by tradesmeninsights | Jun 21, 2016 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Trends, Social Marketing, Uncategorized
By John Sonnhalter, Rainmaker Journeyman, Sonnhalter
While there are plenty of reasons to use automated technology to manage leads through the sales funnel, there comes a point when personalized content needs to be used to reach contractors and professional tradesmen.
Contractors need answers to specific questions whether it’s product or application related. They normally are looking for this relevant info and personalized content is an excellent way of delivering it.
There are benefits to using personalized content. More than half of senior marketers worldwide polled in CMO Council’s June 2015 survey said that using enriched or personalized content and digital interactions brings higher response and engagement rates.
So what are you doing to personalize content to the professional tradesmen? Are you addressing their concerns? Do you know what those concerns are?
Send your sales staffs out in the field and get a better read on what the tradesmen are looking for…don’t assume you know.
by tradesmeninsights | Jun 15, 2016 | Marketing Tips, Traditional Marketing, Uncategorized
Trade show season is upon us and for those of us that are still going to them, you know that the costs to play aren’t going down. That’s why ROI and documented metrics are so important. I talked to Vince Tricomi recently to make sure his post from a year ago still was appropriate and he assured me it was, so I thought I’d remind us all of these metrics.
Vince Tricomi, VP, New Business Development at PFI Displays, explains ways you can maximize your efforts.
Most of you participate in various trade shows from time to time. If you do, you know that they can be very expensive and management is always looking for an ROI. That’s why it’s important for sales and marketing to work together to make sure they get the best bang for the buck.
Except for a lucky few who still write orders at trade shows, most exhibitors can’t tie a specific revenue-generation figure to their trade shows.
That’s OK though. Consider how marketers tie sales figures to a magazine ad: They can’t, and that’s why they measure things like impressions, reach and awareness.
Trade shows offer plenty of measurement opportunities for the savvy event marketer. Some of these metrics are firm, others are calculated estimates, but they can be combined to create clarity into the effectiveness of any trade show program, large or small.
Here are a few of our suggestions:
1. Leads:
a. Let’s get this easy one of out of the way
i. Don’t mess around with collecting business cards
ii. Renting a lead retrieval machine that loads your lead data on a flash drive is money well spent
b. SAVVY TIP: Break these leads down into A, B, and C categories for better insight into the show’s quality.
2. Cost Per Lead:
a. Take the total cost of your exhibit investment and divide it by the total amount of leads collected
b. Compare this to other marketing efforts to see how your show stacks up
c. SAVVY TIP: If you exhibit at multiple shows, this metric also shines light on the comparative effectiveness of each show.
3. Demonstrations:
a. If you’re launching a new product, consider giving one-on-one or group demonstrations
b. Count how many demonstrations you give and how many audience members listen or interact
c. If you’re doing multiple presentations each hour, you’re having a great show
d. SAVVY TIP: Find out from the VP of Sales an average cost of a trip for a sales person to give a demo at a prospect’s office. Compare that with the show’s average cost per demo, and suddenly trade shows look like a bargain!
4. Website Traffic:
a. Know the average visitors to your website before the show, and compare that to the visitors during and immediately after
b. Pay special attention to the pages for the products and offers you featured at the show
c. SAVVY TIP: Don’t forget that trade shows are about face-to-face interactions. Generating web traffic is a great metric, but for most exhibitors it shouldn’t be the main goal.
5. Press Mentions:
a. These hold special appeal, and therefore more “weight” as a viable metric, for all classically trained marketers
b. SAVVY TIP: With the abundance of trade magazines, writers and bloggers at every show, if you’re not getting mentioned, something is wrong; try setting up interviews and press walk-throughs well before the show.
6. Post Show Appointments:
a. In today’s hectic, time-starved business world, one of the hardest challenges faced by every salesperson is securing a face-to-face appointment
b. Commit the sales team to informing you of every show lead that generates a follow-up appointment
c. SAVVY TIP: You’ll have friends for life if your shows facilitate setting post-show meetings. Think creatively about a space in your booth dedicated solely to this endeavor.
Whoops; did that headline say “5 metrics?” Consider the last one a bonus. As you can tell, these suggestions are only the tip of the iceberg. Please share some of your favorite, and most effective, metrics with us.
In closing, leading, full-service exhibit companies, like PFI Displays, offer innovative, easy-to-use software tools that will help you measure your shows—and do a lot more, too.
I’m sure you can add to the list and I’d like to hear ways your company is measuring the effectiveness of trade shows.
If you like this post you might like:
5 Ways to Improve your Trade Show ROI
New Study Shows Best Way of Reaching Manufacturing Professionals
by tradesmeninsights | Jun 7, 2016 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tools, Social Marketing, Uncategorized
By John Sonnhalter, Rainmaker Journeyman, Sonnhalter
LinkedIn is a business platform and although it’s set up for individuals, companies can and should have a company page. It allows your company to have a snapshot of who you are and helps you connect with your audiences.
Yes, LinkedIn has been used primarily in the past for people to network, but remember, not all folks on LinkedIn are looking for jobs.
I recently read an article from socialmediaexaminer.com on 7 Ways to Improve Your LinkedIn Page and I wanted to share some of their 7 insights.
- Brand recognition − Use your company logo and colors that define your brand. Create a custom background image to set you apart. Incorporate your main URL and phone number too.
- Focus message – Instead of taking the about us from your website, tailor the description that speaks directly to the people who are visiting your page.
- Improve search – Under the specialty section, add key words/phrases. You need to make your page easy to find.
- Stay in front of your prospects – Post relevant content on a regular basis and create custom images to set you apart. You have three options for sharing: 1 – Push it to everyone that follows you, 2 – Target specific groups (if you have enough in each group) and 3 – Pay to sponsor the update to attract new followers.
Start promoting your page on email signatures and even send an e-blast out to your current database with a link to your page. The key is don’t miss this opportunity.
by tradesmeninsights | Jun 1, 2016 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tools, Traditional Marketing, Uncategorized
By John Sonnhalter, Rainmaker Journeyman at Sonnhalter
Let’s face it, we’re all in this for the same reason. To talk with people who share the same interest. We must always be tweaking and improving what we deliver.
Warranty cards and trade show leads are a start but we need to be more creative. Salesmen visits to job site are a good way to start a conversation.
So in order to get them to give up their email, we better come up with some interesting and helpful stuff that will make them want to read our emails for future gems.
It’s not only what you have to say, but how you say it. Beyond being potential customers, these contractors can be your best friend by sharing it with their peer group. Remember contractors need to know, like and trust you before any meaningful dialog will start.
Here are some tips to building a better list of contractors and tradesmen:
- Think like a contractor – What are their pain points? Give them practical solutions. Always answer the question, “What’s in it for me?”
- Talk like a human – Don’t use marketing or sales speak. Keep it conversational.
- Give them a reason to sign up – Sneak peeks at new products, exclusive product demos.
- Ask the contractor what they want help with – Get engagement from the audience you want to reach.
- Don’t be afraid of humor – People like to smile and it shows more of your human side.
- Reach out to contractors – On a regular basis, randomly pick several contractors and have a product manager call and pick their brains on possible new product ideas.
Emails are back and stronger than ever if we do them right. Remember, you’re not looking for a big list, but a good one.
by tradesmeninsights | Apr 5, 2016 | Uncategorized
Today, we have a guest post from Jeff Selingo, author of “There Is Life After College,” which comes out on April 12th.
Nearly 40 percent of American workers hold a bachelor’s degree. College graduates are found in virtually every profession. Some 15 percent of mail carriers have a four-year credential, as do one in five clerical and sales workers, as well as, 83,000 bartenders.
Getting a bachelor’s degree is what going to college means to most Americans and is so ingrained in our culture that students who don’t march along are often admonished, questioned and considered failures.
The decades-long march to college-for-everyone at 18 has actually closed off rather than opened up options for teenagers and twentysomethings.
As recently as the 1970s, a teenager had a number of options after graduating from high school: get a good-paying job right away, enlist in the military, find an apprenticeship in a trade or go to college.
A teenager today really has only two of those options still available: the military or college. Less than 1 percent of Americans serve in the military, so most go to college right after high school. In the early 1970s, less than half of high school graduates in the United States went on to college the following fall. Today, nearly 66 percent do.
The goal of universal college has actually done more harm than good because it banished anything that smacks of job training to second-class status.
Don’t get me wrong: I’m not encouraging 18-year-olds to skip out on further education after high school. But not everyone is ready for a traditional American college experience at 18, nor does it align with the interests, skills, and mindsets of some teenagers.
We need more than just one pathway to good jobs in the U.S. What we need is a place like Harvard—both prestigious and rigorous—that will attract students who have talents and interests to pursue skilled jobs critical for the economy that don’t necessarily require a four-year college degree.
As I traveled the country the last two years talking to employers of all sizes and in all sectors of the economy for my forthcoming book, what I heard most is the worry they have about filling so-called middle-skill positions in advanced manufacturing, healthcare and information technology.
Nearly half of the American workforce has these jobs today, but many of them are filled by aging Baby Boomers who will soon be retiring. It’s expected that as many as 25 million of all new job openings in the next decade will be for middle-skills jobs.
Employers told me they have a healthy supply of talent for their white-collar office jobs that usually require at least a bachelor’s degree and sometimes a master’s or Ph.D. But if manufacturing has any hope of making a rebound in the U.S., there is a desperate need for younger workers with technical, hands-on skills that require training after high school.
Today, only 52 percent of young people have either a two- or four-year degree or an industry certificate by the time they reach their mid-twenties. The goal of universal college has actually done more harm than good, because it diverted attention away from any real discussion of a robust apprenticeship program, and it has banished anything that smacks of job training to second-class status.
There is evidence attitudes are beginning to change. First, the number of apprenticeships is rising for the first time since the 2008 recession. Second, with college debt surpassing the trillion-dollar mark, students and parents are giving apprenticeships a second look as an alternative to paying sky-high tuition for a bachelor’s degree that might not lead to a job. Third, some apprenticeships are beginning to have an academic component that makes them nearly indistinguishable from traditional colleges.
The modern version of what an apprenticeship could look like for American students interested in alternatives to college is on display at the Apprentice School in Newport News, Virginia. Students who choose from one of more than 20 occupational areas are paid an annual salary of $54,000 by the final year of the program—$10,000 above that of the average bachelor’s degree recipient—and afterward they are guaranteed a job with the military contractor that operates Newport News Shipbuilding.
The school is just as selective as Harvard. It receives more than 4,000 applications each year for 230 spots, and significant numbers of its graduates go on to earn bachelor’s or master’s degrees. In many ways, it looks and feels like a typical American college, except in one important respect: its students graduate debt free.
We need more such schools and pathways post-high school that serve a greater array of industries as well as students who don’t want to travel down the one route we offer to them now.
About Jeff
Jeffrey Selingo is author of three books on higher education. He is a regular contributor to the Washington Post’s “Grade Point” blog, a professor of practice at Arizona State University and a visiting scholar at Georgia Tech’s Center for 21st Century Universities.
In There Is Life After College, Jeff Selingo explores why students struggle to launch into a career after college and how they can better navigate the route from high school through college and into the work world. It will be released by HarperCollins April 12
by tradesmeninsights | Mar 23, 2016 | Uncategorized
By Chris Ilcin, Account Superintendent, Sonnhalter
It’s not late, I promise.
Yes, I know the Super Bowl was well over a month ago. So what’s the point of reviewing the commercials now? Well that’s pretty much my point.
Advertisers at this year’s “Big Game” (as the nonsponsoring like to call it) spent more on commercials during the broadcast that was spent on Super Bowl ads in the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s COMBINED. So quick, how many do you remember like the 1984 Apple commercial? How many have become the new brand for a company like Chrysler’s “Imported from Detroit”?
Not one. And that’s because for most major brands (or at least the ones that can afford Super Bowl ads) that’s no longer the point. These ads are now focused more on creating “buzz” by being as interruptive as possible. It’s about how many tweets it can spark when it airs, how many shares it can get on Facebook, and how many best/worst listicles it can make it onto the next day. And then it’s on to the next thing, or back to the standard messaging.
A perfect example? PuppyMonkeyBaby. Outrageous by design, its general air of “too cool for you” hits you harder than the overly caffeinated drink it’s selling. It’s all buzz and very little brand (other than the 3 dudes on the couch representing their target demo).
The antithesis? Death Wish Coffee. Sure it’s a CGI-filled 30 seconds, but it sets up the niche this coffee wants to serve, and doesn’t lose its message in the effects.
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Of course it was also done for them for free as part of an Intuit campaign. But that makes it an even smarter move for them as they show that they truly are willing to help small businesses, while also poking fun at the bloated advertising/pop culture spectacle that the Super Bowl has become.
So what’s the takeaway for B2T Marketing?
Don’t believe the hype. Set your brand and create collateral that builds on it, not on a fad or trend. Be a thought leader, not another voice in the crowd. And know you market well enough not to launch a broadside at everyone, but a targeted message where you need it to be.
