Archive for the ‘Marketing’ Category

With trust in the banking sector at an all-time low, Santander’s decision to rebrand all of its UK High Street brands including Abbey, Alliance + Leicester and Bradford and Bingley over to Santander could be seen as a risky one. On the other hand it’s no surprise that the second-biggest banking group in the world (after HSBC) wants to roll out the changes when they reportedly plan to save £180m a year by integrating the three businesses.

Who remembers the £11m Abbey rebrand in 2003 shortly before the Santander takeover? Abbey adopted a soft, all lowercase, pastel coloured brand identity with the new tagline, ‘turning banking on its head’. Rebranding certainly isn’t new to Abbey customers.

It is, after all, five years since Abbey was taken over by Santander and in that time we have seen the incorporation of the Santander ‘flame’ logo, typeface and colour into the Abbey branding. What’s left to change, other than the brand name? As for the other two brands, their takeovers are still fresh and for that reason the rebrands could be seen as more risky.

However, bank customers are extremely loyal and Santander’s decison to roll out the rebrands by the end of 2010 suggests steady change rather than a swift one. Lets not forget that it will be an enormous rebranding exercise, and customers can probably expect some technical glitches along the way. Perhaps most interesting will be the advertising campaigns, direct mail and incentives that will follow, all in the name of turning one, or in this case three recognised brands into one ’super’ brand.

How to get your email marketing messages opened is always on the mind of the email marketer. The sheer volume of companies using email has turned the medium into a bit of a double-edged sword for many potential email marketers: Not only have consumers become increasingly wary of unsolicited messages, significantly reducing ‘open’ rates, but the rising use of spam filters, which often target particular keywords and phrases in subject lines, stops many marketing emails from ever reaching a target’s in-box.

Here are a few key points to consider when writing your email subject line:

Keep it short and simple. There is a danger of making subject lines too long, and because of over-communication, people today tend to like simplicity.

Think segmentation. It’s important to test different subject lines for different customer segments. What works with one group may not work for another. In this way you should always test every subject line before sending your email out to various audiences.

Question almost everything. Subject lines that pose a question can work very well. A subject line that can grab the curiosity of the recipient stands a better chance of getting opened.

Make it about them, not you. An oversight that is often made with subject lines is failing to take the recipient into account. For example, We’re Having a Sale’ could be tweaked to read, ‘You Can Save Money’ because it drives home the value proposition you want to deliver.

Don’t be afraid of free. Often the word ‘free’ in a subject line is avoided because it can trigger a spam filter. However, it may be worth the risk when conducting a split test of your emails, providing you closely monitor the ‘open’ rates of each alternative subject line.

Inform before you sell. By describing what’s in the email in the subject line, a recipient may be much more willing to open it. By informing first, followed by selling, you can stand a much better chance of success simply because the email had been opened.

Hopefully these pointers will help you when considering your email subject line. But always remember to consider the following.

State clearly and succinctly what you are offering and how it will benefit your recipient. Throughout your campaign planning, put yourself in the position of the recipient. What makes you want to open an email? What makes you want to click on the link? If you know your audience, then you know what they want. If you’re not sure how they will respond, test the list in small increments and measure the results.

Good luck.

If you’re looking to promote your website in any way, and are looking to take on board the learning process yourself rather than handing it over to a consultant or web design / SEO company, then there is some funding available for you right now.

The Leader First grant from Train to Gain, offers £500 initial funding, plus a further £1 for £1 funding up to £500 of additional funding on a £1500 project. To take advantage of this funding then you must not have undertaken any similar Leaders First funded training in the last 2 years and will need to apply through Train to Gain.

If you are interested in promoting your website and would like to investigate a funded training programme, then contact us for more details.

If you are keen to drive more traffic to your website and want to increase your search engine ranking, then blogging might be for you.

We would describe a blog as – “an online journal that is regularly updated with content and built on a platform with automated syndication”. In simple terms, consider a blog to be the equivalent of an online diary or bulletin board that is very easy for web users to access.

Blogs can be hosted with blog software or can be hosted by a blog host company. The downside of a blog host company is that you will not get the benefit of SEO (search engine optimisation) for your website.

Blogs and search engine marketing marry extremely well. Search engines have historically looked for content rich websites that are updated frequently, blogs provide the perfect solution for this, provided they are updated regularly. Search engines like keyword links, which blogs can provide. Assuming of course that they are written with keywords in mind. Search engines also like unique and popular content, so it is fairly safe to assume that if your blog is topical then visitors will want to read it!

In a nutshell, active blogs can rank well in search engines, provide quality links back to your main domain, and expand your traffic and presence on the web. So the question is, what are you waiting for?

Is rebranding the key to weathering the recession and a way of injecting new life into an ailing business?

A new report commissioned by branding consultancy the Principle Group, surveyed 250 marketing directors of blue chip companies and UK business owners. The results were interesting to us to say the least. “85% of UK business leaders and managers believe that design will play an important role in generating a recovery for some, or all brands.” We at Masters Allen have had this view for a while, and have been advising our clients and local businesses over the last few months to take stock of their brand and design situation, encouraging them to be bold in these uncertain times by revitalizing and developing their business brands.

“56% of marketing directors of blue chip companies believe that a downturn could be the best time strategically to rebrand.” It makes perfect sense that when everyone in your industry is struggling, taking steps to evolve or reposition yourself as the market leader will give customers confidence in your business not to fail. Take Citroen as an example. The UK and European car market is in trouble, sales are drastically down and factories are in danger of closing. Citroen have chosen to take action and launch a new identity, ahead of a complete market repositioning that will see six new car models launched in the next three years. There is no better time for them to reinvent themselves, ready and well positioned for the market to get back on its feet in just a few years.

“63% of business leaders agree that the act of launching a new brand identity in uncertain times signals a bold embracing of change.” We couldn’t have put it better ourselves. Nobody wants to buy from a company on its knees. Show flexibility and strength, embracing change in the market. Consumers want a brand they can trust in these uncertain times.

From our experience, being seen to evolve your brand, reposition your core values, even expand or concentrate your market offering, is a sign of an active, focussed and thriving business. By showing this strength of brand character we as business owners can promote confidence internally in our staff and externally in our customer base. You never know, it may even give you the confidence to weather the storm!

Story source from Design Week, 12 February 2009

Here’s a useful tool for any business owner or Marketing Manager who wishes to understand the meanings of terms such as, ‘Audience segmentation’ in advertising, or ‘Macromarketing’ in marketing. These practices are employed when developing a strong brand, and used to target the right audience for maximum impact.

US brand and marketing agency Kolbrener, have come up with this novel way of displaying these ‘elements’ in a scientific periodic table. They have created it to communicate these terms clearly to their clients, and have used it cleverly as an educational tool.

We just wish we had thought of it first!

Click on the image below, then rollover each of the elements to learn more.

Web 2.0 content is really starting to become useful in making purchasing decisions. User feedback and customers reviews on websites can aid the website visitor in making a decision and website owners shouldn’t be afraid to allow users and visitors to add comments or post reviews on websites.

Just recently, whilst searching for a hotel in the Lake District, new Lake Windermere, I was taken on a journey across a number of websites reviewing content and ended up on www.activehotels.com. The web 2.0 content there was extremely helpful in understanding a lot more about the resort, the facilities and the hotels available there, right down to reading reviews from people of a similar demographic and their thoughts about not only the hotel itself but about the specific rooms that they stayed in.

This was followed up by a quick call to the hotel to check availability of the exact room that we were interested in. Not only did we manage to book that room but we got a significant discount off the prices on the internet!

Without doubt we will be leaving our review on the very same website in the hope that other visitors will benefit from our comments. Hotels are just one example, but web 2.0 content could be used in any industry from automotive to telecoms, any website should consider the opportunities offered by this new wave of interactive web content.

There are many Search Engine Optimisation experts offering various opinions on how to optimise a website. But there are several things you can check and change yourself, with a little bit of knowledge that may prove to be a golden nugget in the mystical world of SEO.

All search engines, especially Google, read the window title when trying to translate the meaning of a web page. Out of all the components that make up a web page (page titles, meta information, page text etc.) the window title is the most important element that will determine the relevance of a web page matching a search term when searched for on the internet.

So what do we mean when we talk about the “window title”? Web developers and SEO experts will know this as the title tag in the html code, “<title>Graphic Design | Web design | Leicester</title>”. When seen in a web browser it displays text at the top of the browser window in a blue bar (IE only). See below:

Combine this with some basic research to identify how many people are searching for specific keyword phrases, and an understanding of the competition on those phrases and you can achieve some remarkable results, quickly and at little cost.

Don’t forget to focus on traffic. It’s all very well being number 1 on Google, but if that isn’t bringing you traffic then it’s a waste of time. Following on from that, the focus has to be on conversions and return on investment (ROI). Are these the terms that your potential paying customers are entering into the search engines to find your website?

If you want a free report on your website then go to www.mastersallen.co.uk/online_marketing_leicester.htm and fill out the form at the bottom of the page and we will run a report for your website, absolutely free.

Note: The reports are not automated and will be run by real people, so please bear that in mind, it may take a few days to get the report over to you at busy times.

Continuing with our brand themed blogs, we have put together a selection of instantly recognizable brands, each one iconic in it’s own right.

These brand identities are so distinctive, all you need is a glimpse to instantly place them. Some of which are more established in terms of age, but all share the same key component, strong visual cues.

To make our point we have created what we can only describe as a pop quiz! and such is our confidence in how recognizable these brands are, we have zoomed in and only given you a peak at the logos.

Click here to reveal the logos

So what is our point? It would be too easy just to show the above brands in full, for obvious reasons. All of the brands above have recognized the value of brand recognition. To mention a few others, McDonalds have their arches, Goodyear has its blimp and AOL has its distinctive pyramid etc. etc.

Recognizing these items involves visual cues stored in your memory. You’ve seen the item before and you’re able to identify it based on features including shape, location, colour, and size. Even the relationship the item has with another item provides your brain with recognition cues.

Looking at the logos above. Is it a design you instantly recognize? What aspect of the design helps you to recognize it? The colour? The shape? Perhaps you don’t recognize the design, but you do recognize the typeface style. A brand strategy which employs the maximum number of recognition cues has an advantage over a competing brand using fewer cues. The more cues the higher the probability that the brand will be recognized by more people.

All of the brands featured above employ lots of recognition cues, not to mention a large marketing budget!

The longer visitors are on your business website, the greater the opportunity for branding.

Some visitors who come to your website will know what they’re looking for, but many others need guidance. Some of them are considering the competition, and if they are shopping online, your business website has to out-shine the competition to get their business.

It’s important to try to keep your visitors on your site until they become a conversion, or to at least build a relationship with the customer through the website until they feel comfortable enough with your business to come back later and complete the sale.

Below are a few useful pointers to implement within your website to increase potential branding, and branding means more opportunity for conversion.

Add some free information to your website.

The more information you have on your business website, the longer a visitor can browse the site without running into the same pages. If there’s more to read, it’s more likely that visitors will stick around to read it. An added benefit of having more information on your website is that you will get more targeted traffic through search engines to the content pages of your site, where visitors can be introduced to your brand.

The free information on your website can come in the form of articles, reviews, statistics, and tutorials. You can also use this information to increase your range of customer services through your website.

Include interactivity on your website.

Offering a website that a potential customer can interact with, can benefit your chances of a conversion. If you have a product or service that can be customised for a customer, consider creating an interactive media experience where the customer can generate price quotes based on certain information, or can see visually how a change of colour or size will affect a product.

Keep your business website live.

One of the best ways to keep a business website attractive and ’stickable’ is to make sure you have some current information. It has to look like your website is a live entity, with new information being added all the time.

These are just a few ways to add stickability to your website. As long as you keep in mind that your goal is to keep customers on your website until they become a business conversion, you can come up with some other creative ways to achieve more conversions.