By Dan Fisher, Menemsha Group

If you are like most sales and recruiting professionals in the staffing industry, you’re probably sick and frustrated with hearing your prospects and customers tell you “we’re not hiring and we have no budget.” How does one overcome such an objection? Better yet, how does one even engage in a meaningful conversation when you know your prospect or customer is operating under those circumstances? Here is an idea that has worked for me… and hundreds of others. (more…)

Findings from the TechServe Alliance Annual Conference & Tradeshow Women’s Luncheon

Picture if you will, a packed room of 60+ women all who work for or own IT services and staffing firms. Can you see it in your mind? Now, visualize that these women are all actively participating in lively and interactive discussions examining critical and provocative business issues relative to the IT services and staffing industry. (more…)

Testing should not be taken lightly

I know you’ve all been waiting with baited breath for the finale of this email trilogy! Before we get into it, let’s recap what we talked about in part 1 and part 2 of Email Marketing Should Still be a Part of Your Marketing Mix.

• In part 1, we reviewed the major email marketing vendors such as Campaign Monitor, StreamSend and Vertical Response and why you should choose one over another as well as best practices for improving your email marketing including: using pre-header text, table of contents, buttons and links and logos and images (and image blocking).
• In part 2, we continued with best practices for improving your email marketing including integrating social media, creating emails for mobile and using plain-text emails.

In this final blog, we’re taking a deep dive into email testing (which in my opinion is the most important thing you can do to ensure success). So, let’s get to it! (more…)

Making a Case for Strategic Social Media

The other day I was riding Chicago’s “L” and saw an ad for a local business which promoted its social media links. To distract myself from the commute, I pulled out my smartphone and went to their Facebook page. To my surprise, despite running an ad that promoted social media, the company hadn’t updated its page in over 6 months and only had a handful of followers. The same was true for its Twitter account. I found myself thinking that this company wasn’t social at all. I felt duped. (more…)

Why integrating social media, creating emails for mobile and using plain-text is important

In part 1 of Email Marketing Should Still be a Part of Your Marketing Mix, we discussed the major email marketing vendors as well as talked about implementing best practices into your emails including: using pre-header text, table of contents, buttons and links and logos and images (and image blocking). To continue our email marketing best practices discussion let’s talk about integrating social media, building emails for mobile and using plain-text emails. (more…)

Choosing the right email vendor for you and implementing simple best practices

Should email marketing still be a part of your marketing mix? The short answer is YES! Email marketing is just one of many communication tools you should be using to continually connect with your prospects and clients. From event announcements/invitations to monthly e-newsletters, email marketing is an easy and affordable way for your brand to stay top of mind. Like many online tools, email marketing is rapidly changing, and by implementing a few, simple best practices, your emails can make a large impact. (more…)

By now I’m sure, like me, you’re used to regularly seeing QR codes. They’ve become mainstream. From billboards and magazine ads to the more unconventional restaurant take-out menus and the sides of buses and taxi cabs, QR codes are everywhere. Heck, by the end of 2011, airline carriers will be required to provide QR codes on mobile boarding passes for all international flights. (more…)

Everyone in the staffing industry is thrilled to find a HOT, HOT, HOT! job candidate. But what happens when you’re trying to place that highly desirable talent and hiring managers aren’t moving quickly enough to green-light the placement? (more…)

To text or not to text: that is the question many staffing firms are pondering in today’s “how many tools does it take to reach a candidate” market.

As the surge in social recruiting hits unprecedented levels, how far will recruiters go to connect with candidates? From LinkedIn and Facebook to Google ad campaigns, some companies are now turning to text-based (or SMS) campaigns as part of their mobile engagement strategy to reach candidates in real time on their mobile phones. (more…)

A client of ours, Harvey Nash USA, recently released the results of their annual global CIO Survey which assesses the current direction of IT strategy and trends among IT leaders around the world. Now in its sixth year in the U.S. and 13^th globally, the CIO Survey is held in high regard in the industry. But this did not happen overnight. A great deal of time and energy went into capturing a high response rate and thus validity of the results. This year the global report had more than 2,500 responses and in the U.S. alone, 42% of responses were C-level. (more…)

The Fine Line between Getting it Right vs. Getting it Done

Early on in my career I learned a very valuable lesson about getting it “right” versus getting it “done.” As a junior PR rep, I was tasked with congratulating a local media reporter on a recent promotion. All that was needed was a short congratulatory note. The goal, of course, was to express well wishes, as well as to begin to foster a relationship between the firm and the reporter. Easy peezy, or so I thought.

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Imagine you are an IT service provider trying to sell into a company like Royal Caribbean, specifically to the CIO (an everyday occurrence, right?). How can you get his or her attention? One of my colleagues, Jessica Elliott, recently attended a monthly meeting of the South Florida Technology Alliance where she heard the actual CIO of Royal Caribbean, Bill Martin, address this very topic. According to Mr. Martin, he wants vendors to show him how their solutions will impact Royal Caribbean guests, not just to talk about the services they offer. This is not just Bill Martin’s opinion either. Rob Strickland, former CIO of T-Mobile says that he is “much more impressed with sales people who understand what my customers are experiencing.” What they’re saying is it’s not just about pitching your services and solutions, you need to think about how what you’re selling impacts your prospects’ customers, their business and bottom line. (more…)

Building Your Business on Referrals and Word of Mouth

It wasn’t cold and snowy enough here in Chicago, so I traveled to Minneapolis at the end of January to present to the Minnesota chapter of TechServe Alliance. My presentation titled, “Marketing for Where You Want to Be: 10 Proven Ways to Strategically Grow,” triggered a lively discussion that generated a great deal of debate. (more…)

In part 1 of Blogging Tips from the Expert, I shared with you the first three blogging tips to get you started including how to determine topics, tips for writing your blogs and then ideas for successful Search Engine Optimization. Now it’s time for the final three tips.

4. How to address comments, or more importantly how to GET people to comment. One question we are asked most by our clients is, “How do I get people to comment on my blogs? and How do I address them?” This is a tough one and an area I thought worthy of sharing some additional resources. I found this blog by Darren Rowse (creator of ProBlogger.net) called 10 Techniques to get Readers to Comment on your Blog. The advice that stuck out to me is to be open ended by asking questions and inviting comments. And when you do get comments, be sure to interact and reply. When someone leaves an insightful or interesting comment, comment back. The idea being more people will add comments and what started as a static piece of content becomes a dynamic conversations between readers.

5. Length, frequency and promotion. Other questions we get asked a lot!

• How long should my posts be? There is no rule, but rather generally accepted guidelines. Usually, the shorter the better. A blog can be two sentences to 4,000 words. But a few hundred words are typically the sweet spot. I am the worst culprit of not following this ‘guideline’. But, if your blog is longer, break it up into a series (which is what I did here). This way, you’ll have more than one blog to post!
• How often should I blog? You’ll want to blog as often as you can. For larger companies two-to-three blogs per week is a good number, for smaller companies, one blog per week. You can use Twitter to supplement your blog postings, but strive for no less than every other week. Once you get a good base of blogs, you can even refresh your older blog posts if they are still relevant. This way, you have new content without writing new content!
• How do I know when and what to post? Create an editorial calendar and share with all involved to keep everyone on schedule for creating and posting content. Include the intended date, topic and author/source. Add any upcoming events/announcements, holidays and story ideas. Be strategic and organize thematically. A good way to spark topic ideas is to follow other blogs that are in your industry. This is a working calendar that can change as new topics/ideas become available. However, remember that blogs aren’t always planned topics! So while it’s good to have a schedule, try to be spontaneous too!
• How do I promote my blog? To promote your blog, use everything in your arsenal including: e-mail signature, business cards, tradeshows, your website, your newsletter, all social media pages and word of mouth. For example when you post a new blog, tweet about it, post it on Facebook and so on. Make sure an RSS Feed is added to your blog so people can automatically receive content (most often this comes automatically with blogging sites). Comment on the blogs you’ve subscribed too, driving traffic to your blog! Register your blog with sites such as Technorati. Furthermore, don’t stop at promoting your blog as a blog, promote it to help catch the eye of reporters (you’re a subject matter expert they can interview on specific topics!) and pitch for public speaking opportunities.

One last thing I want to leave you with. No matter what you blog about, what tools you use to blog (i.e. WordPress, Blogger, Moveable Type) and how often you blog, the point is that you are blogging, getting your name and your brand out there. Keep it up! The more you do it, the more you will learn and the more you will be well on your way to becoming an expert.

Since you know I am not an expert myself and this is not the end all be all of blogging best practices, I invite you to share your tips that you’ve learned along the way so we all can be perpetual blogging students!

So, I have a confession to make… I may have actually overstated the title of this blog―I’m not exactly an expert blogger. I’m more like the perpetual blogging student eager to learn and share my wisdom with others. How do you become an expert blogger? It’s not as hard as you may think and today my goal is to impart my lessons in what makes a blog successful based on research, client experiences and my own personal blogging.

First and foremost, I want to reiterate what you may already know, but it’s an important point. Why does blogging matter? Blogs are one of the fastest, easiest and least expensive ways to communicate today. It provides direct, unmediated communications with prospects, clients, fans, curious bystanders, and even critics and skeptics. Blogging is a way, as a professional, to establish your own digital persona and set yourself apart. As a company, blogging builds your brand and demonstrates its value. Furthermore, blogging is a great way for companies to address any negative issues that may arise, and keep everyone updated and informed. Blogging can give your company positive content during crisis, and can help mitigate any negative news results coming up in search engine queries about your company.

Now, I want to take you through the first three of six best practices I have learned along the way about blogging.

1. Determine your topic. What is your purpose for blogging (primary news channel? thought leadership? customer stories?). You can focus on all of these, but put your editorial hat on vs. your marketing hat. Ask yourself: Who is our target audience? And what do we want to convey the most to them? Think broadly, meaning your blog can be about news announcements, comments on industry trends/issues, events, presentations, acknowledging glitches, changes in direction, etc. Which brings me to one point, when you do address issues, be timely in your response, acknowledge the problem, promise updates and aim for candor and humility when mistakes happen. This makes you sincere, direct and will instantly build trust.

2. Writing a blog. I admit it is tough for me to write blogs sometimes. But it doesn’t have to be! For me, it starts with the headline, which helps me create the intro paragraph that flows into the second paragraph and so on. I aim for short, descriptive titles that capture attention. Be consistent in your writing style (i.e. capitalize every word in your title). Have the blog come from one author unless there is a good reason for it to come from more than one author. Also, this is when you establish your voice. Strive for informal and conversational (it’s the one marketing medium where this is OK, so be sure to take advantage of it), be direct and use clear language. Be humble and make benefits understandable. Provide examples to explain complicated ideas. Don’t use corporate jargon that your readers won’t understand. But most importantly, have fun with it!

3. Smart writing. Meaning, making your blog SEO (Search Engine Optimization) friendly.

• Include links to other sites, called a “blogroll”. Blogrolling provides your readers with content they might find useful and will also add to your content. If you enjoy the content you are linking to chances are your readers will too.
• Include website keywords whenever you can and categorize your blog according to the subject.
• Finally, add Google Analytics to track clickthroughs, visits, monitor popularity and compare effectiveness of your blog over time. This way, you can adjust your blog as needed so it is optimized in a way to make it easy for people to find you online. If you’re using WordPress it is automatically built-in, which you can find on your dashboard.

In part 2 of Blogging Tips from the Expert, I will share with you the final three blogging tips spawned from questions we get asked from our clients. These tips include how to respond to comments (and how to actually get people to comment), recommended length for blogs, how frequent you should blog and most importantly how to promote your blog.

If you have any ideas on blogging, I encourage you to share them with me and all our readers.

Surveys are incredibly effective when it comes to learning about your client base, prospects or industry trends. People are generally more than happy to give their opinion or talk about something that affects them daily. It’s a way for them to be heard, voice concerns and just “get on their soap box.” With technology and social media at the forefront of communication methodologies, you have the ability to reach targeted audiences more easily than ever before.

But wait! Before you start down the survey path, you have to think about who will be taking them. Surveys need to be well planned and deliberate. Just because you send a survey, doesn’t mean you’ll get responses. In fact, the response rate is one of the biggest challenges companies face when administering surveys―and quite often is an afterthought. The reality is, your survey is only as good as the data (and amount of data) you receive. But don’t worry… it’s actually not that complicated. Here are a few quick tips that will get those responses up in no time.

1. Screen and Clean
Your list, that is. A little list housekeeping at the front end of a survey goes a long way. There is no use in sending surveys to outdated contacts. If you aren’t already keeping your customer and prospect database updated regularly, spend a little time with your employees to verify and update the contacts and their information. If you don’t have a contact list or just want to start fresh, there are plenty of companies who offer list services. For a small investment, they’ll target in on the audience you are trying to reach and provide you with that current contact info. For more information about lists, read our three-part blog series.

2. Target and Focus
Wait to develop your questions until after you identify your target audience. The topic and series of questions should be geared toward the individuals you are surveying. This is important because it allows you to focus on the language and types of questions that will resonate with them. Is the target audience made up of end-users of your product, influencers or decisions-makers? Will they be able to truly answer the questions you are asking? Is there any industry specific lingo you need to be aware of? If your audience feels engaged and can easily answer the first few questions, chances are they will continue; otherwise, they’ll likely drop out.

3. Keep it Short (and Fun!)
The worst thing you can do is waste someone’s time. Your customers and prospects have minimal time to respond to a survey, so make sure you get to the point quickly. Choose 5-10 questions that drive at the topic you are trying to better understand. Tell them upfront that this survey will only take “X” minutes to complete (and make sure it’s true). Make the questions easy to answer, like multiple choice, ranking, etc. No matter which survey tool you use (i.e. Survey Monkey, Zoomerang), they make it easy to create surveys and collect data. If you have the time, throw in a random (lighthearted) question (i.e. What is your favorite dessert?). It keeps them awake and maybe will add a smile to their day. Besides, you may be able to use the data point in some future promotion or presentation.

4. Incentivize
People tend to do things if they know they will get something in return. You don’t have to hand out a gift to everyone who takes it, but you can enter everyone (or first 50 completed) into a drawing for a worthwhile prize. Are they people who like the latest and greatest toys (i.e. an Apple iPad, an Amazon Kindle, etc.)? Are they sports buffs (i.e. a new golf club, sports tickets, etc.)? Or do you need something more generic (a weekend getaway, American Express Gift Card, etc.)? You can also tie it directly to your business (free attendance at a conference, copy of report in advance, etc.). The possibilities are endless and it doesn’t have to be over the top. It’s simply a nice way to say, “Thank you. We appreciate your time.”

5. Timing is Everything
If you haven’t been sending a lot of mass e-mails (via a third party e-mail vendor such as Vertical Response or Constant Contact), you might need to test a couple of different groups and see what day and time works best for your audience. This is easy using an e-mail system as you can see the response rates virtually in real-time. The general rule of thumb is to send Tuesday thru Thursday in the late morning or afternoon (10 a.m. to 3 p.m. CT). But, be aware―every industry is different, so it is important to know your recipients and if there are any looming deadlines or key industry happenings that would deter them from having time to complete a survey. Think about your clients’ and prospects’ day-to-day activities and when they might actually have some downtime to open your e-mail and take the survey.

6. Make it Personal
Take into consideration who the communication is coming from. People feel more compelled to complete something for someone they know or from a person in an executive position. An e-mail from your CEO inviting clients to take the survey indicates the commitment and importance of the topic. Or a simple e-mail from your client’s daily contact can make them feel more obligated to complete. Additionally, (if applicable) add a personal salutation , including a name feels less mechanical.

7. Promote, Promote and Promote Some More
The worst thing you can do to increase response rates is rely solely on your e-mail blasts. Use the e-mail blasts as the first communication. But you want to reach more than your database. Promote the survey on your website, in your e-mail signature and on social media pages (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn). You can use your company pages as well as enlist your sales team to use their personal pages (it’s easy and they will be more likely to post when you supply them with sample content). Furthermore, are you partnered with any industry organizations or associations? Ask them to promote your survey to their contacts. If they agree, find out which mediums they will use (e-mail, website, blog, social media, etc.) and supply them with the content. Lastly, promote your survey in all conversations with clients and prospects. They will appreciate the fact that you value their opinion and be more likely to take the survey. If you have an incentive, be sure to mention that as well. Then follow-up the conversation with a personal invitation to the survey.

8. Everyone Needs a Little Reminder
Not everyone has time to take the survey immediately and chances are, if they put it on their to-do list, it will keep dropping lower on the priority list as more deliverables come in. One or two quick reminders will help in keeping it front of mind or even post reminders on your social media pages. Try sending reminders on different days and at different times from the initial invite, it might be received at a better time. Plus, this is a perfect opportunity to personalize it further and have someone follow up (with a phone call, if there is time). Be sure to mention a deadline for taking the survey!

If at first you don’t succeed… yes, try again! It’s not the end of the world if you have to change your outreach strategy mid-survey. Research has shown that 50% of responses (for an online survey) will arrive within the first day of receiving. So if that rate is low, you may need to step back and think differently. Review the tips above and try something new: send the invitation on different days, provide give-a-way (if you aren’t already doing), buy a list, extend your follow up, partner with an association, etc.

While some may think surveying is a science, it really is more of an art form. If you are new to this, it may take some trial and error. Just don’t give up! When done right, surveys are an incredible sales and marketing tool―and can be a lot of fun. The information you receive can go far (which we’ll talk about more in an upcoming blog.) So start thinking about what you want to know from your clients and prospects and start surveying!

Lastly, let us know about your survey experiences. What tools did you use to increase responses? Did you see a spike when promoting the survey a certain way?

Magic was in the air at this year’s annual TechServe Alliance Conference and Tradeshow. On the outskirts of Disney’s Magic Kingdom, the conference opened with keynote speaker Jack Santiago from the Disney Institute sharing keys to “Disney’s Approach” including leadership excellence, quality service, people management and more. Adding to the event’s enchantment was The Amazing Hondo, internationally acclaimed magician, humorist and motivational entertainer, who not only served as one of the keynote speakers, but also astounded us a second time at a dinner hosted by Jim Childs of CHILDS Advisory Partners.

Jessica Elliott and Leslie Vickrey from ClearEdge spending time with The Amazing Hondo!

Rounding out the conference was the Women’s Roundtable Luncheon, sponsored by ClearEdge Marketing. I was extremely fortunate to host an interactive session with nearly 50 women business owners, managers, recruiters and sales leaders. We sat in groups of 10 exploring industry topics suggested by our esteemed group of moderators. At the end, we held a 15-minute wrap-up session that examined the most heated and challenging discussion points—measuring customer satisfaction, retaining staff and taking advantage of social media and Web 2.0.

So that you may benefit from the knowledge and experience of this thoughtful group of leaders, I’ve captured several takeaways from the roundtable discussions and outlined them for you below:

Measuring Customer Satisfaction

Are you measuring client satisfaction? If not, you’re in good company. Most luncheon participants said that more job orders were the sign that things are going well on an account. What attendees quickly realized is that they are likely missing out on a world of important information regarding what makes a buyer of their company’s services or solutions come back for more. Alternatively, they don’t really know what is turning a client off and perhaps sending them to a competitor.

ClearEdge Marketing clients that monitor client satisfaction often do so in one of two ways:

• They have a home-grown program that consists of an internally developed satisfaction survey sent by e-mail. They can be sent to clients once a year, bi-annually, quarterly and even as frequently as each time a project is completed.

• Others partner with a third-party provider (e.g., Inavero, Net Promoter) that has a formal, methodical approach to measuring client satisfaction. These companies typically measure satisfaction on an annual or bi-annual basis.

As you would expect there are pros and cons to both satisfaction survey approaches, such as cost, the ability to benchmark against others in your industry and administration. However, regardless of the approach you take, the end results should be to know more about what you are doing right and what action or inaction could be costing you clients. In addition, we also encourage clients to use the satisfaction survey results in their marketing efforts. The data can be used to help demonstrate credibility in the sales cycle, or help you secure local awards.

Retaining Staff

It seems everyone in the audience was seeing an increase in demand for their company’s top talent. So how did participants suggest keeping their most prized team members? Incentives and bonuses are the preferred retention strategy. Specific examples included:

• Simple recognition programs are still a powerful retention tool. An example shared at the Luncheon was to recognize an individual with the highest gross profit for the month by celebrating his/her achievement in a regular status call, sharing it in a company e-mail and awarding him/her with a gift card to a coveted restaurant.

• Strong incentives also keep staff focused and working hard. One business leader shared how her organization provides big rewards for sales team members who are able to break into new accounts. The reward? A sales rep will get double commission on the account for the first year. Yes, you read correctly: DOUBLE COMMISSION! (If you are interested in a successful approach that generates an average 20-30% ROI, check out our article Cozying up to Frigid Prospects).

• Rewards trips were also named as a great mechanism for keeping people on board, particularly sales staff. Not only does an amazing, company-sponsored trip provide an incentive for sticking around (you can’t get the dream vacation if you no longer work for the company), it also motivates long-term performance. And if you open the trip up to spouses/significant others, your sales rep is now being encouraged “to win the trip” at home as well as at the office. While some companies certainly have scaled back on reward trips in recent years, I was surprised to hear how many companies actually still go BIG (think trips to Hawaii!) and swear by the results…not worth cutting!

Social Media and Web 2.0

Although around 90% of the audience focused a portion or all of their time talking about social media and Web 2.0, surprisingly many were still in the early stages of actual use. While there was commonality among the applications being used—primarily LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter—how people were using these tools varied widely. Certainly a good portion of the audience is using social media to pull information, including:

• Learning more about the companies or individual prospects they are targeting from a sales perspective
• Keeping up with what’s happening within current client companies and looking for insights to further penetrate accounts
• Educating themselves about their competition
• Screening candidates

On the flip side, attendees also discussed how they used the popular social media tools for pushing out information to clients, prospects and candidates including:

• Company announcements such new team members and press releases
• Articles and industry updates
• Awards or client recognition
• Birthday wishes, pictures of team events, philanthropic activities

These messages are great for brand building and they provide an opportunity to personalize the company, demonstrate its culture and establish it as a credible advisor. If you aren’t already, be sure to integrate your marketing messages across all your social media mediums. Not all clients, prospects and candidates communicate in the same way or use all of the social media tools. So, if you post something to Twitter, be sure to also post it on LinkedIn, Facebook, your Web site, in your newsletter, on your e-mail signature, etc.

Taking Social Media to the Next Level

Given the level of interest in social media and Web 2.0, I wanted to share some additional recommendations we typically provide our clients once they implement a social media program:

• Stop Lurking, Start Participating—So many of the women at the Luncheon admitted that they are takers or lurkers when it comes to social media. That is, they spend the majority of their efforts looking at the information that is posted, but don’t actually contribute their own opinions or recommendations. Ironically, the table I sat at was really looking for ways to get their audience to engage with them by commenting on posts that were made on Facebook, as an example. I would argue that one of the most effective ways to jump start the two way conversation is through making posts of your own.

• Get to Know Your Fans and Followers—This is something we regularly recommend to our clients. Closely evaluate who is following you on the social media tools you are using and cross-reference them with your database—are they current clients, prospects, current candidates, future candidates, etc.? Use that information to establish a program that feeds the needs of your audience—target messages directly to your fans and followers and make sure your sales reps and recruiters are aware of what’s happening, who’s interested in learning more. In addition, evaluate what is getting a strong reaction and use that to create a program that provides more of what your audience likes.

• Evaluate Your Own Brand—How much of a presence does your company have compared to your competition? What are they doing that you aren’t? These are definitely things you want to look at because you can be sure your clients, prospects and candidates are. What’s more, how does your own personal profile stack up against others with your same name and possibly in your industry? Be conscious of others that a client, prospect or candidate may mistake you for and how their reputation may inadvertently be affecting your own.

• Social Media 101—Still in the early stages? Tips for how to get started and keys to measurement are closer than you thought: Webinar Presentation—Tags, Tweets & 2.0: Lessons in Social Media Musts & the Marketing Evolution.

Jessica Elliott, Barbie Barta, Leslie Vickrey, Threase Baker and Diane Gellar enjoying the luncheon!

We’d like to give a tip-of-the-hat to Michelle Spellerberg, Sr. Director, Brand Management & Emerging Media, CareerBuilder.com, and Leah McKelvey, Marketing Manager, Staffing and Recruiting Group, CareerBuilder.com, who hosted a session called Recruiting: How connected are you? A social media workshop for your IT staffing firm. Their presentation had a number of great suggestions. If you haven’t already, check out a few sites they recommended and search yourself or your company just for kicks:

• Social Mention: Real-time social media search and analysis
• HootSuite: Manage multiple social networks—Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.—in one place
• BlogPulse: A trend discovery site for blogs
• Addictomatic: Searches the best live sites on the Web for the latest news, blog posts, videos and images

There were plenty of questions around legal issues and social media, such as who owns LinkedIn contacts. Be sure to reach out to Diane Geller of Gentry Locke Rakes & Moore to help answer your questions and put appropriate protections in place!

I would like to thank everyone who joined us at the luncheon, especially the following Women’s Roundtable Luncheon moderators who made this year’s event a great success.

• Threase Baker, Vice President of Operations and Owner, ABBTECH
• Barbie Barta, Vice President, PSCI
• Jamie Delsing, Managing Partner, Consultis
• Stephanie Schroeder, Vice President, NetEffects
• Susan Thaden, President/CEO, Client Resources, Inc.
• Amy Vasquez, Executive Vice President, Strategic Staffing Solutions (S3)
• Karen Wilson, President, MAKE Corporation

Lastly, I would like to encourage those who attended to add any comments—what we may have inadvertently left out or other thoughts you think should be shared. Please remember to keep the conversation going through TechServe Connect, the new private social networking site for TechServe Alliance members. TechServe Connect has an Executive Women’s Online Forum, a community created exclusively for the powerful and successful female executives in the IT services industry. Make sure you sign on to TechServe Connect and join the Executive Women’s Online Forum and connect with your peers!

I’ll leave you with these words of wisdom from Jack Santiago: Shoot for perfection. Settle for excellence. See you at next year’s Conference November 2-4 in Phoenix, AZ!

Leslie Vickrey
President & Founder
ClearEdge Marketing

Remember when the end of the year was a s-l-o-w time for the staffing and professional services industry? No? Good for you. That means you have been making the very most of end-of-year transitions to finish well and prepare for a new year of opportunities. As you begin that effort, your friends at ClearEdge Marketing have a few end-of-year tips to help you prime your 2010 marketing and sales game.

Five Pre-2010 Marketing Musts

1. Clean Your Prospect List. From Jill Ruiz, ClearEdge Senior Project Manager.
A good or mediocre prospect list is a weakness for any business today. Strengthen your database by ensuring it is a vetted and targeted list of prospective clients that are well worth marketing to. The time you save your sales staff on pursuing poor leads is extremely valuable. The money you save by ensuring marketing programs aren’t pushed out to the wrong contacts is precious. And the more time you focus on strong, qualified leads, the greater your chances are of winning new business. Here are three ways to ensure your prospect list remains lean and effective throughout 2010:

• Purge and update. Get rid of all outdated, inaccurate addresses. Involve your sales team in the clean-up and make it an ongoing effort that is part of your sales process throughout the year.

• Build it out. Grow your list by adding qualified leads from conferences you’ve attended, events you’ve hosted and other networking events and opportunities. Rented lists can also be a good way to enhance your current prospect list.

• Maintain, maintain, maintain. Schedule list clean-up days consistently and in advance to ensure useless addresses are weeded out. Once you’ve implemented multiple list-building tactics, regularly evaluate those investments and their return to determine whether eliminations are required.

2. Leverage Social Media. From Lia Pinto, ClearEdge Social Media Coordinator.
According to Forrester Research, 73% of Internet users worldwide have at least one social media account. Your clients, your candidates and the people you want as clients and candidates are networking, learning and socializing through social media channels in greater numbers. 2010 is not the year to fall behind in the continuous communication evolution. What do you do to keep pace with the social media movement?

• Appoint a person or build a social networking committee. Once you’ve decided to build a social media presence, hold someone accountable. Start with those in your organization who are already familiar with and frequenting social media sites. Identify internal team members who can help contribute content, keep up with networks on a regular basis and watch for information being shared about your business and industry across social networks. And remember-by listening to your clients and peers you will learn how to engage/relate with them.

• Set reasonable, strategic goals. Start slowly and strategically by defining your audience and determining which social media tools and sites your business can leverage with ongoing success. Create a presence on networks where your audience “hangs out.” For example: Are they reading blogs? Do they keep up with Twitter? Do they share content on Digg? Are they viewing videos on YouTube? Are they on Facebook or LinkedIn? ROI for social media should also be different; it depends on what type of interaction you’re looking for and can be different with each organization, industry or social network. Additionally, ROI should not just be monetary, it should be measured “socially” as well.

• Be realistic. When it comes to social media, don’t spread your business too thin. It’s better to become the master of one or two social media sites than to sporadically and half-heartedly post content in five or six places and hope for results. Besides being realistic, also be transparent. Organizations present in social networks need to be truthful and attentive by responding to questions and comments and learning from suggestions and criticism.

3. Review Sales Processes for 2010. From Kathy Dooley, ClearEdge Marketing Director.
Forward-thinking organizations are preparing for the upswing of the market by optimizing their sales processes. Here’s what you can do:

• Examine sales capabilities. Are your sales team and selling approach aligned with how customers buy? Does your staff have the knowledge and tools needed to differentiate you from the competition? Look for gaps in skills and knowledge and find ways to rectify talent and knowledge issues. The beginning of the year is a crucial sales period and you need to have the best team, right from the start.

• Bring process discipline to your sales organization. If the sales process is not clearly mapped out for sales teams, define and map it now. It’s critical to competitive survival today to have a high-performing sales team that management can monitor and support. Without defined sales processes, it’s almost impossible to know how effectively teams are networking and selling.

4. Polish Your Web Site. From Krzysztof Pabian, ClearEdge Creative Director-Multimedia.
To make certain your number one marketing tool is inviting and can deliver bottom-line business results, you don’t need to break the bank. The following small investments in your Web site are worth every penny because they drive traffic and help bring business to you:

• Check the content. A careful sweep will ensure that your business’ messages are strong, clear, appealing and up-to-date. When’s the last time you posted a press release or event? Have you integrated your social media presence into your site? When kept current, your Web site shows visitors what a relevant and credible force your business is. A simple test: What year is your copyright line? We actually see sites with 2006!

• Check your design. Does your site load quickly? Look good on any browser (don’t forget to test Safari and mobile applications!)? If not, visitors could be leaving as soon as they see it. Now’s the time to ensure your site design echoes your brand and company character, and doesn’t get in the way of the site’s functionality.

• Put yourself at the top of the list. Search engine optimization (SEO) will help you achieve strong Internet accessibility. If you haven’t invested in SEO, now is the time. It means the difference between showing up on page one of a Google search, and showing up on page four. Quick fixes: Add title tags to every page and be sure to include meta tag descriptions! Oh, and is your URL registered on sites such as Google and Bing?

5. Get “Creative.” From Jessica Castaneda, ClearEdge Marketing Director.
In our daily dealings with professional services and staffing firms, the ClearEdge team often hears clients say “Once we’re in front of clients, we always win the business. The tricky part is getting in front of them.” What are some of the best ideas for getting in front of prospects for the New Year?

• Use the power and accessibility of the Web. Webinars are an increasingly popular means of sharing expertise and thought leadership in a non-salesy, easily accessible manner. Prospects that may not be open to face-to-face meetings, may be willing to listen in on an informative Webinar as they eat their lunch. As long as the material is relevant and timely and you market your event appropriately, you are sure to gain the audience you seek. For additional credibility, consider teaming up with an association that caters to your target market. Associations are always on the lookout for educational content for their constituency. They may be willing to co-host such events and market them to their membership.

• Form networking groups. Unlike social media sites, networking groups enable you to build long-term relationships with clients and prospects using face-to-face interactions. Building an intimate networking group that enables peers-such as CIOs or CEOs-to share ideas, best practices and lessons learned will position you as an industry insider and trusted partner.

• Prepare to launch a Target Account Program (TAP). A TAP allows your business to rapidly increase awareness and create new business opportunities by honing in on a targeted group of well-researched prospective clients. Properly implemented, a TAP will enable you to increase sales activity and-most importantly-set new appointments!

“Out with the old and in with the new.” You often hear this as the New Year approaches. At ClearEdge Marketing, we say “In with the programs and processes that work,”-be they new best practices or old ones-and out with those that haven’t shown a proper return! The real key to success is taking time to prepare your marketing and sales strategy, and that time is now. Welcome to 2010, the prelude. Be sure and make the most of it.

Leslie Vickrey
President & Founder
ClearEdge Marketing

Be purposeful, be daring, be creative, be likable and have fun. If that doesn’t sound like the droning recession and recovery advice you’re hearing on the cable news stations, I’m not surprised.

These are just a few of the many lessons I gathered at the 2009 TechServe Alliance Conference & Tradeshow in Las Vegas a couple of weeks ago. Since the event, my head has been brimming with bright and bold ideas I took in as an attendee and as a speaker on IT services marketing. I want to share some of what I learned at the Conference with the hopes that these lessons inspire new thinking and clever 2010 strategies for your organization.

Do They Like You? It’s a Question Worth Asking.
In business, being liked is not a question of feeding egos; it’s a matter of closing deals. Ken Schmidt, branding guru for Harley-Davidson, shared this insight in his keynote address, which explained how people buy from people (brands and businesses) they like. No matter how clever an ad campaign is or how ambitious the sales person, a prospect will not buy from a company if they don’t actually like you and want to work with your organization. So how do you get prospects to want to work with you? Here was Ken Schmidt’s seasoned advice:

• Don’t rely on subtle cues. Be clear and consistent in your messages and goals. Don’t be afraid to ask bold questions like, “What do we need to do to get you to try our services?” And remember, the meeting is a much bigger deal to you, than it is the client.

• Be clearly, noticeably, purposefully different. It doesn’t matter how any other company does it. Only worry about conducting business the way you know how, with clients and prospects’ needs at the top of your mind. Let them know you value what they say. If they want to see X happen, tell them you’ll take their idea back to headquarters. Making them feel important and valued will help build and strengthen your relationship.

• Do something they won’t expect. Here’s an example: On your way to your next sales meeting, call the client 15 minutes in advance and say, “I thought about stopping at Starbucks on my way to our meeting, would you like me to bring you anything?” It’s different. It’s something they won’t expect. It will make them feel like you did something special for them. If they say no, you don’t stop. But at least you asked.

• Listen and understand. You MUST understand your clients and prospects’ needs, even if those current needs do not include you. If a client or prospect says they don’t need your services at this time, respect that. Send a note with an article you think they would find interesting, and let them know you look forward to having them as a customer-but until then, you hope they’re well. It’s polite and courteous. And who doesn’t like that? Just remember to stay in touch with them from time to time until they are ready to become a customer, and try to give them reasons why they should be.

Be Focused, Firm and Fun
Keynote speaker Cynthia Pasky, who is the founder, president and CEO of Strategic Staffing Solutions (S3), shared her firm belief in how client relationships built on trust are the ones that last. Pointing to S3′s rigorous, unswerving focus on specific industries, she explained how that strong focus on building rock solid relationships across those industries has allowed S3 to enter its 20th consecutive year of growth and profitability. Pasky offered the following ideas for how IT services organizations could replicate their success:

• Define the market-don’t let it define you. Understand what you want the market to be. And know what you want your business to be in terms of clients, size, industry and what type of GM%. Be clear from the bottom up, and stick to it-even if it means you have to walk away from business.

• Don’t overlook account penetration. Ask yourself what else you can sell to existing clients. Is there market share to be had? Do you see competitors when you walk the clients’ halls? If so, there’s share to be had.

• Keep cold calling. Cindy still does it and believes it should be part of every sales rep’s approach.

• Be creative and have fun. If you don’t have a badge that allows you to get into your clients’ halls, sneak in behind someone who does. You haven’t done your job if you haven’t been thrown out of your customers’ offices a few times. While this approach isn’t for everyone, being bold in the right cases can help set you apart and show you’ll do anything to win the business and service the client. Do everything you can to be selling and take good care of your team as you do it. Have fun. Enjoy what you’re doing.

Make Your Message Your Own
I was privileged to lead two marketing discussions energized by enthusiastic participants who are eager to differentiate their marketplace messages and become more effective sales and marketing professionals. One of the primary keys to increasing sales and marketing effectiveness is better collaboration between these two groups.

A poor sales-marketing partnership means longer sales cycles, increased cost of sales, missed opportunities and the risk of looking incompetent to clients and potential customers. A strong sales-marketing partnership equals a rich, qualified pipeline of prospects that feeds a successful, strong sales cycle. Here are a handful of the winning strategies ClearEdge shared with Conference attendees for improving sales and marketing relationships and performance.

• Alignment to the sales cycle. Marketing teams need to design tools that effectively support their sales teams at every juncture of the sales process.

• Targeted account lists. Every sales professional/account executive should be working off of a short, targeted account/prospect list. By building separate, vetted targeted account lists, a business maximizes its sales efforts. Account execs will no longer end up calling into the same account or accidentally calling an existing client.

• Role reversals. Neither sales nor marketing should work in a vacuum. Send marketing out with sales to meet customers and see their environments, learn customer and prospect challenges first hand, see hard jobs like cold calling and presentations first hand, and understand the responsibilities, stress, routine and tools of sales professionals. Send sales over to marketing to learn how programs are developed, the science behind marketing, the people behind the work and the work behind the work.

• Metrics and measurement. To know the effectiveness of a marketing tool or program, you must measure new revenue and clients by program and campaign, the number of lead generations that can be tied to a specific marketing program or tool, as well as how clients and prospects responded to each program or tool. Successful measurement requires a simple reporting system for sales (e.g. CRM, Excel, or an online tool like Salesforce.com), as well as open and honest communications between sales and marketing.

• Centralized tools and information. Easy access to critical information-for both marketing and sales-will ensure a continued symbiotic relationship between the two departments. Marketing should ensure that up-to-date items like collateral, program results and success stories, as well as tool and program training resources are available to the sales team in a central, easy-to-find location. Sales should make information on program progress, program results and in some cases, prospect lists, readily available to marketing teams.

We’ll here’s hoping you still like me and ClearEdge despite the length of this blog. As you ponder my likeability, please remember I have only covered three sessions from a Conference that was packed with more than 30 lesson-rich sessions. Of course, I might share more next month so be sure and tell me what you’d like to hear more (or less) about and I will gladly oblige.

Leslie Vickrey
Founder & President
ClearEdge Marketing

While the use of print ads, radio/TV ads and event marketing has been down recently, e-mail marketing is one form of communication businesses are really clicking with. A recent Marketing Sherpa survey found that e-mailing to house lists was up 48%. A Forrester Research survey predicts that in five years, clients will be deluged with more than 9,000 e-mail marketing messages annually. That’s about 25 messages every day. With more businesses utilizing this marketing method how can you ensure your e-mails aren’t deleted faster than you can say “junk mail?” 

To answer this question, let’s first look at the reasons e-mail marketing is so popular.  

It’s cost-effective. You can run a valuable, effective e-mail campaign with a minimal investment to create and manage. And forget about postage or envelopes. With e-mail marketing, you can get your message out to hundreds, even thousands of contacts in a matter of seconds, by clicking a few buttons. 

It’s simple. Whether you manage your campaign in-house or use a third party, the tools to send it are very intuitive and easy to use, and the results are easy to measure. 

It’s accessible. Nearly everyone has an e-mail address and can be reached via this medium. 

It can be as frequent as you’d like (just don’t go overboard). With a plan and some discipline, e-mail marketing allows you to regularly stay in front of your clients and prospects. 

While these characteristics make e-mail marketing popular, the popularity brings consequences, including a decrease in industry-wide response metrics and in subscriber tolerance. Dozens of e-mail marketing messages every day means recipients may not have the time or interest to even open a message, let alone click through it. And while someone may have signed up to receive your messages, too many will cause them to put you on the top of their blocked senders list. 

What You Need to Avoid the Blocked Senders List

A plan, discipline and the following tips will help you stay in front of your clients and prospects, providing them with perfectly timed, high-quality e-mail marketing messages. 

• Thoughtful, valuable content. Whether you send your message in the form of a newsletter, Keep-in-Touch (KIT) program or e-card, content is king. Your message must be clear, concise and appealing, so that people will read it, gain interest, and ideally, reach out to you. But you can’t just have great content. It needs to be appealing and appropriate for each segment of your target audience. While you may not have the resources to craft a different message for each group, you can create different subject lines that are relevant for each.

• Branded template. Your e-mail template doesn’t have to be elaborate, but you want readers to know it’s from you. A simple, generic design that includes your company logo and reflects your brand can be reused time and again.

• Discipline and consistency. Just as two trips to the gym each year will not prepare you for a triathlon, your e-mail marketing campaign will not gain client interest if you only send it twice a year. To increase open rates, you must be consistent. If your campaign is monthly, it’s important to send your message around the same time month-over-month (e.g. the third week of the month). A little discipline will go a long way in your effort to stay top-of-mind with those on your list, and the more familiar your list members are with your company, the more likely they are to open your message.

• Consider a third-party service. While you can use a personal e-mail program such as Microsoft Outlook or Lotus Notes, programs like Vertical Response and Constant Contact allow you to upload your e-mail template, test it, send it to a large (or small) list and track the results of your campaign. Both programs are relatively inexpensive and are easy to use.

Measuring Your Results

Once you’ve blasted your message to your list, programs like Vertical Response and Constant Contact allow you to see results on things like who opened it, clicked on any link within your e-mail, as well as which e-mails bounced, and who unsubscribed from your campaign. MailChimp provides an “apples to apples” benchmark comparison for small businesses in several industries, so you can see how your numbers compare.

If your open rate is low (under 25%) on your first few campaigns, don’t be disappointed. It can take several months for people to become familiar with your company and gain interest in your messages. But there are several things you can try to boost your open rate over time. Play around with subject lines, always keeping them simple and short. Experiment with launch times as well. You may be more likely to open a message on Thursday or Friday afternoon when the week is winding down, as opposed to Monday morning when your inbox is filled with requests. Another method is to identify the recipients who haven’t opened the message and have your sales team and recruiters forward the original to them with a personal note. This helps them see your subject line as relevant to them individually.

While it may take a while to perfect your timing and subject line formula, one thing is certain. A list filled with incorrect or old e-mail addresses will not reap positive results. It’s better to have a shorter, accurate list, than a long one filled with addresses that aren’t in use anymore. So take the time to clean your list! Before you blast your message, check for typos, broken links and missing graphics. And remember: you can never send too many tests.

Jessica Elliott
Marketing Director
ClearEdge Marketing

In this economy, IT staffing and consulting firms are seeing many of their clients not only cut back or freeze hiring, but inevitably go through staff layoffs. Our first instinct is to cut and run, don’t waste your time, they aren’t buying. But should you move to greener pastures when layoffs are in full swing at client locations?

Taking the Long-Term View
We all talk about how important it is to build long-term partnerships with our clients. That commitment is never more apparent than when clients go through layoffs. How you treat, value and support clients during the dry spells in hiring activity can have a significant impact on the viability of that partnership when the rains come pouring back. So, how do you demonstrate customer care and build client loyalty when your customers aren’t buying? Below I’ve outlined a simple, two-part approach you can take to help keep your client relationships strong, position yourself as a true long-term partner and enable you to tap into new talent sources and a wealth of future business.

Part 1: Make Your Client Shine Now
Your client is going through a tough spell; tensions amongst their rank and file are no doubt high. Providing a few simple, value-add services can make them stand out to their retained staff, in their communities and to their displaced alumni. While you are not an outplacement firm — nor should you try to be one — you are a master at finding, vetting and placing professionals. Develop a communication your client can disseminate to their displaced workers with a list of available services you are willing to provide, some ideas include:

1. Resume tips and techniques – No one knows resume best practices better than your recruiters. So offer a free webinar to your client’s downsized staff. Review basic resume tips, techniques as well as pitfalls to avoid.

2. Jump start their job search – After a period of adjustment, displaced workers will be ready to start looking for new opportunities. Offer to include their resumes in your database with the expectation that if an opportunity arises they will definitely be called.

3. Become their career expert – Develop a monthly or quarterly newsletter — or develop a career page on your Web site – that gives clients, their current staff and their displaced workers industry information, career advice and current job openings. This positions you as an expert to your client, while also opening the door to future referrals as downsized staff find other employment and possibly run across opportunities for your business.

Part 2: Help Your Client Plan for the Future
While it may seem premature to begin future-state workforce planning while actively going through a downsizing, it’s actually the perfect time. Layoffs are often a reaction to short-term, cost-containment issues; but that won’t always be the case. Downsizes, however painful, give the client a unique opportunity to plan for and develop a more appropriate workforce structure based on future business goals. Offering your workforce expertise during this process will enable you to build an even more solid partnership with the client.

1. Technology and Skills Assessment – Offer a high-level, technology and skills assessment. Will the skills they currently have in place support their six-, 12- or 24-month business goals? Are there key software or infrastructure changes on the horizon that will drive the type of skills they will need to retain or recruit?  By providing your client with an assessment of their current workforce and a forecast of the top skills they will need in the near future, you are helping them make better workforce decisions in order to meet their overarching organizational goals.

2. Flexible Workforce Planning – Having the right skills in place is critical, but developing an optimal workforce structure for their organization will help your client keep costs down and efficiencies high. After all, those were some of the reasons for their current layoffs. By assisting your client in proactively planning for the right mix of direct hires, contract staff and outsourced engagements, they will be in a better position to quickly ramp up or ramp down operations in order to meet the changing demands of the marketplace.

It Pays in the Long Run
For any firm, it is obviously critical to maintain profitability and focus on what is currently making your business money. But, it’s is also important to keep your name in front of clients who may not be ready to buy. The beauty of these value-added services is in the “offering” itself. Just letting clients know you are committed to the partnership despite their current spend will gain you incredible leverage — regardless of whether they take you up on the offers.

Keep in mind, the inevitable economic upswing will soon affect everyone, including your clients. Actively maintaining your relationships, demonstrating your value and supporting your clients during layoffs and dry
spells — when many of your competitors have long hit the road — will put you in the best possible position to shut out the competition and capture significant client-share when activity does pick back up.

Jessica Castaneda
Marketing Director
ClearEdge Marketing

After returning from the recent Staffing Industry Analysts Executive Forum, I’d like to share several best practices from keynote presentations and roundtable discussions that are top-of-mind with many business leaders today. For your benefit, we added “marketing in action” tips and suggestions to each of the key takeaways.

Stay close to your customers.
Customer satisfaction surveys. These are a great way to make certain you’re meeting your customers’ needs. They allow you to learn firsthand what your clients are happy with and what needs to be improved—critical, strategic information no matter the economic climate. But it’s not enough to just distribute the surveys. Once you’ve gathered the results, share them! Let clients, prospects, everyone know that first-rate customer service is a top priority for you. And, if applying for awards or refreshing your message strategy, incorporate the metrics and insights you gather from surveys.

Keep-in-Touch Programs. The purpose of a Keep-in-Touch program (KIT) is to consistently, informatively and creatively distinguish your business by showcasing your internal knowledge and expertise to decision makers. KITs provide a vehicle for persistently reaching out to clients you already have, as well as those you’re trying to win. 

Status updates. Now more than ever, customers want and need to know exactly how you’re helping them. Frequent status updates are an effective way to ensure needs are being met—both on their end and on yours—and that the necessary progress is being made. 

Revisit your strategy and business model.
Get back to basics. Do you know your value proposition? If not, look at your clients’ pain points. How does your company address AND fix these pains? If you can’t sum this up in less than three minutes (1-2 sentences), you’re not focused enough. Once you know what your value proposition is, focus, focus, focus on it and consistently use that message in everything you do. If you communicate your value effectively and clearly emphasize what makes you different, you’ll find clients moving from competitors’ client rosters over to yours.

Create brand advocacy. Get referrals. Ask for client testimonials and create case studies to add to your marketing arsenal. When your arsenal is well stocked with a range of messages and proof points that tell a consistent, provocative story, you’ll be able to produce campaigns that reach the right audience, drive significant business leads and expand brand awareness. If your clients love your work, it doesn’t hurt to ask them to advocate your brand!

Aim for lead conversion, not just lead generation. Measure Target Account Program (TAP) results, and if lead conversion is low, see what you can do to increase it. Make sure your message is reaching the right audience within your target company, even if it means slightly different campaigns depending on the audience.

Be of service.
Examine your existing client accounts. Make sure you’re doing all you can to serve and add value to their business. Come up with innovative ideas to retain your client base as well as shift to growth markets. If you’re tapped out with existing clients, ask them for referrals into new companies. Get them to introduce you whenever possible.

Remember your ABCs. A great tip from one of the marketing roundtable panelists. Always Be Closing (ABC). Everyone on your team needs to be a salesperson, especially in this economy. Your whole team should be thinking about new ways to provide clients with valuable service in addition to ways to bring in new business. Just by answering the phone with the most positive tone possible and being of absolute service can help!

Communicate, communicate, communicate.
Communicate internally, as well as externally. Not only should your clients, prospects and other key stakeholders be informed on what’s happening with your company, but your internal team should be up-to-date as well. If your team understands your company’s bigger picture, they’ll better understand how they fit into it and the role they play in reaching company goals. There’s no such thing as over communicating with your team—during economic downturns and always!

Ensure your Web site is in tip top shape. Keep your content up-to-date and correct. Track where visitors are going, what pages they’re staying on, what they’re interested in—and focus on maintaining and updating those areas while looking for ways to improve the less popular areas. We live in a world where the first thing people do when they hear about a company is visit its Web site. This means there is no marketing tool more important than your site… so make the most of it!

Along with the strategies outlined above, it’s important to remember to network. It’s crucial to embrace social media networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn, as well as blogging. Learn what each can do for you, and then actively participate on them.

Leslie Vickrey
President & Founder
ClearEdge Marketing

ClearEdge Marketing may seem like a young team if you were to examine our company timeline (founded in 2006) or become distracted by our youthful good looks. In truth, most of us at ClearEdge have been marketing together for well over a decade.

In the 1990s, the ClearEdge team was deep in the corridors and offices of corporate America. We were building and managing large-scale marketing, advertising, PR and branding programs for professional services, technology and healthcare companies.  We  worked with large publicly traded companies as well as small start-up firms. Today, we are still together doing what we love—marketing, advertising, PR and branding. The difference is our approach. Embracing the outsourcing models we long helped clients to market, ClearEdge now serves as a flexible and scaleable outsourced marketing team to a diverse range of national and multinational companies.

Why does this model work for ClearEdge? First of all, there is a great need in the marketplace. When our founder, Leslie Vickrey, decided to build her own marketing firm, she knew there were copious small and mid-size professional services, staffing and IT services companies nationwide without the budget for full-time marketing resources. They needed on-demand, highly effective marketing support that allowed them to compete with larger, widely established firms while staying within the bounds of modest marketing budgets.

Professional services companies—experts in the consulting and outsourcing model—were quick to see value and cost efficiency of outsourced marketing resources. In just a few years, ClearEdge has become the go-to marketing support firm for the IT professional services industry and continues to deepen its reach into finance, healthcare and legal.

Our outsourced model has also brought ClearEdge back to our roots of big, global corporate marketing. Changing business models coupled with recent economic difficulties have made outsourced marketing support a very useful tool for large companies and global enterprises as well. Today ClearEdge supports internal teams and runs marketing projects for Fortune 1000 firms, demonstrating that outsourcing is as much a part of the Chief Marketing Officer’s toolkit as it is for today’s CIOs, COOs and CFOs.

The amazing part for us—the ClearEdge staff—is that we get the best of all worlds. We still get to work on the dynamic, creative and deliberate marketing programs we love. Some are small and targeted, some are expansive. All are strategic and measured.

We get to work on local and regional projects as well as global initiatives. We get to be part of large, corporate marketing teams, we get to lead marketing teams and sometimes we ARE the marketing team.

Our work is rich in learning and diversity. Marketers are hungry for knowledge, new market research, industry news, new technologies, new ways to share information, new imagery, new words, new ways of thinking. At ClearEdge, learning is our constant working mode as we study and build strategies and tools for taking on the unique and challenging marketing needs of our diverse clientele. The reservoir of knowledge we are continually building has allowed us to bring new and intriguing ideas to our clients time and again.

Best of all, the ClearEdge outsourced model allows us to work with talented, hardworking and passionate colleagues who live and work in locations across the country and in a few cases across the globe. ClearEdge prides itself on being a small team of committed marketers who achieve big success. A close-knit, happy team with big goals and bold resolve. That’s how we see our work at ClearEdge Marketing—the best of all worlds.

Jessica Castaneda
Marketing Director
ClearEdge Marketing

With the current economic turmoil, many companies are turning inward and holding on to their cash reserves. While it’s always wise to be shrewd with your money—regardless of how the economy is fairing—the old adage “you need to spend money to make money” still holds true.

The good news is that there are tactics you can employ that will have a minimal cost associated with them—but will produce great returns, build your brand and increase your lead generation efforts. In fact, if done right, the ROI from employing all of these tactics will only continue to improve over time. So just what are these tactics?

1. Incorporate search engine optimization (SEO) best practices
Today, more than ever, we’re inundated with so many messages that when people need to search for something, they just Google it. Making sure your company ranks high in organic search results doesn’t happen magically—nor does it happen overnight. But it can happen. The outcome—a flood of new, and possibly returning, visitors to your site—and therefore, more revenue.

These best practices range from keyword research and incorporating the keywords that resonate with your audience across all mediums to confirming your site structure is search-engine friendly and using correct programming code to draw the right attention to keywords on your page.

2. Improve your Web site
Amidst some speculation out there, content is STILL king. Review your site’s content. Does it resonate with your target audience? Is it up to date? Is it Web-friendly? Does it have a call to action on each page? Beef up and revise content as needed, making sure that you incorporate applicable keywords as part of your SEO strategy.

Also, understand the behavior of your Web site visitor by analyzing your site’s traffic. Once you see a trend or a pattern, take steps to remedy any glaring problems so that your visitors will stay on your site longer.

3. Create a blog
Remembering that content is king, producing a blog with targeted posts focused on key industry topics is a guaranteed win-win-win. Your target audience will gain insight and be able to share their comments about that posting.

At the same time, you will be able to leverage its content across multiple marketing mediums. These mediums can range from e-newsletters as part of a Target Account Program (TAP), Facebook and Twitter, to providing you the option of sending clients/prospects a link to a blog posting highlighting the sales point you’re addressing. Your company will also be able to demonstrate its expertise on select topics and, when done right, it will also help you to become a recognized industry resource. The days of long white papers have been replaced with informative blog posts and shorter articles focusing on key business-related topics.

Lastly, the search engines will associate this relevant content to your company when people are searching for topics related to your post—thus helping you increase in the search engine rankings (in other words, appear higher on the list).

4. Implement a linking strategy
People are short on time and new products and information are rolled out every hour. Unless you’re Microsoft or Coca-Cola, not everyone knows about who you are and what you have to offer. Implementing a linking strategy helps dwindle that percentage down—one comment at a time.

This is done by posting comments on various blogs and forums that ultimately directs others back to your site and/or blog. For example, you’re in IT staffing and are looking to recruit potential SAP developers. Locate and join any user groups and communities focused on SAP. Once a member, post comments and reply to other people’s comments (a.k.a. threads). Continue to do this for a couple of posts, and then start to mention in future posts that your company specializes in IT staffing and is in need of SAP developers. Provide a link to your site and/or job posting. Repeat this process across multiple mediums and sites.

5. Invest in social media
People have been connecting to friends, family and colleagues on MySpace, Facebook and Twitter for some time and businesses have discovered how powerful these social networking and social messaging sites are for reaching their target audience.

Like businesses, consumers are also turning inward during this economic situation. They are making more and more purchasing decisions based upon recommendations from friends and colleagues in their network. This trend is expected to only continue—thus promoting the need to not only have a company presence on these social networking and social messaging sites, but also actively post and comment on them.

As with anything online, these tactics should complement each other. This creates a synergy that enables you to maximize your efforts and build your brand, while generating additional revenue. Another benefit to having an online presence is that it enables you to modify your messaging and/or approach at a moment’s notice—helping you stay current with the latest trends and hot topics.

So what are you waiting for? Get out there and get online! Start experiencing firsthand the benefits of implementing these five key methods to help you to generate additional revenue.

Elizabeth Smith
Director of Social Media Marketing
ClearEdge Marketing

I was reading an article recently that talked about evangelism. Not the Jim and Tammy Bakker style of evangelism—but customer evangelism. The article started out with this question: What is the most effective advertising tool available?

A. TV
B. Print ads
C. Billboards
D. Your customers 

If you answered “D,” you’re onto one of the hottest new trends in marketing—customer evangelism.

The concept of customer evangelism is all about creating true believers in your company. When you build this kind of loyalty, you gain two priceless assets: a pool of repeat customers and ongoing word-of-mouth referrals to new customers.

The tricky part: you can’t hire or buy customer evangelists. You have to earn them. But how? According to Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba, authors of Creating Customer Evangelists: How Loyal Customers Become a Volunteer Sales Force, the following techniques can help you build a loyal following.

-Constantly communicate with customers to understand what they love about your products and services.
-Share knowledge with customers to increase the perceived and actual value of a service.
-Build “buzz” based on sincere, personal referrals. 
-Create a customer community, where people who care about your business, products or services can gather.
-Provide “bite-size” products or services so customers can share the experience without an expensive purchase.
-Aim for a larger cause to create emotional connections.
 
How do these techniques translate into real life? Today there are plenty of ways to build customer evangelists. For now, I’ll focus on constant communication and building a buzz based on referrals.

Constant communication. Company blogs are perhaps the easiest, most cost-efficient and widest-reaching way to stay in constant touch with clients. Blog content can be posted quickly, it is informal yet controlled, and it provides a forum for feedback on the subject matter posted. Other benefits to blogs that are often overlooked are that they can give companies higher search engine rankings and exposure to a wider, diverse customer community. An example of a company with a wide-reaching blog is Google. Their blog talks about everything from issues they think are important to society to company news. Keep blogs informative, avoid marketing “fluff,” and keep them fresh.

Another opportunity to turn clients into evangelists is through your company newsletter. Even if your client or prospective client isn’t looking to purchase your services right at that time, they are reminded of you and perhaps learned something from your newsletter that they might share with a colleague. Whether your newsletter is printed or sent via e-mail, you’ve established top-of-mind awareness and another chance to connect with clients.

Building a Buzz. Of course “word of mouth” advertising is invaluable. It says something about your reputation as people typically only recommend a company where they’ve had stellar service and have been treated well. Any opportunity to post customer testimonials on your Web site or to include them in a newsletter gives clients a taste of what other similar companies are experiencing and a look at new ways that they themselves might be able to maximize your services.
 
One final word of advice—keep things natural. While it’s important to encourage customer evangelism, don’t try to force it.

Jennifer Higgins
Senior Writer
ClearEdge Marketing

If you are an IT executive looking for a true thrill and profound inspiration in 2008 (one that I guarantee will make your knees tremble and your palms sweaty), I suggest you consider high tea. Tea might not sound very intimidating, but let me introduce you to the hosts: they are young, bright, thoughtful achievers from across inner-city Chicago, and they represent the future of our IT industry. They are i.c.stars.   

i.c.stars is an innovative technology mentoring program designed to foster the skills of driven young people (ages 18-27) who often lack formal education but are rich in ambition, ideas and smarts. An intensive four-month technology and business immersion, the program is producing skilled, inventive technology enthusiasts who are going on to jobs at leading IT firms across the Chicago community. You can read a profile of the program, its history and its success by Chicago Sun-Times writer and former news anchor Carol Marin here.  

i.c.stars high tea events are part of their leadership training program in which interns host an afternoon tea for a technology leader from the Chicago community. Their job is to interview the professionals they invite to tea in order to gain knowledge, learn from the experiences of an industry veteran and challenge norms. Let me tell you this: The toughest job interviewer you have faced is nothing compared to a table of 10 eager and intelligent i.c.stars interns ready to question, challenge, discuss, debate, laugh and learn.  

My high tea experience with i.c.stars was mind-blowing not only because of the rate at which these young people are learning and growing, but also because I was learning as quickly as they were. I had tea for an hour with the current crop of i.c.stars interns, and it was one of the most important hours in my technology career. They were sponges who, after introducing me to the entire table of interns, began an interview process during which I was put on the spot, challenged, asked serious questions and invited to question their ideas and assumptions. 

It was both exhilarating and exhausting, but most of all it was full of promise. I was able to see the potential of our IT industry in the eyes and ideas of these young interns. And, despite what economic reports may warn, our future is full of promise.  

The goal of i.c.stars is to help develop future IT leaders, which is an important objective for the entire IT industry. If we want a stronger IT industry tomorrow, we must commit to training and educating tomorrow’s leaders. i.c.stars offers today’s IT leaders a perfect opportunity to help strengthen the future of the technology industry while also giving back to the community. If you are like me, finding the time to “give back” in a meaningful way is not simple. However, attending high tea with i.c.stars is a simple (albeit challenging and provocative) way to share your knowledge and give to both the community and the industry.  

I would like to challenge IT executives and leaders from across the Illinois region to have a cup of tea or two with i.c.stars. Discover how i.c. stars can turn one hour into a week’s worth of learning and get a glimpse of how great our future technology leadership can be. If you are not in the Illinois region, then let me encourage you to consider a professional mentorship program in your own community. Giving back to future generations is not only rewarding, it is inspiring. What could be better for the soul or our technology future than pure inspiration?

Leslie Vickrey
President & Founder
ClearEdge Marketing

Your prospect list should be the foundation of your sales strategy. It should be the very first thing your sales team does to prepare for any type of sales or marketing activity – be it cold calling or a full-on target account program. A strategically developed and validated prospect list is the most important element to any successful sales program. Yet it is often the most neglected part of the sales process. 

The best prospect lists are made, not bought.
By this I don’t mean you cannot start with a purchased list. Hoovers, Dun & Bradstreet or even appropriate publications and associations are great channels to gather potential sales targets. But you cannot stop there. These lists are fantastic until about 60 seconds after you purchase them. Without a good degree of validation from sales teams – meaning actively reaching out to each contact and verifying that they are still at the company and their contact information is still correct, they get stale very quickly. Once you have the right information in your system, you can use it as part of a Keep-in-Touch (KIT) Program or Target Account Program (TAP).  

Know your target.
The best way to identify the right target for your company is to know what you are looking for. Take a look at your current clients. Who are your best clients right now? Who are your ideal clients, those you wish you were doing business with? Are your best clients also your ideal clients? If not, why not? Questions like these will help you narrow down the type of prospects you would like to go after. It will also help you segment prospects into categories – “A list” are those prospects who fit your “ideal” criteria, “B list” may be prospects who would be good to have in your client base, but not as ideal as the “A list”, and so on. Moving clients from the “B list” to the “A list” are important too. Once you know who you want and their priority for your firm, your sales team has a much clearer plan of attack and can more productively spend their time getting the right business. 

Know your list.
Once you have a base list of prospects, your team should make sure that list is up-to-date and accurate. Nothing says “uninterested in my business” like a campaign targeted to the CIO who left 10 months prior. I remember a firm who developed a high-end, multi-week direct mail campaign to CIOs. The campaign theme was on target, the message compelling and the giveaways were interesting. Management asked the sales team for its “top tier” prospects to be included in the program. All was set and the campaign launched. Then, nothing. What happened? Come to find out when management “took a closer look” at the prospect lists their sales team swore by, they realized over 50% of the e-mails were incorrect, resulting in only half of the campaign reaching targeted prospects. Not to mention that many of the targets were no longer with those organizations. It’s no wonder the campaign ROI was low. It starts with knowing your list, knowing your targets.  

Grow and nurture your list.
Your prospect list should be a growing part of your business. As you interact with targets on your list, they will move up and down in priority as their needs and interests change. Some “B list” folks may move up to the “A list” and conversely some “A list” targets may be demoted to a “B list” prospect. But, regardless of where on the list your targets fall, they should never be ignored. The point of prioritizing your prospect list is to identify who gets your most immediate and fervent attention – not who gets attention, period. Keeping constant communication with your list is the only way to keep it current. Communication vehicles such as Keep-In-Touch (KIT) Programs or Target Account Programs (TAP) are great ways to do just that. 

Adding to your list.
The best way to grow your prospect list is what we call the “homegrown” approach. This isn’t an earth-shattering revelation. Basically, you add people with whom you’ve come in contact and had a chance to interact and evaluate. It may be someone from a conference, networking lunch or little league. It could be online leads, such as those from LinkedIn or Facebook.  

Don’t forget your current accounts.
If you haven’t captured 100% of your current clients’ business then they should be on your prospect list. Different departments, sister divisions, the list goes on. Use your loyal clients within these businesses to help you spread the word. Penetration programs targeting specific companies are a great way to give you an edge over outside competition. In any sales program, never forget to include your current clients and penetration leads. 

Quality over quantity.
Wouldn’t you rather invest time and resources into 100 solid prospects who will get you the type of business that will move your company forward than in 1,000 prospects who may end up wasting your time and resources?  

A little due diligence, some solid prioritizing and a program of constant communication can help you develop relationships with leads that will pay off well into the future.   

Document list activity.
One last step, crucial to the success of your prospect list, is documenting your activity in a Contact Management System (CMS). While it can be a hassle to keep up, the CMS helps you manage your prospects and keep track of who you called or reached out to, and when. Depending on the CMS your company uses, you can even track the success of your marketing campaigns. It also helps with metrics, so you know personally how much activity you require to meet your goals. When your prospect list is managed properly, at campaign time you can more easily pull your list of contacts and know you’ll see a greater return. And isn’t that the reason for your list in the first place?

Jessica Castaneda
Marketing Director
ClearEdge Marketing

Have you ever noticed that the colors you see on your monitor or desktop printouts don’t exactly match the colors on the pieces you get professionally printed? My goal today is to help you understand why this sometimes happens, and how you can better manage your print jobs to ensure a better color match.  First, it’s important to understand some lingo we use in the design and printing world. Here are a few abbreviations we use, and what they represent: 

• RGB – refers to the colors red, green and blue
• CMYK – stands for cyan (blue), magenta (red), yellow and black
• PMS – stands for Pantone Matching System® 

The differences between RGB and CMYK

RGB is used in computer monitors, digital cameras, scanners and art designed for the Web. RGB is used for Web work, whereas CMYK and PMS are used for print work. For best results, your artwork should be created in PMS or CMYK from the start, not created in RGB and then converted later on.  

Why doesn’t the color on my monitor match the printout?

The colors that you see on your computer screen may not exactly match what is reproduced by a high quality offset printing press — or, for that matter, even your desktop printer. Your computer monitor is calibrated in RGB — due to the different color models and the wide variation in monitor technologies, the colors will be similar, but not exact. Because of these differences the colors from one monitor to another may be quite different; therefore, you can’t realistically judge or compare what you see on screen to a printed product. 

Another avenue you can’t use to “match” press colors is the desktop printer. If you print a sample on your inkjet or laser color printer, there may be instances of substantial variations from the high quality produced from an offset lithographic printing press. This is due to the widely-varying results from different output devices including inkjet, thermal, dye sublimation and color laser printers, papers, inks, materials and even printers. Bottom line: when placed side-by-side, it is unlikely that the printed product you get from your commercial printer will match the colors on your monitor or a printout from your desktop printer. If your color is critical, be sure to order a color approval proof to be printed on the same material as your final graphics. 

Offset Press Printing

Most high quality commercial printing is done on an offset press using a four-color process called CMYK. As I mentioned before, CMYK stands for cyan (blue), magenta (red), yellow and black. These four colors are used to create the various shades of color on any given product. Offset printing can be 1-,
2-, 3- or 4-color. A separate film needs to be shot for each of the colors. Each time a color is added to the press, the press has to be washed down and the new ink added. Hence, the more colors used, the more expensive the printing costs. 

Spot Colors

Spot colors are used most frequently for one and two color jobs and when an exact color needs to be produced every time. Logos are perfect examples for spot colors. The Pantone® PMS color matching system is most frequently used for selection and printing of spot colors. For example, if your logo or brand is represented with a distinctive blue, be sure to let your commercial printer know this color needs to match a specific PMS. This number will then be matched on the press to deliver the exact result you need. If your logo wasn’t created in PMS colors then you will need to try and match your color using a Pantone Guide. 

Will my graphics match our Pantone® (PMS) solid ink colors?

To see how your PMS solid ink colors will reproduce in CMYK, it is suggested you review a Pantone® Color Bridge, or as it used to be known, a solid to process guide at Pantone’s Web site. The guide shows what happens when you reproduce Pantone Matching System® (PMS) colors in CMYK. Although many can be successfully simulated, a large majority cannot due to the limitations inherent in 4-color process (CMYK) printing. The fan guide displays Pantone® colors on stock alongside their closest 4-color process match. The CMYK screen values are provided for each process color. 

As you can tell, printing issues and lingo can be a lot to take in. But by understanding the printing process, and the obstacles that can come up during it, you ensure that there won’t be any surprises waiting for you the next time you visit the printer. Stay tuned for more design tips in blogs to come… 

Michelle LoGerfo
Graphic Designer
ClearEdge Marketing

In the wake of the 2007 NACCB Annual Conference & Tradeshow in Las Vegas, I’m still thinking about the valuable information I was able to absorb while I was there.  

Marking its 20th anniversary, the NACCB Annual Conference & Trade Show was a huge success with one of the highest turnouts ever. The event continues to be a great venue for senior executives in the IT services industry to share ideas with each other. From techniques on winning new clients to insights on the ever-changing world economy, everyone who attended the conference had something interesting to reveal–and to learn.

One of the most memorable lessons, for me (really a refresher course for us marketers to remind ourselves and our clients), came from Scott Ginsberg, speaker and author of Hello, My Name is Scott, The Power of Approachability, Make a Name for Yourself and How to be That Guy.

During his presentation, Scott asked conference goers ‘What are you known for?’ A question that some business owners know right away, many struggle to answer, but we all should ask ourselves. After all, if the owner of the business can’t sell someone on what makes their own company and services unique, then how can the sales team, or anyone on staff for that matter, be expected to do so? We discussed this crucial question during a marketing roundtable I had the opportunity to host, as well as two key thoughts Scott mentioned that are also imperative for a flourishing business, and more specifically, a brand that is impossible to forget.

Get noticed. Get remembered. Get business.
In the world of marketing, perhaps no project can accomplish these three things for your business more effectively than a combined Target Account Program (TAP) and Keep-in-Touch strategy. A TAP that includes a series of clever, informative drop-offs makes your prospective clients notice you, remember you, and if you follow through on it effectively, it encourages them to hire you. It’s one thing to have a list of potential clients. But it’s quite another to actively show them what your business is capable of while building a personal relationship with them, as a combined target account program and keep-in-touch strategy enables you to do.

Consistency is far better than rare moments of greatness.
A consistent message strategy is vital in engaging clients and keeping them for the long term. A fancy business card or a sharp tagline won’t get you far without a solid message and value proposition to back it up. A simple, unwavering message sets a foundation for your business to serve clients. It lets them know what they can expect to attain from working with you.

Before I go, I want to say I hope you gained as much from these ideas brought up at this year’s conference as I have. And the next time someone asks you what makes your business unique, I hope you have an unforgettable answer. Well, do you?

Leslie Vickrey
President & Founder
ClearEdge Marketing

In my last post, I discussed how blogging, when done right, can be a valuable means for businesses to communicate with key audiences (customers, prospects, partners, analysts).  However, the nature of blogging itself is risky; it gives one individual a powerful platform for communicating to the masses. Businesses need to be very careful in minimizing blogging risks by vetting and approving company blog content.“WAIT,” the purist might say. “A blog is one person’s journal, a unique perspective on the world. It’s not authentic if it’s shaped around business priorities and messaging standards.” That’s true only if that individual is representing merely himself/herself to the world. If the blog, however, is on a company site, discussing company issues, that blog is a business ambassador and must behave as such.

Consider this blogging blunder by a Microsoft employee, a story that was detailed in Al Sacco’s blog on CIO.com. It’s an interesting case because the blogger was writing on his own personal blog page, but he divulged proprietary company information and a Web link to internal company resources that he learned of while at his job at Microsoft. In this case, the employee was at fault, fault, fault and should have known by confidential agreements and common sense that such information can’t be made public unless the company has made it public.

In this age of online social networking and blogging, it’s important for businesses to remind employees that they cannot share proprietary company information with the public. Few employees are out to be malicious, they just forget or (as we all are guilty of at times) they are just not thinking.

Businesses need to be rigorous in creating and updating confidentiality agreements. We all need to be reminded of what you can and can’t say about business information in public forums. Reading and signing confidentiality agreements is an important way to help employees better manage the information they are given.

As for company blogs and blog entries, businesses need to make sure they are centrally reviewed before they are posted. Whether it’s communication teams or management teams doing the reviews, all entries going on company Web sites should be checked for accuracy, good grammar and to ensure that no proprietary or inappropriate information is being leaked.

Company blogs are a company product and should be in their very best form when they hit the Internet. No business strives to communicate and deliver mediocrity and blog entries should not become the place to start.

Sarah Schunk
Senior Writer
ClearEdge Marketing

Hands down one of the greatest surprises in my work with IT services firms is how often I encounter a company trying to run sales and marketing programs without prospect lists. Having a targeted list of qualified prospects (target account list) is sales and marketing 101, yet so many businesses have forgotten the importance and effectiveness of narrowing their sales scope in order to concentrate on the best opportunities.

Many sales professionals will look at me like I have a second head if I ask, “How big is the current prospect list you are working from? Or, how many times a week are you contacting the individuals on your prospect list?”

In sales and marketing, you have to have a bit of a bounty hunter’s mindset. You must know who your “Most Wanted” targets are and go after them with strategic, creative assertiveness. Without a well-developed prospect list, a significant amount of your sales and marketing efforts go to waste on unqualified or uninterested parties. With a strong prospect list, you are continually sending valuable messages to potential clients that need, use and have the funds for the services your organization provides.

As the final sales quarter of 2007 gets underway for businesses, I want to provide sales professionals with a 10-point reminder of the numerous reasons why it’s so important to work from a qualified prospect list:

Why Prospect Lists Are a MUST

1. Focus. A qualified prospect list allows sales professionals to focus on the best business and revenue opportunities.

2. Time. Sales professionals reduce their workloads significantly by building and working from one list of prospects that is regularly updated rather than sending out new information to a constantly changing group of recipients. They also don’t waste time chasing the wrong prospects.

3. Effectiveness. Working from a list of qualified prospects will always be more effective than striking out on your own with each new sales and marketing program. The prospect lists allows you to concentrate on the best sales opportunities, which increases your likelihood of making sales. 

4. Profiling. Having a target prospect list helps sales and marketing professionals to define and know the profile (size, industry, challenges, etc.) of target companies. It makes the entire marketing and sales organization more focused and effective.

5. Greater Access. With a targeted prospect, sales people have time to better get to know, research and make contact with the company. They are more likely going to have the time and resources to get to reach and know key decision makers, a vital step in the sales process. 

6. Reduced Redundancy. When sales teams do not work from prospect lists, they run the risk of having multiple sales professionals contact the same company. The result is a business looks disorganized to the prospective client. When all sales teams work on qualified sales lists that are centrally vetted for redundancies, these types of awkward sales replications will not occur.

7. Measurement. When a prospect list is used it is much easier for a business to measure the effectiveness of sales and marketing programs. The organization gains important insight into why certain programs piqued the interest of prospects and why others failed to make an impact.

8. Increased Organization. A qualified list is a critical tool in organizing the busy, busy schedule of today’s sales professionals who must make calls, attend events, go to business and sales events, make business pitches and attend meetings. The list is another important tool that allows sales professionals to measure and keep track of their progress in reaching prospects.

9. Image & Brand Building. Focusing marketing and sales messages on key clients in a strategic, focused method is one of the best ways to build a strong, memorable brand with key businesses. The prospect list allows marketing teams and the sales professionals to customize and direct messages to the target, creating stronger, more resonant messages.

10. Timing. The prospect list is also an important tool for helping determine how much time you have invested with a prospect. If prospecting efforts with a qualified lead have gone on for numerous months with zero response, it may be time to move the prospect to a secondary list in order to add new, warmer prospects to the A list.

Stay tuned to the ClearEdge blog for more on how to organize and update prospect lists and how to keep prospect lists growing with proven lead generation techniques.

Leslie Vickrey
President & Founder
ClearEdge Marketing

You know the ones, prospects who never take your calls, send you straight to voice mail or are heading into yet another meeting. If only they would give you five minutes of their time, you could tell them why your solutions are faster/better/different and how you can positively impact their business. Just five minutes! It’s frustrating. So much so that sometimes you just want to get into your car and head over there in person. And that is not such a bad idea.

But, before you stand outside their door screaming their name ala Marlon Brando in “A Street Car Named Desire,” you may want to put a plan together. That’s where a Target Account Program (TAP) can help. As the name suggests, a TAP is intended to help you target and get in front of your business’ level 1, gold-star, key prospects. It is a planned, scheduled and methodically executed multi-week program that uses a variety of marketing approaches – mail, in-person visits, calls, e-mail, etc. to help you stand out from the crowd. TAPs can vary depending on your target audience, but usually they involve in-person drop-offs of information about your services delivered in a clever and interesting manner often accompanied by a small giveaway that ties in with your message and theme.

Even the most cold-hearted prospect can’t ignore someone visiting week after week dropping off clever, funny or meaningful information – that is professional, interesting and always relevant to their business.

Choosing the “gold-star” prospects

In the book “Positioning: The Battle for your Mind” veteran marketing strategists Al Ries and Jack Trout write that an average person can rarely remember more than seven brands in any given product category. And that’s in a high-interest category. In low-interest categories, the average person is hard-pressed to remember more than one or two brands. Because of the clever and personal nature of TAP programs, they are a great way to get you a coveted spot in your prospects’ minds. But, because of their success, it’s natural to want to include as many prospects as possible in the TAP. Why not? If getting into the brains of 10 key prospects is good, 20 must be better, right? Not so fast.

The key to a successful TAP is planning, and the first step in planning a TAP is developing a pristine prospect list. Here are some critical things to consider:

Industry – Keep in mind that a key element in a TAP is the drop-offs. You’ll want to make sure you can actually get to your prospect or at least to the front desk at their company without running into obstacles such as security guards or key card access. Pharmaceutical companies and financial institutions are a couple of places with added security. And, unless you’re interested in a stint at Guantanamo, you’ll want to get approval prior to leaving drop-offs at government locations. A little due-diligence will go a long way to ensure you have drop-off friendly companies on your list.

Geography – It’s important to consider the geography of your prospects relative to your sales force. While you want to include your top 10 prospects in the first TAP you do, it may be more feasible to break up your prospect list by geography to ensure your sales force can effectively visit the locations within the schedule and not have to do a drive-by drop-and-run. It’s also important that your sales force has the opportunity to ask if the prospect is available and, if given the chance, the time to meet with them right then and there!

Another key point about geography is that what works in Mayberry doesn’t necessarily work in Manhattan. If your business covers several markets, you’ll need to consider whether the same TAP campaign will work across all areas, or if you’ll need to tailor your message for better impact.

Company Size & Organizational Chart – When developing your prospect list, think about the size of the company and the level within the company you are targeting. The goal is to aim as high as appropriate in the organization. A general rule of thumb is the smaller the company, the higher on the organizational chart you’ll target. While chances are slim you’ll get in front of the CEO of a Fortune 100 company (nor would you necessarily want to), you’ll most likely be able to present your company’s services to the CEO of a mid-sized organization. 

That said a common mistake made by sales folks is targeting too low a level within their prospects’ companies. I call this the “C-level syndrome.” Often sales people – especially those more junior – target middle-management because they are an easier pitch. The problem is they often aren’t the key decision maker – the person who can do the most for you – most quickly. For best results, you’ll want to do some digging and find out who the highest-level person is in the area you are targeting. If you aim at a mid-market CEO, they may tell you to talk with someone under them – but now you come armed with the boss’ recommendation. If you target a middle manager, more often than not, that’s where you’ll stay.

Politics – If you decide to go after new business within an existing client (penetrate untapped areas of the organization), it’s a good idea to let the people you’re already doing business with know about your efforts. If not, your great client in the Widget division might get peeved to see his counterpart from the Gizmo division wearing your polo on casual Friday. It sounds petty, but it happens … a lot. The last thing you want to do is spend your time (and money) dropping off gifts as peace offerings to people you’re already working with. The best way to mitigate this etiquette faux pas is to tell the people you know well in advance that you’re planning a drop-off campaign, and that you would appreciate them putting in a good word for you with your target. You have limited drop-offs and with their help, you can make a better impact. Chances are they will be more than happy to comply. This way no one feels left out and your TAP penetrates even deeper into your target organization. 

These are just a few points, but they can make a huge impact on the success of your TAP campaign and your effort to gain new prospects. Execute them correctly, and before you know it you’ll be sitting face-to-face with that frigid prospect who is no longer “away from their desk.”

Jessica Castaneda
Marketing Director
ClearEdge Marketing

A critical consideration when developing an integrated marketing program is to ensure it is directly tied to — and fuels the success of — your company’s business and sales goals. Sounds logical, right? Yet many organizations mistakenly focus their marketing efforts on tactics such as creating a “slick” brochure or a flashy Web site rather than creating a strategic marketing plan that yields measurable results.
 
Moving from tactical to strategic marketing requires a shift in the marketing mindset from “what we think makes sense to do” to “what we know we need to do” in order to drive profits. It requires a fundamental understanding of your organization’s mission, brand and top five or six business goals, and an in-depth analysis of the marketing investments that will have the greatest impact on each objective. Then, and only then, can a truly effective marketing strategy be created; a detailed plan that clearly describes the blend of marketing tactics that will generate the greatest ROI for the company.

Effective marketing and communication strategies are inextricably linked to an organization’s existing (and ideally fully operational) business plan. They show a direct correlation between enterprise goals and marketing initiatives. As a real-life example, I recently spent two days facilitating a strategic planning session for an IT professional services company with significant growth objectives. By the end of the meeting, the firm had not only created a precise action plan and timetable for achieving its revenue and profit targets; it also identified specific marketing strategies designed to drive the achievement of these objectives.

Below is an example of how marketing tactics evolve directly from the strategic plan.

Strategic Goal: Obtain annual ROI of at least 18% in the next two years

Strategy:
-Facilitate the identification and opening of 20 new accounts

Tactical Approach:
-Targeted account program: Establish and implement a plan that incorporates at least five, multiple medium touch points (e-mail, direct mail, in-person and perhaps even a sponsored event) for each key prospect. ClearEdge Marketing’s research has shown that an effective TAP campaign can be 20-30% more effective than traditional direct mail programs.

-Keep in touch program: Launch a compelling, knowledge-based communication program that allows your company to get a foot in the key decision-maker’s door. Periodically provide — via e-mail, direct mail and/or in person — compelling information about industry issues and challenges that matter to them. Leverage newsletters, article series, case study campaigns and/or blogs as the communication vehicle for persistently reaching out to the clients you are trying to win.

Strategy:
-Increase revenue derived from existing accounts by 30 percent

Tactical Approach:
-Introductory letter: A custom letter that highlights your success within the organization and  includes internal testimonials and referral contact information.

-Sponsored company event: Schedule and conduct executive roundtables on hot industry topics at four major client locations. Design event for maximum interaction between your sales team and a cross-section of existing and prospective client managers to generate internal introduction and referrals.

The most important thing to remember on your way to becoming a strategic marketing organization is that, in the end, only results matter. Just as you do in your strategic planning efforts, institute a fail-safe method for tracking, measuring and communicating the impact of your marketing programs on the organization’s bottom line.

Stay tuned for more strategic marketing insights…

Kathy Dooley
Marketing Director
ClearEdge Marketing

For anyone who questions the pervasiveness and business value of blogs in the marketplace today, the New York Times Small Business section has some stories worth reading. Marci Alboher describes some exciting successes several entrepreneurs have achieved as a result of their blogging ambitions in her article “Blogging Your Way into a Business.” From people who began writing and ended up with a profitable business to savvy entrepreneurs who saw blogging as a way to build a marketplace, the article describes another way the Internet is building communities of consumers. I believe the blogging lesson for established businesses is that new customers can be found and won through creative, true and valuable blog content.

In the U.S., more and more people are turning to their computers first when they need something—to get the weather, to get directions, to look for entertainment possibilities, to shop, to travel, to find medical information, to find love, to find friends. Businesses that can be reliable, creative, entertaining and honest providers of information through smart, regular blog content can build a readership (an audience) and eventually increase their consumer base.

One mistake many business blogs make today is that they are writing what they know, but they are not writing what potential consumers are interested in or hungry for. A successful, sticky blog requires careful content analysis. If you are looking to share valuable knowledge with consumers, make sure it’s knowledge they need right now. Does it speak to their current needs and challenges or are you speaking only to issues you/your business leaders find of greatest interest?

What is great about blogging is that success can be quickly analyzed. Readership numbers, whether they are growing or stagnating, will quickly tell you whether a blog is capturing an audience. Blog readers and Internet users are infamous for passing on information and article links when they find them of value. If your blog is striking chords, it will grow by reader-to-reader sharing and not just through your blog marketing efforts.

As a business works to develop its blogging capabilities, it’s important to pay attention to all the cues audience members send. If you are getting feedback from readers and the number of readers is growing, you are on to something. If you are writing into a void with little audience response, it’s time to analyze your content and what your audience wants.

Read some of today’s most successful business and marketplace blogs to gather ideas. To get you started here is a global ranking of the 50 Best Business Blogs from The Times. And be sure to take a lesson from successful blog entrepreneurs. Get to know your audience early and well. They will be your best gauge for how to write and develop blog content.

Sarah Schunk
Senior Writer
ClearEdge Marketing

Staffing, across all professions and skills, has always been a competitive field. But growing rates of VMS (vendor management systems) solutions at large- and mid-size businesses have given a new kind of dread to the phrase “cut-throat competition.”

I have had several staffing clients in the technology and finance and accounting sectors come to me in need of VMS advice. They want to know how to avoid slashing rates to the brink of profitability just to stay in the competition for new business. What I tell them is this: The VMS trend is here to stay so it’s time to decide. Do you want to remain a staffing vendor or are you ready to evolve into a valued solutions partner?

Many staffing businesses are finding success by simplifying their approach, eliminating consultative work and fulfilling talent requirements within the confines of VMS pipelines and procurement-style staffing. And why shouldn’t they? The contingent staffing market is strong, and it’s growing. Human Resource Executive Online recently profiled the rapid growth of the contingent workforce and cited a 2007 Staffing Industry Analysts study, which predicts that in just two years 10% of the U.S. workforce will be contingent talent.

The staffing industry has also rapidly evolved along with the growing contingent workforce. This past May, workforce expert Doug Berg shared with BusinessWeek how traditional staffing segments (clerical and technical) as well as new segments (such as medical and legal) are fueling contingent workforce expansion. As more highly skilled professionals join the ranks of contingent workers, many staffing firms have broadened their services to support more complex recruitment and workforce management needs. Some staffing firms are now both talent and service providers, offering services that can include project-based solutions, managed services, outsourcing, offshoring, training, human resource consulting and more.

The reality of VMS has created a crossroads for staffing firms who have evolved into combined service and talent providers. The rates and the standardized procurement-style fulfillment approach that VMS customers demand do not reflect the value-added service offerings these businesses provide. However, in the marketplace and to their own teams (recruiters and sales staff), they are often still seen as staffing providers who belong in the procurement supply chain rather than as solution providers that partner with senior-level decision makers and board-level executives.

For businesses that are determined to maintain their higher-end services and solutions, redefining their marketplace image from the inside out is critical to escaping the margin squeeze. If clients, partners and internal teams still see your business as a contingent talent provider, they will keep your business tethered to traditional staffing and today’s low-margin VMS opportunities. But if your business is able to communicate and demonstrate value to business leaders and decision makers, it will hurdle over and beyond the procurement role to remain a trusted consultant and value-added provider.

“Great,” some businesses might say. “We will update the Web site, create a new brochure and bam: we have a new image.” Unfortunately and at the same time fortunately, it’s not so easy. It’s unfortunate that retooling a business’ image is hard because it does require time and investment at a time when competition is stiff and businesses are already fighting tough margin pressure. However, it’s fortunate that not any business can just change some words and implement a new design to quickly become a high-value solution provider.

Building a new marketplace image requires significant business and marketing changes. Below I have created a general outline of the major steps that must be taken when redefining a staffing organization as a business solutions provider. In between these major milestones are numerous internal and external changes that must occur in order to successfully shed the staffing image and redefine a company.

Five Critical Stages of Staffing Image Transformation

1. The Business Assessment - Ensuring solutions are what you are providing and can provide.
Staffing is now different from solutions and the VMS model is making that a reality. You cannot become a solutions provider by creating a new name for staffing services. It’s important to begin an image change by taking an honest look at the services you provide today, what your business is capable of, what your business is best at and how you want to change. It is at this stage of top-to-bottom assessment of existing business operations and future-state goals that allows businesses to truly decide whether they belong in the staffing or solutions arena.

2. The Message Conversion - Retooling business messaging from the inside out.
To be seen as a solutions provider you must talk like one, which requires a comprehensive assessment and update of a business’ entire messaging platform—from internal messages (mission statements) to external messages (how you explain your strategy, services, and VALUE).

3. The Talent Evolution - Changing the way you sell and maybe who sells.
You don’t sell solutions to the same people you sell staffing to and you don’t take the same sales approach. Solutions sales start at higher entry points in organizations and require a different foundation of knowledge. For many businesses, becoming a solutions business requires the addition of new sales talent, and for all businesses it requires a serious approach to training, which is the subsequent stage discussed below.

4. The Compensation Upgrade – Manage the business and your sales team the way you want to be perceived.
You cannot run a solutions business but reward your sales team on headcount as a staffing firm would. A company must retool compensation plans to ensure they clearly line up with both business and vision goals. If sales teams aren’t rewarded for selling solutions, they will not sell solutions.

5. The Training Push – Training the whole gang.
It’s amazing how many businesses offer solutions, but their internal teams still talk like they work for staffing companies. Transitioning into solutions services requires strong training for staff members at all levels and areas of a business.

6. The Ongoing Campaign – Getting the solutions message out through various marketing and communications mediums.
Redefining an image requires a long, ongoing campaign leveraging both traditional marketing (advertising, Internet, sales literature, etc.) and proactive communications (speaking engagements, hosting events, publishing studies, writing articles and more).

I look forward to discussing and debating these stages of image transformation and the challenges of moving up the service provider value chain with you here on the ClearEdge Blog.

Leslie Vickrey
President & Founder
ClearEdge Marketing