Why waste time (and money for that matter) marketing your products and services to people who are not interested in what you are selling.  You need to communicate with the people who matter most to your business and do it better than your competitors.

To start creating custome profiles of your existing and potential customers in your market, you need to look at their characteristics (demographics and psycho graphics) as well as their attitudes and buying behaviors.

Demographics

How would you describe your customer in terms of age, gender, household size, income, occupation, education and country of birth.  For example, the demographics of a customer who buys a Cadillac may be female, age 30-45 years, white collar occupation, household income greater than $75,000 and lives in Lake Way.

There are resource websites, including government websites that are a good source of info to find out more about the demographics of the customers who live in the areas in which your business competes.

Geography

This is the where are they bit of the profile.  By finding out where they are, we can focus your marketing tactics specifically for those in that area.  Change your office location, or write your copy with the local flavor mentioned.  This will create more rapport with your prospects, because you are in their “home town”

Psychographics

This is how you would describe your customers in terms of;

• interests – the key social interests your customers engage in, like golf, family, theatre etc.
• General personality – the personality characteristics of your customers.  Are they cooperative, outgoing, introverted, extroverted, classic and timeless or a total party on heels?
• Where do they “hang” – what places on and offline do they network, socialize and are you likely to find them?

If you know your customers psycho-graphics you can tailor promotional activities, sales drives and communication messages that appeal to their specific interests and lifestyle.

Attitudes

The attitude of our customers to your product or service and business is important as it can give an indication of their involvement with your brand.  It is important to know how they think and feel in a certain way to be able to market your product or service  more effectively.

Buying Behavior

This relates to how your customers behave when deciding to buy your product or service versus your competitirs.

Motives and influences may vary by customer group and will always include a rational and emotional reason.  They can include rational reasons such as location, convenience, customer service, image, range and promotional offers.  Or emotional reasons.  It makes them feel a certain way.

The more you know about your current and potential customers the easier it is to communicate the right message at the right time.

Click here for a work sheet and detailed instructions on creating a customer profile.

If you would like more free info and strategies like this, join our Wedding Marketing Tips list here.

• It’s the right thing to do – people complain about not enough comments on their own blog but don’t take enough time to comment on others.  We all like some attention or an occasional pat on the head for aj ob well done.  Treat others as you would like to be treated yourself!  Give a little gain a lot.

• Make friends and influence people – Blogging is partly a networking activity isn’t it?  People are more likely to link to you (or more) if they have heard of you.  Get yourself out there and make friends.  Use your voice, and be real.
• Clicks – People click you link to see what other interesting stuff you write about.  That may lead them to something on your blog.
• Develop a Bloggers Eye – Find the point of interest in a story.  By commenting you are training your brain to think of something interesting.
• Create Comment-able Content – By observing which posts you commented on and which you did not (or couldn’t no matter how hard you tried!)  you develop an awareness of what words to attract comments.
• Comments = Ideas -  You managed to comment. Could your comment be expanded int a post of your own?
• You never know who is reading – It amazes me who reads my comments on obscure blogs that I thought only myself and a handful of others read.  My comment on one blog led to a consulting job!  You never know unless you try.
• What you give you get more of – I strongly believe what you put out comes back to you.  You will get more comments yourself if you give them.  Make sure they are relevant, and well written.
• Keep Match Fit – Exercise your writing muscles, the more your practice the more you improve.  Comments should be short, fast, to the point and make an impact.  I like to mix mine up with praise, and questions which spark more interaction on the post.
• Comment on Fresh Blogs for Fresh Perspectives – If you are always among the same crowd you will find inevitably the same thoughts being reflected back over and over.  Break out of that pattern and comment on new blogs every day.  When you break out of the same old blogs, or set a goal to comment on more blogs than the day before, you will be forced to leave your blog-reading comfy zone and visit new blogs.  This exposes you to fresh new ideas, a new way of looking at things, and a way to break out of the echo chamber.

Blogging is not just about saying your part… it is also about going out and joining the conversation.  Reaching out to people and exposing who you are to them, and getting inspired by what they are sharing is just as important to fuel the engine.  Asking yourself “What can the blogosphere do for me, means that you also need to give back to the blogosphere.

Heres to more comments!

If you would like more free info and strategies like this, join our Wedding Marketing Tips list here.

Leadership.. what it means to you, and how you view yourself as a leader is extremely important.  This video from TEDx is worth the short 6 minutes.

Comments?  You all know I have tons of my own, but I want to hear all about you!

Are you the next big thing? Has your fledgling company just taken on its first two employees because business is pouring in faster than you can handle it? Right now you’re working around the kitchen table  or home office,  but between kids, spouses, and a menagerie of pets, it’s becoming impossible to get anything done.

Or perhaps you’re a seasoned entrepreneur who knows the wisdom of taking it slow, but you lack a network of talented designers and marketers that can help ease your workload. You’ve got the capital for your own office space, but often find yourself meeting clients at coffee shops or working at the library, because you can’t stand the isolation.

You need coworking.

I know, I know. You’ve heard your freelance friends talking about how much they love coworking, but you don’t think it’s for you. You’re not just taking on contract work. You’re building a business. You’ve got proprietary information to protect, and need space for meetings with your 2, 3, or 6 member team.

Coworking is still for you.

According to the hundreds of international coworkers who responded to the 2010/11 Global Coworking Survey…

The following things are important to entrepreneurs and likely, your employees.
86% value flexible work times and the ability to interact with new people
82% value sharing knowledge with others
79% place high value on the random opportunities and discoveries made inside coworking spaces

What benefits can you expect your employees to experience?
85% saw an increase in daily motivation
88% have better interactions with other people
60% organize their working day better so they can relax more at home
86% reported meeting at least 3 helpful acquaintances in the first two months of membership
91% of coworkers are either very satisfied or satisfied with their overall coworking experience
85% plan on staying in their coworking community for at least another year

(OK that’s way more than three reasons…)

Coworking with us at The Wedding Group will unleash the true potential of your employees, and as a result, your company. Instead of limiting your pool of ideas or subcontractors in a tiny office (or kitchen), coworking incubates your business through instant connections to a city-wide network of motivated independent professionals.

In a coworking space, asking for advice, feedback, or parsing out contract work is as hard as turning around in your chair. (The people who can do these things are sitting right next to you, see?) Also, it will give your employees a change of scenery, and a chance to learn from the seasoned designers, marketers, writers, and programmers who work with us every day.

Learn more about thebenefits of coworking for small business here, or send us an email about what you’re budget can handle. We’ll work something out.

If you feel that your blogging not resulting in the same sort of success, why on tweak your approach by following this simply formula?

{DEFINE+LISTEN+ADDRESS) x (SIMPLE+CONCISE+RELEVANT) = BLOGGING SUCCESS

What does that actually mean?  Clearly define and listen to your target audience, provide solutions that address their pain points, needs and wants, and keep your message simple, concise and relevant.

Let’s break that down.

Define Your Target Audience

It is tough to effectively communicate your message to an audience you have not clearly defined.  Make sure you have a clear understand of your company’s target audience, or who your buyer is.  Here are some questions to think about when developing your knowledge of your buyers.

Demographic Profile- HUH?  How old is your ideal client?  Gender, income level, education, etc.  This will give you a three-dimensional picture of who they are.

Employment Information -  What industry do they work in?  What is their seniority level?

Information Consumption – Where doe your buyer turn to for information?  Is it their friends or family?  Are they searching online resources?  Social Network or newspapers?

Listen to Your Audience

Interview 20-30 Brides that are not current clients.  What motivates them or interests them?  Make sure t ask open ended questions to gather more detailed information.

Anticipated Experience – what features and benefits i s the bride looking for?  What type of experience is he or she expecting when buying your product/service?

How will your product/service resolve a problem or address a pain point?  Adk them open ended quesitons to learn more about their behavioral characteristics.

Know what you are up against.  Why would the buyer not purchase your product?  We are looking for what their objections are so  you can tailor blog posts to resolve their concerns.

Address Their Needs and Wants

What do they value, what goals do they have?  What will get them excited to work wit you?  What are they trying to accomplish with this relationship?

Once you know your audience and understand their pain points, it is important to communicate how your products and services can solve their problems.  Blogging provides brands an ideal platform and context to do this on a consistent bases.  Take advantage of it.

Keep it Simple Silly (K I S S)

When writing, be sure to make your point (s) clearly, and then be done.  People are way too busy to read a 2000 word novella on any topic.  Try to keep it to 200-600 words for the best results.   Make your content lean and mean, if there isn’t a compelling reason to include certain information, remove it.  When in doubt, cut it out.

Keep it Relevant

The most important thing I can share is to make sure each blog post is in some way relevant to your target audience.  Remember the most effective posts tend to resolve, inform or entertain.

Make certain you are constantly tying in your product/service to each blog topic.  If you cant do this, perhaps you should shelf that topic for later on when you are rich and famous.  Remember, you are blogging to demonstrate that your brand can provide value to your prospective clients.  Everything else is just noise.

Here’s to your success,

If you would like more free info and strategies like this, join our Wedding Marketing Tips list here.

Blogging is one of the most effective activities you can do when it comes to attracting leads for your wedding biz.

Don’t believe that?  Well here is how we have seen it result for us.  We have found that when we blog, we;

• attract targeted local brides and groom traffic.
• increase our website ranking and visibility.
• demonstrate our expertise.
• gain powerful networking with other wedding pros.
• pre-sell brides on our services… and so much more!

The problem is that writing a blog post.. or even a whole bunch of them, isn’t enough.  We should be reading stuff that brides actually read.

It’s All About the Title

How do you decide what to read when you are checking out a blog?

What I do is  surf around, skimming articles.  I am not really committed to anything, just sort of “checking things out”.  Asking myself, “What is worth my time” while I read the titles.

THE TITLE – This is the place where you either have my attention, or you don’t.  Come up with a good title and you are half way there.

I totally get stuck here sometimes.  Racking my brain for what to write next.  How do I put it into words that capture their attention without being to wordy?  Does that happen to you? Here is a technique I use when I struggle with writers block.

5 Title Strategies Techniques

1. – 7 Common/Disastrous/Deadly Mistakes Brides Make When {insert your topic here, like “picking their wedding flowers}

We all want to avoid making mistakes, especially when it comes to something as important as our wedding day.  Use the pain around “deadly mistakes” and the bride simply will HAVE to stop and read your article.

Examples:

• 7 Common Mistakes Brides Make When Choosing the Wedding Date
• 3 Disastrous Mistakes Bries Make After the Wedding
• 4 Disastrous MIstakes Brides Make that Ruin the Honeymoon

2.  5 Best Location for {Insert your topic} in {Your Area}

When in doubt, write about Locations.

One of the biggest challenges we hear about from brides has been choosing the perfect location.  Whether that be for photos, their ceremony or honeymoon, they all struggle with where is the best place for them.  Use your knowledge about venues you love to write a blog post they can’t resist, and that showcases your vibe.

SEO BONUS:  These titles are amazing when it comes to attracting local bride and groom search engine traffic.

Examples;

• 5 Best Intimate Wedding Venues in Austin
• 10 Best Lake View Locations on Lake Travis
• 3 Uncommon Wedding Location in Austin

3. – How to Get/Do/Have {Cool things Brides want} For Your Wedding

Admit it, we are all addicted to Pinterest, the pins that are by far the most popular, are the “How to” pins.  That is because we want to be inspired.  Brides crave wedding ideas and inspiration.  “How to” posts draw them i like a magnet.

Examples;

• How to Find the Perfect Wedding Dress for your Figure
• How to Plan a Beach Destination Wedding
• How to Use Color to Express Your Personality at the Wedding

4 – The Pros and Cons of {Insert topic} For Your Wedding

When making a decision, couples want to explore both sides of their choice.  This is especailly useful for couples in the planning stages.

Examples:

• The Pros and Cons of Planning Your Own Wedding
• The Pros and Cons of an Outdoor Ceremony
• The Pros and Cons of Delaying Your Honeymoon

5. – Planning a Wedding at the {Insert Venue in your area}

Yet another way to write a rockin’ local blog post title.  This title uses local keywords quite naturally, which means you will have local brides and grooms flocking to your site.

You can also use it as an easy way to network by promoting the best venues in your area.

Examples;

• Planning a Wedding at the Ritz
• 5 Reason to Plan a Wedding at the Driskill
• How to Plan an Outrageous Wedding at the Elks Club

Parting Tips

These tips are just the beginning.  A few more things to keep in mind are:

• Mix and match like I did in some of the samples titles.  Dive in and make them resonate your corporate voice.
• Come up with your compelling title before you write.  This way you can be sure your piece is going to knock their socks off.
• Send a quick email or Facebook message offering your potential titles to the couples you already booked to ask which they find most interesting, then write it.

No more writers block!!

If you would like more free info and strategies like this, join our Wedding Marketing Tips list here.

Each room is decorated a bit differently, but the overall theme here at TWG’s Posh Bridal Lounge, is all things weddings!

When we started the build out, I knew I loved the vintage vibe that was so popular.  It just felt like home.  Cozy and unpretentious.  There was something to be said about the sleek feel of the ultra modern vibe here in Austin as well, so we decided “Why not mix the two?”

The sleek modern feel of the Ikea dinner tables and cabinets creates the foundation of durability and stability.  The “fluff” is added in vintage style to bring the theme together in each room.  Did you know that when you are member, you can decorate the space with your brand?  This way each room feels like it is “your office”.

Our open and airy common room, affectionatly called “The Lounge” is a great place to pop in for the day and get some work done.  No kids, or distractions, just great coffee, networking and a relaxed inspirational space.

Grab some lunch and come over for a tour!  Your first day if FREE when you do!

Coffee, Tea and Water are always free.  We also try to keep an assortment of healthy and unhealthy snacks on hand just in case you have a sugar crash when you are here, and need a pick me up!

Stop by soon and check us out!

The last place you want to see your emails is in the spam folder. Yet with the further sophistication and higher demands of Internet Service Providers, the probability of this happening is high. That is why deliver-ability becomes a critical element of a successful email marketing campaign. To help you tackle this issue, we put together some best practices for increasing email deliverability:

1. Check Your Email for Spam-Triggering Words

Make sure your subject line and body of email don’t include any keywords that can trigger spam alerts. Some Email Service Providers (Email Service Provider ;ESPs) help you identify these phrases with features such as Content Detective, SpamAssassin and ContentChecker. But the most universal piece of advice you can adopt to avoid spam-triggering words is to keep your emails out of the box. Be bold and think outside the frame of what other companies are using.

2. Suppress Against Hard Bounces

Are you keeping track of the percentage of hard bounces you get? You need to be. If that number is rising, bring it up with your ESP. Since hard bounced can really hurt your reputation, you will have to clean your list regularly. Make sure you suppress against them if that is not already something your ESP is doing on the back end.

3. Increase Engagement Levels

Mail clients have started tying the engagement levels of your email subscribers to your reputation as a sender. In response to this, you will need to keep your recipients highly engaged in order to appear reputable in the eyes of Gmail, AOL, Yahoo, etc. Do your recipients click on emails or do they delete them? Do they mark them as spam? What action do they take? Make sure your subscribers don’t get what they don’t want.

4. Set Expectations in the Welcome Email

Greet the newcomers when they sign up for your newsletter or other types of email communication. In the welcome email, set some expectations explaining why that person is receiving your messages, how often they are going to be sent out and from whom exactly. These details will help you build a relationship that goes a long way. When you sign up for GroupOn, for instance, you expect to be receiving daily emails and look forward to them. Follow GroupOn’s example and make your subscribers look forward to your emails.

5. Don’t Forget Branding

Branding is vital to how emails are being read and how recipients understand them. It helps people make the connection and say, “This is the real thing, not just a third-party email.” Include your logo in your email communication and make it clear this really is your company. Also consider including your company name in the subject line of your emails.

6. Use a Preference Center

If a recipient wants to update her email address, does she have an easy way to do that? Provide her with a preference center, in which she can make that selection and tell you what the best email is to be contacted at. Give people the option to mark how frequently they want to receive emails from you and share their favorite topics. Such a feature will show you care for your subscribers and respect their preferences.

7. Track Your Complaint Feedback Loop

You are probably tracking hard bounces and soft bounces. But do you know how many people clicked on the “This Is Spam” button? First, look into that and understand how many of these complaints you are getting. If the number is significant, you will have to take action. Remove the subscribers who have complained and stop torturing these poor souls. Also consider putting the unsubscribe button at the top of the email instead of at the bottom. (Unsubscribing is better for your reputation than having your email reported as spam.)

These best practices will help you monitor your deliverability and improve it overtime. Don’t be the piece of mail that got stuck in the spam pile and unintentionally got thrown out. Stand out.  Read more on email marketing tips.

If you’d like to get more free information and strategies like this, joun our email list here.

In this post I will carefully dissect the anatomy of an effective, optimized marketing email.

1.  A Clear, Concise, and Attention-Grabbing Subject Line

Before your email subscribers even read your email, the first thing they will see is the subject line.  You email is sitting in your prospects inbox’s alongside a ton of other emails, many of which will be from other vendors just like you. This is why it is so important that you make it stand out with clear, eye-catching subject line.  Keep it brief, but use your space wisely, and try to describe the offer you are giving them within the email as clearly and consciously as possible.  Avoid trigger words that can easily land you in the SPAM box.

2.  A Real, Live Human

In communication between real people, the “From” address is someone’s name.  Experiment with how you customize your email’s sender name, and consider making ti come from a real person to make your messages more personal.  Test to determine which format of your sender name contributes to the best open rate.

3.  Obvious Branding

There shouldn’t be any question to your subscribers about where your email is coming from. Create and utilize an email template with consisting branding elements. Include your logo! Use your company’s branding colors. Omitting branding elements suggests a lack of professionalism and security.  You want them to trust you, or they will not buy what you are selling.

4.  Personalization

While research shows that one third of marketers believe that personalized marketing campaigns are highly effective, the majority of marketers aren’t including any personalization elements in their campaigns. Email marketing (especially lead nurturing) offers a great opportunity to leverage the power of personalization. You can use data about your database to segment them into groups and send them more personalized content offers based on their behavior and wants/needs. At the very least, use your data to personalize the greeting in your email. Furthermore, as we mentioned earlier, make your email come from a real person within your organization. Consider including their picture and signing off the email with their nickname.

5.  Offer Context

Before you give your email recipients the opportunity to access your offer, set the stage for why what you’re offering is valuable to them. Keep it brief, use compelling language, and consider incorporating statistics to emphasize importance. Add a link or two for your offer within this section, too.

6.  Obvious Focused Call to Action (CTA)

Include a prominent CTA for your offer. Make your CTA’s text specific about what action the reader must take to receive the offer  and create a sense of urgency (e.g. “Now,” “Today,” etc.). Avoid vague language like “Submit,” and try to tie the CTA to the offer itself (e.g. for a live webinar, you must say “Register For the Webinar Now” or “Reserve Your Seat Today”).

7. Explanation/Value of Offer:

Clearly highlight what email recipients will get out of downloading your ebook or registering for your mailing list. Use bullet points to break up the text and emphasize key takeaways. Demonstrate the value of the offer.

8. Social Sharing Buttons/Links

Include social sharing links on every email you send to further expand the reach of your email content. If readers find the content within your email valuable and feel compelled to share it with their social media connections, now they can easily do so! This will help you reach a wider range of potential leads with very little effort.

9. Image

Break up text with a professional-looking image. Try matching this image with the content of your offer. So, if you’re offering an ebook, include a picture of the cover page.

10. Additional Product-Based Offer

Maybe some of your email subscribers are ready for a more product-focused offer like a personal consultation. Use the real estate in your P.S. as an opportunity to tie your main content offer to a more middle-of-the funnel offer.

11. Social Media Follow Buttons/Links

Grow your social media reach by giving recipients opportunities to subscribe to your updates in social media, too. Add social media follow buttons to encourage subscribers to follow you on Twitter, ‘Like’ your Facebook page, subscribe to your YouTube channel, or follow your company updates on LinkedIn.

12. Link to Privacy Policy

As the web evolved into an even more social and public platform, concerns about privacy continue to get raised. Give your email subscribers peace of mind and a sense of security by including a link to your company’s privacy policy.

13. Unsubscribe Link

ALWAYS include an unsubscribe link at the bottom of your email marketing messages. Neglecting to do so will put you in violation of CAN-SPAM regulations, cost you quite a bit of your valuable marketing budget, and severely damage your company’s credibility.

The researcher, Simply Measured, drew its results from an admittedly small sample: just 15 Facebook brand pages.  Doing so may have created a false sense of lift, especially since the greatest beneficiaries, Livestrong and Toyota, saw their engagement rates jump 161% and 156%, respectively.  (The full list of brands appears below)

Adam Schoenfeld, CEO of Simply Measured, says the average, however, is weighted so that the engagement per post is taken into account.  “These are just preliminary results,” he says.  Simply Measured looked at early adopters and compared their Pages’ engagement from Jan1 to Feb. 29 and then from Feb. 29 (the day Facebook allowed Timeline Brand Pages) until March 26 and compared results.  (If the brand launched its Timeline Page after Feb. 29, then Simply Measured started from that date.)  The findings are as follows;

A deeper dive into the data reveals that responses to status updates actually fell with Timeline, but engagement with videos and photos were up a composite 65%.  Shoenfeld’s theory is that the larger images on Timeline are leading to more engagement with visual material.  That will prompt marketers to post more videos and photos.  “We’re wondering if this is because of Pinterest,” he says.

Facebook reported that a week after introducing Timeline, some 8 million brands – roughly one-fourth of the brands on Facebook — had upgraded to the new design.  Those that didn’t will be ported over to Timeline on March 30.

Is your Facebook page making sales for you?