Archive for March, 2008

Small products that change our lives

Every once in a while a product comes out that is so simple but so ingenius that I can’t help but marvel at how I lived without it! This is exactly what I think everytime Roboform goes to work. So, I felt it was my duty to share this product with you.

If you’re like me, you have at least 20 different websites you go to each day that have a required login and password to get onto the site. Now, for most of us, we use the same login information and password for most of them, but sometimes that isn’t possible (requires a certain number of letters, numbers, etc). Often we can memorize the passwords that we use all the time. But, I have over 100 websites that I have login and passwords for. I can’t remember all of them…and I wouldn’t want to try! So, we create a document (or use an ewallet) that stores all of that information so we have it on hand when we need it.  But, you still have to go look it up! What if your computer could remember it?

Or, what about all those forms that ask for your name, email, phone number, etc just to download a document or to request more information?  Or order forms? They realistically don’t take that long to fill in, but why waste your time?What if you had a way to only type it once and your computer could remember it?

Roboform to the rescue!! Roboform is a software that you install into your computer, and works in your internet browser as a storage and filling program.

For example, when you go to Yahoo! and enter your username and password, Roboform pops up with a screen that allows you to store the information and then next time you go, there is a button at the top of your browser that says ‘Yahoo!’, you jus click it, and it enters the login information for you. You can organize your logins in folders just like your favorites and make it easy to find just what you are looking for. You can also select the website you want to go to through your Roboform, so no more remembering those 100 website addresses either…it keeps it all for you (and keeps it organized!)

Then, they have a great form section. You go into the form and enter in all of your information. It stores it all for you. When you go to a website that asks for form information you click on your form filler button and it fills the correct information into the appropriate spaces. It makes it so simple it’s scary!

In all honesty, this program isn’t going to really save my life, but the amount of time it saves me from looking up passwords and entering forms certainly seems like saving me a lifetime! Check it out, what do you have to lose? They have a free trial!

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Ballet Dancing and Tornado Marketing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOqxSaW05p4

I watched this video a while ago and I was absolutely awestruck. The flexibility, strength and beauty of these performers can make anyone feel out of shape! (Especially those of us who keep meaning to get into an exercise routine…work always seems to get in the way! But, what struck me even more was the dedication that it takes to be able to perform at this level. And, how many other ballet dancers there are in the world that work extremely hard, but would never reach this level and can only watch, dream, and keep trying. In one fell swoop, this video was one of the most inspirational and frustrating things to watch. It is inspirational knowing that when you work hard (ridiculously hard) you can achieve greatness. But it also made me frustrated, thinking about all of the other dancers that work every day of their lives to be like the performers in this video and will never make it.

Then, I started thinking about how that relates to business (yes, almost everything can be brought back around to business). Think about how much time, energy and effort goes into your business. But, just like those who watch and dream about being these dancers, there is always going to be someone better than you. Even if you put every ounce of your effort in, there is always going to be someone able to put in more time, more money, or have more natural talent. This is obviously a frustrating reality to accept, but I feel that it gives us a motivation to continue to work harder.

Now, it’s Friday, so I would NEVER think to leave a post on a bad note, so here’s the silver lining: Just because there is someone out there that is considered the ‘best’ doesn’t mean your effort is worth any less. Yes, these dancers are some of the best (if not the best) in their field, but there are also hundreds of other dance companies that are successful doing the same thing. For us, this means that just because there are thousands of marketing companies that are successful, doesn’t make us any less successful, it just gives us something to strive for.

My suggestion? Pick someone that you think is better than you at something that you want to be better at and ask them how they got there. No one knows better how to succeed than someone who has succeeded.

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The space shuttle has landed!

Sixteen days ago, I was in Florida at Microsoft’s Convergence, watching with friends, clients and colleagues as the space shuttle began its fiery launch into orbit. Even with cloud cover, the shuttle launch was an amazing sight! Today the space shuttle landed, and that started me thinking about our marketing mission-critical items.

Kirsten and I flew back from Convergence to help the Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce promote the upcoming Small Business Expo. Both of these events – the OC Mixer and Convergence – were a significant investment for the people exhibiting at the shows. If you were at these events, have you done your follow up?

Did you know 80% of tradeshow leads are never followed up on? That’s crazy! It’s like throwing away 80% of your marketing budget! I’ve had experiences where I’ve talked to people for 10 minutes because I’m EXTREMELY INTERESTED in what they’re selling – and the company STILL didn’t follow up. What’s up with that?

The problem is two-fold: First, there has to be an organized plan, set up in advance, that determines who will follow up and how. Email? Phone calls? Second, companies need to take notes and separate their prospects into stack-ranked leads – a simple A, B, or C scribbled on the back of a business card will do. To be effective at tradeshow and network marketing, you absolutely, positively MUST separate the hot prospects from the goodie grabbers. Your goodie grabbers might easily take up your offer to buy them a cup of coffee or a free lunch – further wasting your time and money while your hot prospects are wondering why you never called.

Take a cue from NASA and the space program. Prepare. Plan. Know what’s next. The phrase “Mission Critical” has become part of our business jargon, but it needs to part of our business reality. If marketing is mission-critical to your business, make sure you think through - and follow through on - your entire marketing strategy.

What are your tips for successful, timely tradeshow and networking event follow up? Do you have a business card scanner? How do you separate your message from the other 100 exhibitors? One of my personal favorite strategies is to send hand-written, snail-mail delivered cards to the A prospects.

Post your suggestions here!

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Examine your images

Images: the things we place on our websites, marketing pieces, blogs, etc… are supposed to symbolize the idea that we are trying to explain. Sounds like a pretty easy thing to do, right? Well, from experience and vsiting lots of websites, apparently it isn’t! The pictures you choose for your marketing must create the same ideas, responses and emotions that the wording does, otherwise, why put the picture there at all?

 For example, pulling from our website (www.tornadomktg.com), the first paragraph looks like this:

I’m Adrianne Machina. I started Tornado Marketing to serve the marketing needs of small businesses, especially those in technology consulting. During my 15-year career, I’ve met many business owners and executives who are amazingly technically competent and business savvy, but they struggle with marketing. Marketing is a fundamental part of business success. The best product (or service provider) rarely wins. It’s the provider who is perceived as being the best fit who wins — and that’s marketing! Tornado Marketing can help your business get GROWING!

Although this is a very basic example, the image fits exactly what we are conveying. The picture is of Adrianne Machina (me) and the paragraph is about Adrianne Machina (me).

Good news!

There is an easy way to test your images to make sure that they are portraying what you want. Gather a group of friends together (people that you trust to give you their honest opinion about the pictures). Then, put out 4-5 of the pictures you were thinking about using for your marketing piece. Have them give you a description of what is going on in the picture or what feeling it evokes. You might be surprised at the answer people give you!

Lets take an image:

Now…leave a comment and tell us what you think the image is portraying or what you might use it for (type of ad, product, etc). We will see what the results are, and that will give you an idea of how one image can be seen in so many different ways….

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Talking to your customer – in a way they’ll understand

If you are sending a marketing piece to the IT guys, an email to the Sales Team and calling the CEO, do you change your tone of voice and word choice? If you aren’t, your message might not be as clear as you would like. Even if you are trying to say the same thing to all 3 people, you may not be able to say it the same way.

For example, an IT guy is not going to have the same worry points as the CEO when it comes to website design software. The IT guy wants to know that it is easy to use, going to take a minimal amount of time to learn how to use it and is going to make him look good. The CEO wants software that is inexpensive but also creates an amazing website for the company. So, if you were marketing this product, you would have to craft 2 entirely unique messages. For example:

“ZYX website design software – simple, effective and powerful.” (to the IT guy)

“ZYX website design software – affordable, but no one would know from looking at your website!” (to the CEO)

Now obviously, neither of these are great, but you get the idea. The first one (to the IT guy) targets his worries (easy and powerful). Whereas the second (to the CEO) targets his worry of cost efficient but well done. If you create the right message to the right target, your success ratio will be much higher.

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Spring Cleaning

Seeing as today is the first day of spring, I felt that it was a great time to talk about spring cleaning!

We spent yesterday doing some spring cleaning at Tornado Marketing, it had gotten a little messy and disorganized from our trip and all of the things we have on our plates. We were getting caught up in all the ’stuff’ and were losing track of the most important tasks. I believe that spring cleaning is absolutely neccessary to make sure that your physical space and your mental space are set up for being productive. When there is a lot of clutter (around you or in your head) it makes it difficult to separate out what needs to be done, and what really is just ‘clutter’. The great thing is, spring cleaning doesn’t have to take a lot of time to get a big reward. Here are my steps to a quick and efficient spring cleaning.

1. Put on some good music: it’s no fun to clean unless you have either someone to talk to and work with or good music to listen to. This will also help you clear your head! ( i like 80’s rock and country…it’s upbeat and fun to listen to)

2. Create a pile of important papers: This isn’t the time to read them or try to work on them, if they look important put it in the pile and then put the pile aside, you can come back to it (remember, try to only keep the really important papers in this pile)

3. Create a file of maybe’s: If you haven’t used it recently but know that it has importance to something you’re working on or want to be doing, put it in this pile (c’mon….are you really going to need 3 copies of the same article?)

4. Get a big plastic bag: if it isn’t in the important or maybe pile, throw it away. Also, throw away the pens that stopped working, the cd cases with no cd’s, all the junk that you’ve gathered from daily working… (you can do it, i know you can)

5. Clear off everything from your desk: except your computer, a pad of paper and your important paper pile. Then go through the important papers and create 3 files. File them where they should go; Today, Tomorrow or Next week, then focus on them in that order.

These 5 steps will help you to clear out all the paperwork clutter. Just a couple hours of effort and cleaning and we are ready and raring to go.

It’s amazing what something so simple can do!

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Small Business Essentials Expo

 We are excited to announce that we are partnering with Microsoft and Data Resolutions to host an amazing small business seminar. We are one of the keynote speakers and will be talking about Tornado Marketing and the top tips and tricks to make it more efficient and beneficial for your company. The event will be held April 23rd at the Irvine Spectrum Movie theatre. The event is free to attendees, and there are still spots available for sponsorship.

Want more information? Want to register?

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Creativity

Creativity is an absolute requirement of EVERY small business. You cannot succeed in business if you are not creative in how you market your business. Creativity can help you to generate leads, referrals and the ever popular word of mouth.

What is better than having people talk about how amazing you and your service are without having to ask them to?

John Jantsch wrote a great post about creativity and referrals, so I thought that I would pass it along.

To see the entire post, click here

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If you don’t know where you’re going, how will you ever get there?

If you are going somewhere that you’ve never been, you usually try to plan a route first, right? Some of you may use your in car GPS, a handheld map or your favorite map site (MapQuest, Google maps, etc). But, however we do it; most of us plan where we are headed.

Now, when you look at the future of your business (unless you have a Delorian going 80) you don’t know where you’re going. So, wouldn’t it make sense to create a map to plan this route as well?

In business, your road map is your goals; daily, weekly, monthly, yearly and long term (5+ years). If you don’t know what your goals are, how do you know what roads to take? How do you know when to slow down, speed up, or if you’re headed in the wrong direction? We can’t be expected to just start driving and hope that we get somewhere. We must know that at the end of the day, we took the turns that will bring us closer to our destination. This means that we all need to know our goals, where we want to be and how to get there. We must create our own road map to succeed in our business.

One final note, as in any map, if you miss a turn, it’s not the end of the journey. There is always a way to get to your destination. It may just not be the quickest, the shortest or the way you initially planned. Remember, just keep going!

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Back in town from Microsoft Convergence 2008

Good Afternoon!

It is great to be back in California!

Tornado Marketing just spent the most amazing 4 days in Orlando, FL at Microsoft Convergence 2008. During the conference, we got to sit down and listen to some amazing speakers. They covered everything from where Microsoft Dynamics software is headed to top marketing tips. We met so many great people, with great advice that we are excited to pass on to our readers! We had an amazing, but exhausting, trip. We are going to need a couple days just to get everything down on paper! Stay tuned as we turn what we learned into posts for you to check out…

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