Tony Attwood’s Blog

It is interesting that for once political parties are getting interested in what creative people do. Indeed I can’t think when it last happened.

Personally I am not sure I want too much interest in creativity from government, but still, it is nice to be recognised as actually existing.

Addressing delegates at the ISBA conference in London on 18 March the shadow culture minister Ed Vaizey has said the self regulatory system administered by the Advertising Standards Authority is working well and there is no need to change it.

The shadow minister also assured marketers that the Conservative response to the “emotive” issue of marketing to children would be considered.

This is utterly different from the speeches of David Cameron who has recently called on marketers and broadcasters to “think about the messages that you’re putting out to our children” and aggressively attacked what he called the “offensive marketing tactics” used by some companies. He has demanded new arrangements allowing parents to protest against adverts more easily.

Cameron’s view to me seems to be in line with the long term demonisation of people who write adverts - I get the feeling we are seen as some sort of horned beast skulking in the corner, saliva dripping from fangs, forcing unsuspecting ordinary folk to buy stuff.

Except if a creative person writes a party political ad.

And I am not myself being party political here. I’ve never seen a broad understanding of creative advertising within any party.

Which is probably why no one has ever asked me to contribute to a political campaign - but I have written a lot of other things. If you’d like me to review anything you are putting out, and have a jolly chat on the phone, give me a call. 01536 399 000.

Tony Attwood

In this market, if there is one thing I think virtually every company should do in terms of marketing at this moment, it is to build email lists of clients and prospective clients.

Now when I say this to people, they mostly come back to me and say, “oh we’ve done that”. But when I get a bit closer (if they let me get a bit closer that is), it then turns out everything is not quite as I think it should be.

Here’s what I feel is the perfect scenario…

First, all enquirers’ and purchasers’ email addresses are added to a database showing their postal and email address. These people are then emailed each week or two with an informative item - not just pure sales but also giving some interesting background. Something that they will want to read, because of their area of interest.

If you are interested in seeing examples of such emails, give me a call and I will forward you a few samples.

Second, email lists of potential customers have to be built up. Of course you might be lucky and find you can buy these readymade, but most of us don’t have this luck.

To give an example, let’s assume you sell software to businesses. You can go out and buy a list of most businesses selected by what they sell - but those lists are likely to be just addresses to the MD or an administrator. They can work, and I would not knock them, but it can also be incredibly beneficial to build a list of the email addresses of the actual people who will decide to buy your product.

Doing this it not nearly as complex or expensive as people think. True, an email address researched in this way might cost you £2 - but the fact is that once you have that address, it is yours, and you can use it quite a few times. (Also if you need to get two or three people’s addresses per company the price remains much the same, but the volume of addresses increases).

Next you load these addresses into a database attach to a specialist email marketing program, write your interesting copy, and send it out. Of course you have to have an unsubscribe button on the email - but how many unsubs you get depends on how good your copy is. If it is really exciting and lively you will get more people asking to sign up, than you get people leaving.

Obviously this is a quick summary - but having this list of potential customers which you mail every few weeks with interesting copy, and having your list of people who have shown their interest or actually bought, is a major step towards having a business that really makes use of digital technology.

And it really does work.

As always, if you want to know more email Tony@hamilton-house.com or call 01536 399 013

I like lists. This one was recently done for a potential client - you don’t have to buy into all of it, but if it ensures you think, “why don’t we do that” and come up with a good answer, that’s fine.

Ten things you must do to get good marketing results….

1. All marketing must be exciting and interesting to read. Look at anything, read the first line, and think, would I, as an outsider, bother to keep reading when I have another 100 emails in my inbox?

2. Always write about the reader and the benefits to him her, or about things that will interest the reader. Never about you.

3. Consider why a customer should buy this product from you, rather than someone else.

4. Consider why the customer needs this product and reflect that.

5. Write regularly - if your writing is really good people will want to read it. If it isn’t there is nowhere to hide. Nothing compensates for poor writing - people will delete within a second.

6. Use the best lists possible which go directly to the person you want to reach. If such a list is not available, research it - it will be worth its weight in gold.

7.. If emailing ensure that you have a facility for instant auto unsubscribe for readers. And then constantly improve the quality of the writing so they don’t unsubscribe.

8. Know what your competitors do, and make sure you are different.

9. Always ensure that you are applying the laws of the psychology of perception. If you have not heard of this start with http://www.theory.bz/factors.html - not every article is on this topic, but even those that are not are still interesting.

10. Measure the results. Measure the open rate, the click through rate and the purchase rate. Note the problem and improve that area. Then do it again and again.

Here’s a simple example of “word of mouth” advertising in practice.

A few months ago I published a novel about my favourite football team. It is set in 1910 - the year in which they went bust. (Fortunately they did recover, and came back to greater glories later).

Faced with the problem of getting publicity for the book, I set up a Google Alert so that every time someone mentions the name of that team in a blog etc, I get an email, and can go and look at the article.

Of course I get a load of false leads (people using the name but not talking about the club), but a lot of them come up good - and about two or three times a day I can get onto a site (be it a national newspaper or an individual writing his/her own blog) which talks about this football club in the past.

Since blogs generally include a comments section, I go in, and add some information that the writer of the original didn’t have, and then say, “there’s more about this in my book”. I then tell them the title and how to buy it.

So each day, my book gets another few mentions on the internet, and my website gets the same. As a result a few more people buy the book. But better, the web site address for the book gets established further and further - and since readers of each of these sites is there because of an interest in the club in the first place, the awareness grows.

The key point to remember here is that all this is cumulative. If four people get notes about my book today, then by the end of the week I might have 20 items up. Those items stay there and can be found by anyone next week and the week after. After a year there might be a couple of hundred extra mentions.

That will have the effect of improving the ranking of the web site on the internet, and some of those mentions will be seen by others who will pass them on to friends…

Now some people say that this is a ludicrous approach since it is so expensive. In fact, in terms of its effectiveness it has been proven to be about one tenth of the cost of Google Adwords.

If you would like to talk to me further about this sort of approach, give me a call on 01536 399 013 or alternatively email Tony@hamilton-house.com