Kameel Vohra - Sales, Marketing & Start-ups

An example of great content marketing by Hamleys

Published on May 13, 2013 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: content, content marketing, Hamleys, marketing, offline.

This is an excellent example of content marketing. Pun intended. Hamleys knows precisely what it clients enjoy, and is happy to give it away for free.

They keep the kids entertained, buy some incredible good will, and all but guarantee some repeat sales. After all, what child can sit in a toy store listening to stories for an hour without buying anything?

It wouldn’t surprise me if every parent that got this was planing a trip. I know I am.

Offline ‘content’ marketing is just as powerful, if not more so, than its online counter part. If you know your audience well, developing content that gets attention will be easy.

Yes, it will require you to invest upfront and there is some risk. But hopefully cases like this will help you convince your stakeholders that investing in content is worth its weight in gold.

We got some publicity!… Now what?

Published on May 10, 2013 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: coverage, marketing, news, organisation, paperwork, process, publicity.

Picture of Superman's Newspaper building, the Daily Planet

Getting an article published about you in a newspaper, trade journal or online is a big feat. There’s no doubt that you put in lots of effort, and you’re going to enjoy the extra publicity. It’s not time to rest on your laurels though!

Any article published about you or your business can keep working for you long after its initial circulation has finished. Instead of just filling some space on a pin-board, you can use the articles to build your brand credibility and to give reporters a good reason to write a little more about you.

The number of articles/mentions you get in the media should also be a key metric you use for tracking your marketing agency/team’s effectiveness. Even b2b companies can benefit from media coverage.

Recording the details

The first step is to make sure that all your article details are properly recorded so that you can cite them properly. There’s nothing worse than saying “yeah someone wrote about us, but we can’t remember who”. Wikipedia has a great mechanism of citation that you can refer to, but as a general rule for any type of publicity you get, remember to capture the following details:

Name of the author(s)
Title of the article within quotation marks
Name of the publication in italics
City of publication, if not included in name of publication
Year&month/date, of publication
Volume number, issue number, and page numbers (article numbers in some electronic journals)
Scanned copy/pdf copy of the article itself (really handy in case the original publication disappears)
URL of publication (if also published online)

Your article citations should look something like this:

Blogs, Joe. “Gourmet Cooking in Hotel”. The Acme Trade Journal. New York. 1999/12/31, Vol 1, Issue 2, p3

Try to fill all the details in, but don’t worry if you’re missing a few details. It becomes considerably more difficult to get some of these details as the articles age, so it’s best to record the details as soon as the article’s published.

Building Credibility

If you have a Wikipedia page, put your articles as references or external links at the bottom of your Wikipedia page. This not only makes your business look more well established, but the chances of editors removing well cited/referenced pages is much more limited (as long as the rest of the page is still in compliance with Wikipedia policy).

At a minimum, add just the citations with a link to the online version (if available) or the scanned copy, on the Press/Media page of your website. If you don’t have a Press page, this is perfect time to create one. Journalists are always more comfortable writing about a business that’s been published before.

Shout about it

Of course, remember to tell the world Someone wrote about you! It’s a big deal. Talk about it through all your social channels, send out an EDM. Let people know you’re a little bit more famous. The extra attention is what you’re looking for!

What are you doing to make the most of your media coverage?

The real cost of outdated websites

Published on May 8, 2013 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: bad data, brand, information, online, outdated, website.

Whilst I was in Bangalore I was looking for a HSBC ATM to withdraw some cash from, so I hopped onto the HSBC website (below), used the ATM finder and drove to the nearest ATM location. Here ends the good news. I spent 30 minutes and a little too much frustration looking for the ATM before I finally called the HSBC call center, who (after a few minutes of hold music) informed me that there were no ATMs in ITPL – and that the website was wrong!

I’m not entirely sure whats worse. The fact that I wasted so much time driving around and looking for the ATM (which didn’t exist), or the fact that I don’t trust the branch/atm finder service.

Rather than helping, having an outdated website causes customer frustration, and creates the wrong impression of your brand. If you can’t provide up-to-date or correct information, You’re probably better off not providing the information at all. If you’re compelled to put something online, at the very least specify the date the information was published/last-updated, so your readers have some idea as to how current & reliable it is.

If you’re building a website, keep in mind your ability to maintain it with fresh, or at least current & relevant information. If you have to maintain an existing website, and don’t have enough internal resource – or can’t get support from other departments, consider cutting back on the size of your website. It’s better to direct your customers to a fresh, well maintained, relevant but small website – than a big site, with minimal or outdated information.

Don’t forget the CTA when advert hijacking

Published on May 5, 2013 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: advert, advertising, call to action, cta, emailer, hijacking, marketing.

I recently got a barrage of emails from JetAirways, asking me to vote for them in the Freddies (Airline Industry Frequent Flyer program) award. The subsequently announcing their wins & their appreciation to their customers. It’s a separate thing that I have an axe to grind with their FF programme, it was a good opportunity for them to interact with their customers, foster some engagement, get feedback and stay visible. Professional, well executed, but a little dry:

JetAirways Freddies Vote Request Emailer

Then I got this utterly fabulous email from Indigo:

IndiGo Email saying no Platinum, no gold, no silver, just one class for all

The comic ingenuity made me literally laugh out loud. This was some great advert hijacking (not to be confused with the more illegal concept of advert hijacking) of the JetAirways campaign. I’m not actually convinced by the add, because I travel frequently and enjoy my FFP perks, but it was funny & most importantly it got my attention. Especially interesting because I travel regularly on JetAirways and tend to almost instantly scan & delete their (otherwise dull) emails.

I really like the way they’re leveraging someone else’s campaign as best as they can. It requires a really nimble team to be able to deliver an advertising response so quickly. Though it’d be an even better response if there was something tangible for the customer to do with it. As it stands, all I can do with the material is laugh and write this article, it desperately needs a good call to action.

So if you can hijack someone else’s campaign, try to be humorous about it & remember to include a good cta so that you maximize your returns.

Creating great content

Published on April 19, 2013 in Uncategorized. 3 Comments Tags: author, blog, blogging, content, guest, write.

The truth is that developing loads of great content on a regular basis is really hard – even with a good team of writers, which most organisations don’t have the luxury of. There are a few paid services which can help, such as:

godotmedia.com (these guys were surprisingly good)
zerys.com
watermyblog.com
bloghands.com

There are also some great guest blogging services, which can provide you a variety of content at the cost of a couple of back links:

triberr.com
guestblogit.com
bloggerlinkup.com
blogengage.com
inboundwriter.com
myblogguest.com

Ofcourse you can’t rely entirely on external sources. After all, nobody knows your business or your clients as well as you do. Ideally building a culture of content production is the best way forward, but it’s not an ideal world and it takes a long time to bring people round to the idea.

The best idea I’ve heard of so far, is to use your existing email correspondences as a source. Personally, I think it’s genius. Most of us spend an ungodly amount of time reading, writing & replying to email. Why not make it work more to our advantage? Thinking about your responses as a potential blog post casts a new light on your inbox. I’m going to be experimenting with this concept over the coming weeks, so I’ll keep you posted on how it goes.

What strategies are you employing to create great content?

The 7 key elements of a good Landing Page

Published on April 15, 2013 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: design, guide, how to, landing, leads, marketing, page, tutorial, web.

By now the importance of good Landing Pages should have been drummed into every good web designer. They’re not a mystery, the anatomy of Landing Pages has been dissected repeatedly by many competent authorities. Whilst most of the analysis have the same common elements, I’d still recommended reading through a few of them – if anything to get a breadth of knowledge and a better understanding of how best to construct specific elements.

I recently stumbled across this FuzeBox landing page, and one element stood out like a sore thumb. I couldn’t believe the number of landing pages that had omitted it. The basic elements are all present:

Navigation – Reduced navigation, preferably nil, to prevent people clicking away
Bold headlines – Clearly answering your question, or stating why you’re still reading
Bullet point content with headers – we don’t want to lose you in fluff, here are the essential points
The best picture we have – so you know what you’re buying
Clearly visible (above the fold) contact us form – so we can get your details
A submit button – that doesn’t say submit but instead holds the promise of something more
and FINALLY – the telephone number, so you can call them right NOW if you actually want to

The number of websites & landing pages I’ve reached when sourcing a product that don’t have contact numbers is incredible. I want something now. I want to call you to buy it. I don’t want to fill out your form. Don’t lose a prospective inquiry just because you’re supposed to have “some-annoying-form” filled up. Your telephone leads are just as important (if not more so), and need to monitored & managed just as carefully. You could even consider adding a telephone CTA/offer in the body of your content!

Do you have your contact number boldly visible on your landing pages?
Are you tracking your telephone leads?

Awesome Social Recommendation

Published on April 11, 2013 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: Customer, feedback, review, social.

I’ve just started working with psd2html on a new web design project, and I noticed that they have a “rate our performance button”. What’s brilliant is that after your select a rating it asks you for a written comment. If your comment is good it asks you to tweet your comment. You don’t need to retype anything or do anything other than click the button again. I’m not surprised they regularly have great twitter reviews.

The ability to instantly convert positive feedback into a social recommendation is incredibly powerful, especially given that each recommendation is coming from an existing customer that’s already taken the time to write a positive comment. Most of the time it’s hard to find content to engage your clients, this technique has them socially (and positively) engaging with your brand – without you creating any new content.

At what point in your sales cycle are you collecting feedback? What are you doing with that feedback?
Are you showing off all your awesome customer reviews?

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