that sticks with you, or the visual content associated with it.

Visual content accounts for so much of what your customers will perceive that it is arguably more important than your written content. Having the two work seamlessly together is the makings of a great piece of content.

To do this, we need to keep our images in line with the rest of our message. This means it should match our style, tone, voice and key message. This is going to require us to get pretty creative with our message and find ways to convey it visually.

The key to producing great image content is to focus on these key aspects while keeping your overall brand in mind at all times.

● Capturing the Viewers Attention: Before we can start to convey our message to our target, we need to have their attention. Strong, eye-catching visuals that scream your message are perfect for drawing people into your other content. Afterall, 93% of communication between people is visual and 90% of the information sent to the brain is visual.

● Claiming a Spot in Their Memory: What do you want people to walk away with? If I’ve viewed your ad, what types of things should invoke me to think about it again? The answer to both these questions is found in your key message and brand voice, as we want them to walk away with that being the takeaway point. Creative imagery can be far more effective than body copy for achieving this, as people tend to remember visuals more clearly.

Why Creativity is So Important
Being creative with your brand voice and key message is key to success. In a world where it gets harder and harder to compete and get noticed, you need something to make you stand out. A common mistake is to check out competitors and copy what they are doing, and while this can prove to be valuable, it can also hurt your overall exposure. Being unique is key to standing out amongst the crowd. If you plan your key message creatively, the rest should follow suit much more easily, setting you up to emerge at the end with a truly unique and creative brand that will stand out amongst your competitors, both online and offline. If you can achieve that, you’ll be well on your way to overall success.

None of This Changes Between Digital and Physical
The takeaway here is that no matter where your advertising is operating from, your campaign and business will benefit from creative messaging. We are trying to create a consistent voice and message for our brand, which means it needs to extend to both the online and offline spaces. It doesn’t really matter how targeted your ad is if your brand message is speaking to an entirely different group then you are targeting.

It’s important to distinguish that while digital and physical spaces require different strategies on a whole, your message should remain in use and unchanged. This makes implementing creative messaging into your materials a universal approach for both markets. In short, your message doesn’t change depending on whether you’re online or not, what does change is how you get that message delivered.

If adding a layer of support to your branding, advertising, or marketing would be beneficial, we would love to talk with you. Email us at agency@glintadv.com or better yet, give us a call at 817-616-0320.

Get your Free SEO Audit Right Now

Digital Marketing, Integrated Marketing, Traditional Advertising, Uncategorized

How Traditional Advertising Fits In A Digital World

August 7, 2017 glintadv Leave a comment

Digital Advertising

Ways to Incorporate TV and Print Media into Technology Based Advertising.

When it comes to advertising, maybe you have an antiquated perspective. Don’t be abashed; you invest most of your marketing dollars into traditional forms of advertising like TV commercials, print ads, direct mail, radio spots, and brochures. That’s great, especially if all of these marketing efforts are garnering customers. But like many businesses, traditional advertising may not be as effective as it was for you when you first launched your business. We understand; more than likely you’re not getting as much of a response from your audience as you used to, which may mean that you need to expand your efforts and explore the digital world.

So, you remember a time when people would see your product on TV or in the newspaper and respond to your sales promos immediately. You knew how to get their attention with a powerful image, a catchy slogan and an offer that they couldn’t refuse. That was all it took to draw customers to your product or service. Those were the days when marketing was straightforward and uncomplicated. Now, digital marketing is the medium that businesses are using to catapult them onto a platform where they can be more successful in the marketing world. And if you want to achieve this type of success, you should make it an essential component of your marketing plan; your competition probably most certainly has.

Chances are many of your ideal customers are engaged in the digital age like the rest of the online consumers you’re trying to attract. They’re glued to their mobile phones, tablets and anything with blinking lights, which makes it easier for businesses to attract them on the digital scope.

These days tons of ads are seen via smartphone, facebook, google, digital displays, website banners, viral videos, blogs, and articles, just to name a few. If you want to extend your reach to the infinite amount of customers online that will never see the billboard you just put up, you’ve got to become more connected with digital marketing. We’re not trying to be discouraging; you can continue your traditional marketing campaigns, but be open to merging it with the digital world. If it’s working for you, keep going.

If you’re still a little dubious about the sheer power and influence of digital advertising, you should know that more and more businesses are turning to digital marketing every year. In fact, according to Reuters, marketers spent $72.5 billion on digital advertising in 2016, which is an increase of 22 percent from 2015. Social media platforms like Google and Facebook account for the majority of revenue from digital advertising, and they don’t seem to be slowing down.

Google and Facebook are responsible for the surge in growth of digital advertising, which has digital companies scrambling for the advertising dollars that businesses are willing to spend in the digital world.

For companies that are making the transition from traditional advertising to digital advertising, video is a medium that most use to convey their message. If you notice, the next time you look at a YouTube video, you may have to watch a commercial at the beginning of the video or at intermittent times while the video is playing. What a way to combine traditional with digital!

Now, just because businesses are using digital platforms to display their advertisements doesn’t mean that they’re acquiring customers at record speed. An interesting ad may catch their eye for a few seconds, but if no emotional connection is made, a sale is probably not likely

Digital marketing has shifted the way people perceive advertisements. They’re familiar with the antics that advertisers used on the unassuming customer decades ago. So, you can’t be too blunt, phony, too provocative or sneaky by recycling an old campaign you thought no one would remember. Ads have to draw potential customers in based on what that customer is likely to purchase. If businesses are willing to engage with people, the business will have a better way of understanding what the customer wants and how they are likely to respond.

That’s what’s so amazing about the digital universe; you can measure your impact on your audience by the immediate responses you may get to your advertisements, videos, and posts. Getting feedback and questions about your product will give you a better idea of what will prompt them to buy. Beware of those comments though; they can be brutal. Just be level headed about it. You’ll recover. The main thing is that you don’t give up and that you keep improving.

Remember, every day the consumer is overloaded with brand advertisements that want them to buy their products. So, get ready for the challenge; the competition is fierce! Your objective is to use the digital world to get into their minds, so you’ll know how to convert them into customers.

The traditional advertising that you do through broadcast and print media can now be used with digital ads and content that you create and put online. By doing this, the consumer can find you through organic and paid searches or even stumble across an article you wrote. Keep your social media engaging, and they’ll find you on the popular social networks.

Once they understand your brand, a trust can develop and who knows! Perhaps then, this prospect will make a purchase. For more information on integrating your brand with traditional and digital, visit us at www.glintadv.com or give us a call at 817-616-0320.