Customized Multi-channel Marketing - hosted by L2

Now that we’ve achieved a ‘critical mass’ of live applications on the new platform, we’re going to start kicking off 2x a week Webex meetings for customers and prospects.  Not salesy or lecturish… my hope is it’s more like a Iron Chef (for marketing software) where customers and prospects come to us with challenges and we show how to put together the ingredients on Fuse and make it happen.

And afterwards Seth Godin will play the role of Alton Brown and tell us how we did. (Okay, we may not have Seth or Alton.. but we’ll hopefully have some of you!)

Stay tuned to the blog to find out more.

We’ve been in business 7 years, developing this platform (Fuse) for over 5 and have dozens of customers with reach into something like 250,000 users via channels.  In some ways we’re huge but running sales we’ve crossed some kind of karma threshold I think.. signing up two new Fuse customers in the same day.  We’ve had multiples in a week but the pace is accelerating nicely!

We’re also on pace to ramp up at least 2 new customers a week for the next month without breaking a sweat, and our larger channel partners are rumbling about large scale opportunities that have been percolating for months… yet, the economy is down?  Postage is going up pushing people away from direct marketing?  Huh…

A really smart guy once described our business as ‘recession proof’ in that when times are good, it makes sense to maximize your marketing dollar by making sure each and every message has as much impact as you can put into it and the time and energy to deliver those messages pay big ROI.. and when times are BAD, it makes sense because every little marketing dollar you spend HAS to have as much impact as possible so your time and effort managing your meager marketing budgets is well spent using Fuse to do just that.

Maybe that’s it?  Or maybe we’ve finally figured out how to simplify our sales pitch down to something people can grasp and run with.  Fuse is a deep, vast, powerful platform of a product and perhaps our new ’slimmer/easier’ approach was the missing piece of the puzzle.

I’m cautious though, because I don’t want to fall victim of the ‘full moon syndrome’ and attribute our successes to recent observations.  Only time will tell.

Still, a nice milestone!

Much of the focus on Software as as Service has been on differences in architecture, setup and implementation with other models like enterprise software or web 2.0. This post is not about these, instead it is about highlighting the "Service" aspect in a SaaS model.

For that I use an anecdote of Toys and batteries:

How often do we find in television commercials, print advertisements, etc. an outstanding advertisement about the newest robots (http://www.robosapienv2online.com/ ), Air Hogs that can battle each other (http://www.airhogs.com/) or even education toys like those by leapfrog (www.leapfrog.com), and at the end of the commercial/ advert, they say "batteries not included!".

Surely, it makes sense to provide 1 set of batteries- a tiny fraction of the cost of the toy/item that goes a long way in increasing customer satisfaction!

Similarly, in Software as a Service, the key to success still lie in service quality. Sure, SaaS makes it cheaper than creating it in-house and more convenient than an enterprise solution, but the main benefit is the quality of service that it affords.

In a business environment that is increasingly competitive, it is still difficult to find a company that provides quality service and support for their customers. Yet this simple act goes a long way to keeping current customers happy, keeping businesses afloat and sales coming in.

Apply the same approach of including the "batteries" to your business in the following ways
- good customer support
- follow-up with your customers after the purchase
- trial offer/ discounts
- free bundled services/software
- could even be that Personalized Birthday Card you send to your clients
- doing things that surprise your customers.

At L2, we’re increasingly adopting this approach of "including the batteries" with lowered pricing for new customers to launch their first personalized marketing campaign with our software and improving our customer service and time to market with existing customers and their campaigns.

And with customer comments like these, it looks like we’re heading in the right direction.

"Your secret sauce is not just your code, it’s Joe and Alan and Lawrence (Operations and Lawrence is our CTO) "

"I have some colleagues that chose another product besides Fuse and while they got alot of marketing and sales attention up front, the post-implementation support has been absent.  It’s not that way with you guys(L2)"

For more on improving customer service

See Joel on Software’s february post with 7 steps to remarkable customer service
http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/customerservice.html

And kevin Eikenberry’s post on how customer relationships can be recession busters
http://www.kevineikenberry.com/blogs/2008/04/customer-relationships-are-recession.asp

I almost feel that with each campaign that marketers send out, they hold their breath and cross their fingers as they wait for responses to come in. Sometimes they get spectacular results, other times they’re disappointed.

This tends to happen to marketers at different ends of the spectrum; bold marketers exploring new concepts, mediums of customer segments and the inexperienced marketer that may not yet know the best way to market their product to their customer segments.

This post outlines some of the strategies that can help marketers reduce this uncertainty over their campaign results and overturn poor campaign results.

1. Lessons are always there for the learning
One step that’s most often overlooked is evaluating the campaign after it is sent. Even with campaigns that do not do as well, there are lessons to be learned. Lessons that allow you to better understand how to target your different market segments, create better messaging.

2. Don’t lose heart as easily
With campaigns that do not perform as well, there’s a great temptation to scratch them altogether and move on to the next one. For some, this might be the right course of action; take the lessons and apply them to a better marketing concept. For others however, the key is not to give up as easily. Perhaps by changing around the focus of the campaign, the results will come.

Poor campaigns could be made more spectacular by maybe
- changing or placing an emphasis on the offer
- Adding personalization to the campaign
- Send reminders to boast the results (In one of our client campaigns, reminder emails with different messages to recipients who had not opened the email or opened but did not click on the links helped improve click-through rates from 8% to about 15%)

3. Remember the basics
With every campaign, remember that the first bases to cover include
- The list (What details you have of your prospects and how to use it)
- The message (Is it consistent with your brand? Is the message targeted to your audience? Is the message interesting?)
- The offer (Is your offer of value to your customers? Is it convincing? Do you need to put a time deadline to the offer to motivate immediate response?)

4. Testing is important
Testing helps you get a good sample of the success you can expect with the campaign. It also gives you the opportunity to iron out any kinks you may not expect in the campaign, the option to change the message to be more effective and make even more targeted offers depending on the response from each customer segment you send the campaign to. When you do this with a smaller, sample list before you send the campaign out to your entire list, you give yourself the chance to greatly improve on the success of your campaign and get the kinds of spectacular results that make marketers heroes.

While marketing is a relatively simple word, the definitions of which are rarely consistent. This post was written for this very purpose, to make understanding personalized marketing simple and outline the various processes that make up a personalized campaign.

Marketers can take heart that creating a personalized marketing campaign involves familiar processes that marketing encompasses; concepts like segmenting, picking the ideal customer, giving prospects choice in how to respond, including an offer as part of a promotion among others. The difference is the approach that personalized marketers use in their marketing.

The ideal prospect

Good marketers will already be selling and promoting themselves to the ideal customer segment, but personalized marketing requires a step further. It involves understanding how each person within this customer segment is different by including generic and industry specific demographic characteristics like:

Generic
- Title
- Gender
- Occupation
- Company Name
- Preferred contact type

Industry specific
- Last vacation spot (Travel Agencies)
- Model of the car they drive (Car Dealers)
- Favorite genre of books (Publishers, Book Sellers)
- Buying behavior (Retailers)

Most companies and organizations will already have the demographic information they need to launch a personalized marketing campaign. Personalized marketing then allows marketers to leverage this data to create a message, look and feel and offer that is customized to each individual.

Giving prospects a choice of how to respond

While some markets are very easy to reach with the right offer; others like campaigns to C-level executives are more difficult. Regardless of which of these categories your marketing falls under, your campaign can benefit from allowing your prospects to respond easily.

Personalized marketing also involves integrating the various channels together in the campaign. When you use a personalized email, attached to a personalized website together with your personalized direct mail and (800) number, you increase the likelihood of your prospect responding to your campaign.

Increased response and ROI

Your prospects are no longer responding to traditional marketing in the way they used to. Competition for their time and attention will increasingly become more competitive and if messages are not tailored to each person’s needs and their ego, they get tossed in the trash.

Personalized marketing on the other hand, fulfils your prospect’s needs to have messages and offers that are focused on them. These messages are more likely to get read and with the right offer are likely to get responses that are important to your lead generation process.

The process of narrowing down your prospect pool to your ideal market segments and then further tailoring the message and offer down to the individual allows you to reap the benefits of targeted marketing; including better responses, higher ROI and more brand recognition.

It is crucial for marketers and managers to focus on not only attracting customers, but lifelong customers. The old cliché, "a penny saved is a penny earned" could also be applied to your customers. After all, gaining new customers is more expensive than retaining the ones you already have. The five steps below will help to improve your customer retention.

Offer a Great Service / Product – This seems like a given, but you aren’t going to retain any kind of customer base by providing sub-standard products or services. Make sure you are worthy of those loyal customers before you set out to attract them.

Put the Customer First – Make your customers the most important priority. This should be standard practice within the company, as you should be training all employees to be respectful and polite when it comes to the customers’ needs.

Offer Specials and Discounts – Customers want to feel like they are getting a great deal, so offer regular specials / discounts to both new and repeat patrons.

Make Yourself Available – While your company may not be able to field calls 24 hours a day, your customer should feel as if you are reachable 24/7. Not only should you offer a customer hotline during manageable hours, you should also be available via email. The latter gives the appearance that you are always on hand.

Answer Complaints Immediately – This could be the most crucial step in retaining a customer. Complaints are to be expected, no matter how well you manage a business. However, it is how you respond and resolve this complaint that will determine if your concerned customers stay loyal. Respond to complaints with the utmost urgency.

Maintaining loyal customers takes a lot of time and commitment, which is why some companies falter in this department. However, this is truly the most cost-effective way to focus your time. A great service and effective marketing campaigns are worthless without successful customer relations.

Heather Johnson is a freelance business, finance and credit writer, as well as a regular contributor for Business Credit Cards, a site for comparing business credit cards. She welcomes questions, comments, and freelancing job inquiries at her email address

On March 11, Peppercom and PRnews released results from a survey of Marketing and PR professionals and generally found limited success with their digital marketing programs and more disappointing that "60% felt they were behind their competitors in terms of digitial initiatives".

We frequently espouse the benefits of having a personalized digital marketing campaign, citing the clear benefits of

• increased campaign response and ROI
• the ability to track responses even to a direct mail campaign
• allow prospects to respond through multi-channel (or cross media) campaigns.

At the same time, we help shape our client/ partners expectations of their digital marketing program, helping them understand that it also involves building up your brand reputation and getting your customers to remember you when they are ready to purchase.

We also understand that the innovative marketer who knows how to leverage the benefits that digital campaigns provide, could find themselves having to convince bosses or colleagues of the same benefits. While it could be a tough job to convince a c-suite executive to commit resources to launching a digital campaign, it certainly is profitable to do so!

For this reason, we have prepared a whitepaper (pending final edits) to help the innovative marketer convince their bosses, marketing colleagues or potential clients of the effectiveness of direct marketing campaigns. We believe it would be of use to advertising agencies, data providers, digital printers and enterprise marketers.

To receive a PDF copy of the white paper, email us at

Any time I catch a company trying to push an Alternate Reality Game (ARG) or manufacture a viral effect of a video or some other stunt, my perception immune system reacts violently and whatever they are selling, even if it were Oxygen in the depths of space, becomes the most vile thing in the world to me.

When someone shares a clever idea or a interesting site for the value they think it holds (not the value they want YOU to perceive), I will give it my attention and if I agree, will share it.

This just happened to me with Twitter.  Seth Grodin blogged about twitter, which I’d heard about before but it got lost in the noise.  What he said was interesting, so I went to twitter.com and watched their video, now I’m looking into what it would take to hire the company that did the video to help us explain Fuse.  I also invited a bunch of friends.. and so it goes.

I’ve started to beat the drum a bit about our new release of Fuse and I have to admit, I really think it’s neat and am a bit like a kid with a new toy.  I want to show all its buttons, features and crazy tricks I can do.  The demos are going great and I’m getting lots of good feedback.

One common bit of feedback from our customers has been, in short and paraphrased a bit, "These new features are great but what we really like is that we know you’ll support us no matter what, to make sure we’re successful with the product".  Some exact quotes were things like "Unless you’re telling me Fuse 6 comes with new people at L2, I’m not worried" and "Your secret sauce is not just your code, it’s Joe and Alan and Lawrence and Paul"(guys in our operations and support team.. and Lawrence is our CTO, but he talks to customers too).

Other noted lines of commentary are "I have some colleagues that chose another product than Fuse and while they got alot of marketing and sales attention up front, the post-implementation support has been absent.  It’s not that way with you guys(L2)".

This is true for a couple of reasons I guess, we’ve built our business model around the idea that we aren’t successful (and don’t make money) unless our customers are successful.  We don’t develop features unless customers are asking for them (mostly) and the most important thing in our day is when customers need us to help win business they are persuing. We LOVE that.

Anyway, so this has been a good reminder for me to appreciate the guys "in the back" more (and I already think they are awesome) and remind customers that we’re here before, during and after the sale to make sure their applications built on Fuse are successful.

If you haven’t seen the press release, it’s posted here.

http://press.web6.l2soft.com

And yeah, it’s a joke.  Gee, I’ll bet I had you fooled too.  While we really, really are releasing a brilliant new UI for Fuse we thought that doing that on April 1 would be silly so I opted for a fake release.

Originally, it was just internal but then I saw some of the responses I was getting and decided to up the ante a bit and send it out to a few friends.  Now it seems to be spreading and the comments are pretty funny too.

Here’s some of my favorites:

"Congratulations, I’ll fool around with it later."

-  From a customer who probably didn’t actually read the press release.  I suspect that’s how a lot of press releases are read.

"ooh saw it.. we actually gonna use the concept for the launch?"

- From a marketing intern who actually thinks this is a good idea.  Funny, though, last night I actually thought about integrating a simple 3d game engine with the Fuse API to send Emails everytime you pressed ‘attack’.  The Fuse API is that flexible, but I also realized the horror I might unleash on the internet if this got out of hand.

"you guys are too funny man…"

- Via IM from a former co-worker… I thought that was it and then…

"wait..is the interface really changed?"

SCORE!

"That is simply Brilliant and hilarious – Great job! I think you have a bit too much time on your hands… J You are a creative guy!!! "