3 Marketing Trends To Make Your Business More Competitive

While individuals brainstorm their New Year’s Resolutions, we’re dreaming up how to make businesses better in 2013. Perhaps your company has a great product line but little marketing to spread the word. Or maybe you need to work on your relationships with customers.

Whatever changes you sense are due for your business in 2013, the projected marketing trends for the New Year can make you more competitive. Keep reading for a few suggestions on 2013’s top marketing trends and how to make them work for your business.

At Your Service
Your consumers are finally coming into their own. The ability to voice complaints about major brands on social media or price shop online, demonstrates that consumers now have more power than ever. Instead of dealing with minor or major annoyances about the brands they do business with, consumers can simply move on to another provider.

Make sure that customers never abandon you for something your business can control. Customer service is your chance to develop long-term relationships with loyal customers.

Provide extraordinary customer service and your customers will be far less likely to leave you. Treat customer care as an afterthought, however, and you’ll soon be one too.

Pleased and Pandering
You don’t have to pander to your prospects to persuade them with your marketing. But in 2013 developing technologies makes personalized marketing a must instead of a bonus. Set your company apart with marketing materials that show prospects they’re worth the extra investment.

Develop direct mail pieces that take advantage of customer data. Subtly show that your business and your prospects are perfect for one another by using their personalized information and copy that emphasizes what you have in common.

For example, a baker might mail a piece about a “wedding cake” as an anniversary gift. Save money by only sending the piece to households with married couples.

Upward Mobility
Social media drives sales—mostly it gives happy customers a mouthpiece to recommend their favorite brands to friends. We saw that trend play out this past year.

But 2013 will be the year of mobile commerce. The amount of money consumers spend via their smartphones will absolutely skyrocket in 2013. Take advantage with an upwardly mobile marketing plan.

Create marketing materials that reach prospects at multiple points, then drive them to your mobile website. Print QR codes on your mail pieces, any signs where pedestrians will have access to them and even your business cards.

You don’t have to be a trendy business to develop marketing that’s on-trend in 2013. Prep now—before your competitors do—so that 2013 will be as profitable as December is merry.

NJC Printing provides quality digital and offset printing to businesses in St. Louis, Missouri and throughout the Midwest. Please visit our website at www.NJCPrint.com to learn more about us or to Request An Estimate.

Direct Mail Keeping It Short and Sweet!

Direct mail is an often under-appreciated form of advertising. Let’s face it, our first instinct is to quickly toss it away so we can get on with our day. But direct mail shouldn’t be so quickly discounted in a marketing strategy.

The possibility for direct mail with good response rates is promising, especially because it stands out as different from all the online advertising we now consume. But competition is still tough—in between the other coupons, bills and magazines, people don’t make much time for leisurely mail reading. Keep your message short and sweet to increase the chances of recipients reading your entire mail piece.

And what do recipients’ mail reading habits mean for you? It means you have a couple of seconds (maybe less) to get noticed. So do just that. Here are our favorite tips for creating delightful, must-read direct mail pieces.

A little humor goes a long way. Add some human spark to the voice of your direct mail. Dare to be funny. But don’t let your humor get in the way of the original purpose of your mailing.

Make your offer up front. Don’t make readers dig for the benefit you’re offering—put it up top and prominent. Oh, and make it something of value to your audience. Turn the focus away from your business and back to the prospect.

Direct mail is strongest when partnered up with another form of marketing. Whether that’s a QR code, landing page on your website, or even making a traditional follow-up phone call, don’t rely on a single direct mail piece to do the whole job.

What’s more important than what you’re saying is who you’re saying it to. Make sure you have a reliable list of recipients and that you’re sending to a segment of your audience that will be interested in your offer.
Personalization helps response rates. Consider employing variable text and images based on the information you have about your prospects. If you know their gender, for instance, you can select appropriate photos for either a man or woman.

Follow these tips and your direct mail will have a fighting chance. Channel your inner Godfather and “give them an offer they can’t refuse.” (Sorry, we had to.)

NJC Printing provides quality digital and offset printing to businesses in St. Louis, Missouri and throughout the Midwest. Please visit our website at www.NJCPrint.com to learn more about us or to Request An Estimate.

A Message To Hold On To……. Literally!!

It can be easy to get caught up in the next big digital marketing tool. But how much of this digital marketing do your customers respond to? Although it is indisputable that digital marketing has changed the way businesses market and advertise, studies have shown that consumers still crave the tangible items that you can provide for them. So go ahead and give your customers a message that they’ll hold on to, literally. Here are some reasons you shouldn’t forget about print marketing.

The Old Timer
There must be a reason that physical marketing pieces have worked for so long. As it turns out, there are internal reasons that we love tangible marketing materials, such as direct mail or newsletters.  A recent study by Millward Brown (millwardbrown.com) showed that these physical materials use up emotional processing. And when it comes to memory and brand associations, more emotional processing is essential.

Physical marketing pieces also generate a great brain response connected to internal feelings. More activity occurs in the parts of your brain that generate vivid memories when you are presented with physical materials. That means your customers should connect on a greater level with your physical marketing tools and also remember your materials better than digital marketing.

Let’s Get Real
When you’re at home, you wouldn’t print out a document until you were finished preparing it. And then, when the information is printed on paper it suddenly becomes much more real. Just like this, a tangible item gives your customers a sense of reality that digital marketing can’t give them. Consumers can often skip over or quickly delete items that they are emailed or that pop up on the side of their computer screens. But when the item is placed in front of them, chances are they will take a closer look before deciding whether or not they want to hold on to the information. And if you have designed your materials creatively and effectively, it will be even more difficult for consumers to discard the information.

Time is Money
Companies that take the time to send tangible marketing pieces show consumers a level of caring that they might not get in the digital world. Isn’t it nice these days when you receive a hand written card in the mail, as opposed to an email? Knowing that somebody took the time to actually prepare something for you shows a much greater sense of personalization than an email that you could have sent in a few seconds without hassle. If you took the time to send customers tangible marketing materials, they’ll know that you’re really there to help them with what they need. They’ll feel cared for and you’ll see that your extra time and money pays off in the long run.

NJC Printing provides quality digital and offset printing to businesses in St. Louis, Missouri and throughout the Midwest. Please visit our website at www.NJCPrint.com to learn more about us or to Request An Estimate.

Your Brand in Print….Implementing New Strategies

There is a time for everything in the marketing business. A time to stick with your current marketing strategy, a time to change your plan just a little and a time to try something completely different. The beginning of the year brings an exciting time to implement new strategies that could ultimately improve your company’s bottom line. Here are some ideas to help get your marketing in gear for 2012.

QR Codes
Technology rules the world these days, and consumers want information at their fingertips. QR codes are just that, a quick response code that your clients will love. The small square codes can contain a large amount of information, and anything that you would like to program into them. You can place them on direct mail, business cards, posters and even buildings. In terms of marketing, you can direct customers to a coupon, contact information or a link to a special promotion on your website. The possibilities for creativity are virtually endless.

Personalization
Nobody likes to be treated as just another number. And with variable data, your customers won’t feel like a number at all. Variable data printing allows you to personalize your mailings towards each of your customers. The more information you have on your customers, the more personal you can get. And in today’s social media world, there’s more information to get. This marketing strategy allows you to deliver messages that matter to your customers, meaning they won’t automatically ditch your mail because they find it irrelevant.

Content is King
With all of the information we ever need—and then some—readily available to us online, many think the traditional printed newsletter is dead. Oh, contraire.Consumers are information hungry and a well-produced, quick-read newsletter is just the ticket to keep your brand on your customers’ mind.

NJC Printing provides quality digital and offset printing to businesses in St. Louis, Missouri and throughout the Midwest. Please visit our website at www.NJCPrint.com to learn more about us or to Request An Estimate.