Reprieve in sight for Spearmint Leaves?

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Reprieve in sight for Spearmint Leaves?

I've heard it more than once.

Client: "Create a campaign that will go viral."

Marketer (witheringly): "It doesn't just happen like that."

Client: "Make it happen."

Meanwhile... in the meeting room of Allen's creative marketing agency a plan was hatched.

A plan so sinister that it would see the public up in arms.

A plan so shocking that it would garner national media coverage.

A plan that would see the ever-professional morning news teams falling over themselves to come up with most ridiculous lolly-related stunts.

A plan that would, most importantly, mobilise the lolly-eating public to lament and share their lolly woes on their social media profiles while rushing out to their local supermarket to stock up on their lolly favourites.

But... before you go and spend your hard-earned lolly, think about this: do you believe everything you read?

While I think Allen's do have every intention of downsizing some of its products including Killer Pythons, Violet Crumbles and Red Skins; this bad news was overshadowed by what was perceived as far worse news: the killing off of the not-so-popular Green Frogs and the old favourite, Spearmint Leaves.

Spearmint Leaves: the staple of Australian Women's Weekly birthday cake decorating. Who will think of the children?

Hands will be wrung, breath will not be freshened and jungle cakes will not be decorated; creating mass public- and social-media-hysteria.

Call me a marketing cynic but I see the possibility of a reprieve in the future of spearmint leaves. Is the axing of spearmint leaves merely a marketing stunt by Allen's Australia?

Perhaps Allen's will play knight-in-shining-armour to their beloved (and newly-engaged) public, laughingly saying they felt compelled to act under the mounting public pressure and that our beloved Spearmint Leaves have earned a reprieve from the lolly chopping block. The Australian lolly-eating public will feel triumphant in their lolly-saving social media engagement.

Perhaps Allen's care not and this truly is the death knell for our beloved Spearmint Leaves (as it does say on their social media page the products were discontinued in 2014?!).

Regardless Allen's have achieved thousands of dollars of free media coverage: a win for Allen's social media and sales teams.

If your brain was a country what would be the capital city?

Wow, my blog has been quiet lately. So quiet, in fact, it’s been rendered mute! Why? Well, to celebrate the winter solstice I left the sunny climes of East Gippsland and headed to Thailand for a well-earned break with my gorgeous family.

Holidays are a wonderful thing. Time to relax and rejuvenate, reflect and re-energise. That’s exactly what our break did for me and I’m back, raring to go, bursting with ideas.

If you’ve never been lucky enough to go to beautiful Thailand, it is an awe-inspiring place. I have been known to say that if my brain were a country, Bangkok would be its capital city. Full of colour, sights, smiles and smells that hit the senses in a full-on assault of heaving humanity. Always surprising, Bangkok moves at a frenetic pace and can be quite overwhelming, just like my mind.

This trip we stayed near Krabi, a stunning locale on the coast. Far away from the madness of Bangkok but still with the ordered chaos I associate with beautiful Thailand. You know the movie The Beach? Well, that’s where we were: heaven on earth.

Don’t think just because I was on holiday I didn’t have my marketing hat on.

I saw some wonderful marketing executions while staying in Thailand; one in particular near Tup Kaek Beach (highly recommended!), a local Italian restaurant marketed itself on a huge billboard at a major intersection as “Probably the best Italian food in Krabi”.

Oh my how I laughed, I wish I’d taken a picture! The most perfectly non-committal copy ever executed.

The thing about Thai business people is they’re not backward in coming forward.

Walking down the street you will be approached many, many times by business owners beseeching you to view their wares, visit their shop, dine on their food and ride in their Tuk Tuk. I could not believe how forthright some people were! I can be reserved even telling people what I do. Let alone grabbing their hand and leading them to my place of work!

And it got me thinking… As a quite unnatural salesperson I’m rather remiss at chasing leads and being forward at promoting my business in conversation. This might surprise you that as a marketing person I’m not a salesperson but sales and marketing are not necessarily homogeneous.

I used to have a job that gave me a rather severe phobia of the phone: if the phone rang it was bad news. Always. And it was always my problem.

Hence I’ve become quite the passive marketer. I put in place my strategies and wait for the clients to come to me. Not very proactive but then I’m quite busy, you see, and haven’t really had space in my life for more clients… Or so I keep telling myself.

Now the universe has given me a precious gift, the gift every businessperson yearns for: more time.

So look out world! I’ve resolved to be active, proactive and reactive. Quite frankly I’ll be downright forthright.

I might even make a phone call! What’s the worse they can say?

“No.”

I read a beautiful quote today (thank you to the team at the Female Entrepreneur Association)

“The only thing standing in between you and your goal is the story you keep telling yourself as to why you can’t achieve it.”

Remember that next time you’re delaying executing your marketing plan. I know I will.

Who's your best customer?

In my line of work I hear (and talk) a lot about target audiences.

The target audience is king. It's who we're talking to when we're doing the marketing talk. It's who we want to motivate to walk when we're doing the marketing walk.

I developed a successful TV/radio campaign last year. Customer numbers (it's a service industry) went up 5% which, when you extrapolate over the market I was in, equalled a lot of people. The client was happy. I was not.

They were the wrong type of people. They were small potatoes. Quantity, not quality. They weren't the people who were going to make the company the most amount of money from the fewest transactions.

Sounds cold, I know, but this is the business I'm in.

I want bums on seats, clicks on mice, eyeballs on screens. I want people to hear/see/read the message and take action but I don't want everybody to do that, just the people who are going to be the most profitable.

It's the very basic tenet of marketing: return on investment (ROI).

So, who is your best customer? Not the most loyal, or the most regular and certainly not the one who bends your ear for 20 minutes only to leave after buying from the bargain bin; or (in my industry) the one who demands full artistic control and myriad changes on a small, one-off job..

Your best customer is the one who represents the highest value for the lowest effort.

While you can make your money with lots of small sales; regular, high value sales are the ones will keep you busy and make you money.

Your best customer who repeatedly buys high value goods/services, is low maintenance and recommends you to their friends!

Define your best customer, write down this definition, draw a picture of that customer and make sure their framed portrait is at your side when you're doing your marketing plan.

After all, you love that person and they mean the world to you and your business.

101 Best and Most Proven Sales and Marketing Ideas

101 Best and Most Proven Sales and Marketing Ideas (best viewed in 800x600 resolution) includes some marketing gems from the last millennium.

I think it demonstrates how far we've come in terms of technology yet it's easy to see how translatable these ideas are in, well, the new millennium (there's a term you haven't heard for about 12 years!).

So, how do you apply these "Marketing 101" ideas to life in the content-driven, social media age?

I've taken some of Mr. Gerry Robert's pearls of wisdom and translated them, post-Y2K.

7. Send Out 35 Sales Letters Every Week Regardless: Get in the habit of sending out at least that many letters to prospects every week. No matter what, make sure they go out every Friday.
These days we call this LinkedIn: find and make connections that will enhance your business. Remember: 35 a week people!

13. Write A Special Report: If you are in selling, you are in solving. What do you solve for people? Write a 10 pages report, offer it to your prospects for Free and your telephone will ring off the wall.
White papers can establish you as a leading thinker in your industry and garner respect from your peers. I don't know if your telephone will ring off the wall but your Twitter might go nuts.

44. Use Pictures: Pictures of satisfied clients go further than lengthy letters. People are visual and if they see people just like them they will think you are Okay.
Ah Pinterest, how I love thee. Instagram too. Pictures speak thousands of words and us humans are highly visual people. Create beautiful images and they will come. Even if you don't work in a particularly visual industry you can repin images relevant to your sector on your Pinterest boards and people will think you are Okay.

45. Create Your Own Marketing Binder: Put any awards you have in the binder along with photos, testimonial, product information, how you do business, your sales presentation and leave it with prospects, so they can evaluate you.
Your company website is the perfect place to post testimonials, awards and other information to demonstrate how awesome you are at what you do. No one is going to do it for you!

65. Instead Of A Letter Send An Audio Cassette: You may have noticed something called the "jam". Instead of writing a letter, speak your letter into a cassette and they will listen to it in their cars in the "jam".
Quality content is much more likely to go viral in video format than on text-only platforms. With Google's Penguin release video will also increase the perceived quality of your website and also move your site further up in Google’s search results. People can watch your videos on the "tube".

66. Get On Everyone's Mailing List: I love to learn from what people send me.
Follow everyone and anyone who is respected in your industry on Twitter. I love to learn from what people Tweet!

76. Position Yourself As An "Expert And Authority": Even if you are new to your industry you can be perceived as an expert. The way to do it is with information. Write something, research something or print something and you are an instant "expert".
Well look at that, I'm an instant expert. Blogging is an amazing way to express your views or post well-researched position papers that will have you looking like an expert in no time.

91. Keep In touch By Fax: Send a weekly or monthly report or newsletter via the fax machine. Send a positive quotation of the day.
Facebook is the "sometimes food" social media platform for many businesses but don't overlook it in your content plan. Be sure to "send a positive quotation of the day" at least once a week.

What's your favourite of Mr Robert's gems? Are there any translations I have overlooked?

[UPDATE: I just found the original publication of this work in the New Straits Times, July 11, 1995.]