by tradespeopleinsights | Nov 23, 2010 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Trends, Traditional Marketing
B-to-B Marketers need to take advantage of every marketing tool, especially if your target market is the professional tradesman. Most of these folks are on the move and depend on their cell phone, not only to stay in touch, but to get valuable info that will help them do their job. One tool for mobile smart phones that probably is overlooked is the QR code.
More and more these days, we are seeing the use of QR codes in the consumer market. But QR codes are fairly new to arrive in the business-to-business sector. Since we see these as a great way to build a bridge between print and online presence, we thought we would take the guesswork out of these strange little codes.
Today Aylie Fifer, Relationship Architect at Sonnhalter will hopefully take some of the mystery out of this potential marketing tool with this 2-part guest post:
What are QR codes?
A QR Code is a matrix code (or two-dimensional bar code) created by Japanese corporation Denso-Wave in 1994. The “QR” is derived from “Quick Response,” as the creator intended the code to allow its contents to be decoded at high speed.
This 2D bar code that stores URL information (or other information) so that when scanned with a smart phone reader (using the mobile’s camera), it directs you to a specific URL (or other location such as a video, a v-card, etc.)
These are very, very popular in Japan and are starting to catch on it the U.S., but mostly in the CPG market right now – we are starting to see it enter into the business-to-business world.
Here is a site to show you how QR codes work (you have to have a phone that has a QR reader on it or download an app):
http://www.google.com/help/maps/favoriteplaces/business/barcode.html
The creation of QR codes:
Usually synonymous with mass production, the quick response (QR) bar code was originally created by Japanese company Denso-Wave to keep inventory. However, because QR codes allow for more data than the standard 10-digit bar code, and because scanning requires less effort than typing a URL, the QR code has taken a turn for the personal. Denso has the patent to the QR code but as of yet, has not chosen to enforce it.
Denso-Wave website: http://www.denso-wave.com/qrcode/index-e.html
From Bar Code to QR Code – from the website http://www.denso-wave.com/qrcode/aboutqr-e.html
Bar codes have become widely popular because of their reading speed, accuracy, and superior functionality characteristics. As bar codes become popular and their convenience universally recognized, the market began to call for codes capable of storing more information, more character types, and that could be printed in a smaller space.
As a result, various efforts were made to increase the amount of information stored by bar codes, such as increasing the number of bar code digits or laying out multiple bar codes.
However, these improvements also caused problems such as enlarging the bar code area, complicating reading operations, and increasing printing cost.
2D Code emerged in response to these needs and problems:
2D Code is also progressing from the stacked bar code method (that stacks bar codes), to the increased information density matrix method.
About QR codes:
QR Code is a kind of 2-D (two-dimensional) symbology developed by Denso Wave (a division of Dens Corporation at the time) and released in 1994 with the primary aim of being a symbol that is easily interpreted by scanner equipment.
QR Code (2D Code) contains information in both the vertical and horizontal directions, whereas a bar code contains data in one direction only. QR Code holds a considerably greater volume of information than a bar code. Thus allowing for more sophisticated information to be encoded than just numbers such as a web link or a vcard.
Tomorrow we will talk about the difference between Microsoft tags and traditional QR codes.
While there are many different variations of QR codes such as Microsoft tags or Shotcodes, the premise is the same – a quick-reading code that takes you to more information. In our next post, we will discuss what Microsoft tags are and how they compare to traditional QR codes.
by tradespeopleinsights | Nov 18, 2010 | Marketing Tools, Traditional Marketing
Are you looking for a repeatable way to provide training to your customers so your sales people can focus on selling?
Explore options for online training, best practices, what not to do and how you can launch a course in under a week. The presenter, Lisa Bordeaux from Bluevolt, a leading online training source for suppliers, distributors and end users, will be our presenter.
Join us to learn more about how manufacturers are developing product training courses that educate people on their products and building product experts in the field.
Our research shows that Distributor sales people recommend products to customers 2-5 times per day. They recommend what they know and most of the products they sell they have never seen in application. Learn how others are bringing those products to life online and making it easier to educate and market to the channel with partners, buying groups, customers and others.
Details:
Tuesday, December 7th, 2-3 PM EST. Registration is closed.
by tradespeopleinsights | Nov 17, 2010 | Marketing Tools, Social Marketing, Traditional Marketing
If you are, there’s a new association that started in 2009 (good timing isn’t it) that deals with the construction industry and best practices to market to them. It’s called Construction Marketing Association (CMA) and they are out of Chicago. I’ve joined it as I think it’s important for those of us that play in this market can get together with our peers and look at what’s working and what’s not.
The founder, Neil Brown, has been in the construction industry on both the client and agency side for the past 15 years. Neil’s vision is to support marketers with a broad range of resources from monthly webinars, e-newsletters, blog, databanks and a network of professionals you can talk with on a regular basis. Neil is trying to start regional chapters as well, and I’ve agreed to head up NE Ohio.
The CMA is a start-up operation, but I think it has legs. The bottom line is in order for anything to be successful, it needs people to join and interact. Individual memberships are $169/year and there are corporate rates for 5 or more.
Take a look at their site and consider joining. I know there are some great marketing minds out there with a vast amount of experience in this channel. Won’t you share your knowledge?
by tradespeopleinsights | Nov 15, 2010 | Marketing Trends
I just returned from the 34th Annual Specialty Tools and Fasteners Distributors Association (STAFDA) convention and trade show. Attendance was up and so were the spirits of all who attended. Georgia Foley and the team once again put on a great event.
Their keynote speaker this year was Sarah Palin who delighted the audience and shared her vision on several issues that affect the STAFDA membership.
I spoke to several folks during the show including distributors, reps and manufacturers, and pretty much across the board they were all optimistic for 2011. Most noted that there are pockets of business out there, you just have to look for them.
I’ve assembled some “on the floor interviews” from several manufacturers that I’d like to share with you here.
by tradespeopleinsights | Nov 11, 2010 | Marketing Trends, Social Marketing
GlobalSpec is an internationally known portal used by engineers, technical and manufacturing professionals. They recently released a new study: Trends in Industrial Marketing 2010.
Of the 464 respondents, 70% hold management positions in sales or marketing. These companies had marketing budgets from 50,000 to over a million dollars.
Here are some highlights:
• 70% of companies anticipate an increase in sales compared to 2009.
• Marketing budgets are recovering after a down year in 2009, with 31% reporting an increase in their marketing budget this year.
• The top three marketing challenges in 2010 are having too few resources, not enough quality leads and a need to improve marketing ROI.
• Three of the top four sources of leads are online channels, including the company website, e-mail marketing and search engine optimization.
• 68% of companies plan to increase spending on social media in 2010. LinkedIn and Facebook are the most popular social media applications currently being used.
• 47% will spend more than one-third of their marketing budget online, and the majority (51%) will invest more in online marketing in 2010 than they did in 2009.
How do you stack up with these trends?
by tradespeopleinsights | Nov 10, 2010 | Marketing Tips, Social Marketing, Traditional Marketing
When was the last time you and your IT department willingly collaborated on a project? The truth is, probably never.
The reality is in today’s environment, the customer is taking control of the engagement, and marketing’s challenge is how to get to the customer faster and more efficiently (customer-centric). Customers are turning away from companies who can’t provide the experience, channel of engagement and immediate service they need.
The CMO Council recently did a study sponsored by Accenture called Driving Revenue Through Customer Relevance, that outlines ways CMOs and CIOs can achieve Agile Intelligent Marketing together.
Now marketers may not be known to be the sharpest pencil in the box, but we do have a good sense of what the customer’s needs are (and all needs are not the same), while IT is usually all B/W.
According to the report,”CMOs must take a greater ownership of the customer experience and assume a leadership role in embracing digital marketing practices, data-driven strategies and new marketing process integration platforms across their organizations.” Technology now underpins and shapes the entire customer experience. IT departments need to take strides to be a stategic enabler rather than an operational cog.
The reality is working with or without IT, marketers are doing tactical things with e-mails,website analytics, lead generation, etc. with the ever-increasing pressure of ROI on marketing dollars no matter where they are spent. Beyond the spend, you need to look at what’s really the end game? It’s to get a new customer or make an existing one happy.
The moral of the story is for Marketing and IT to play nice. Remember, your pay checks come from the same account and together you can make a better impact for the company.
