*enter cliche “lets do it” type music here* whooohoooo!

Why Should you know this simple number? (If you don’t know it, go here to calculate and convert for your type of biz – or here for another good article)
Every opportunity to promote your company that comes along should be calculated on how it will benefit your bottom line. Don’t get sold on how many eye balls see you, how many times your name is mentioned or who you are gong to be associated with (of course these are essential to know when calculating your RISK & ROI of each promotion), it’s about WHAT’S IN IT FOR YOU? And let’s be honest, you don’t have “general branding” marketing dollars – do you? So be picky where you spend those valuable marketing dollars.

Let’s Crunch Some Numbers:
You are selling a widget.
Using the above formula, you have figured that your cost per customer is (X) and you have an opportunity that fits both your demographic & psychgraphic profile of your desired client. Your objectives & strategy line up as well (if you don’t know what these are – find your sign).

I am not a math wiz – but here is what jen math looks like:  Y/X=Z

Cost Per Customer: $10
Opportunity: $500
Need to sell 50 widgets to make the opportunity pay for itself.
…and of course you have added some kind of tracking (text, phone number, super secret word of the day, funny face, certain product etc) that will tell you EXACTLY where those 50 people came from.

I found this blog comment on a post on MarketingProfs.com when I was subscribing – now I am not & I can’t find the link. sorry, looser link….but some good info regardless that I scraped while researching for this post.

On top of that, I’d calculate the ROI by looking at:

Cost per Acquisition (CPA) = Cost of campaign / Number of sales

Return On Advertising Spend (ROAS) = Total Revenue Resulting from Sales / Cost of campaign

PROFITABLE Return on Advertising Spend (PROAS) = (Total Revenue Resulting from Sales * Margin) / Cost of campaign

My favorite is CPA. I use it to compare advertising campaigns quickly

PS: Thanks Tac – I needed the push.

Background:

• Cobalt doesn’t have a social presence – perfect! I don’t have to undo terrible practices. (mainly a business can NOT be a “friend” – you will eventually get shut down from FB & loose ALL THAT DATA).
• Cobalt has opened up a retail Off Road Center that is on the same lot to their customized Truck Equipment shop in Nampa on Karcher Road.

P-People:
Who do we want to know about us?
Jeff (their offroad specialist) wants the customer who is going to be a long term, year long customer. They spend money every month on accessories for their vehicle. The lift kit guy is great, but after spending $4,000 in one shot – he might not come back for a while.

O-Objective:
What do we want to accomplish?
We want to build a data base of new customers – to build a fire, you must first start with kindling.-thank you Greg Stielstra.

S-Strategy:
How will the relationship with the customer change?
We want people to talk about the Cobalt  Off Road Center when they think of truck accessories in the Treasure Valley.

T-Tools:
Which technology tools will get us to the objective?
Since I AM in radio – we will use that medium in prime areas (Bob & Tom on The Eagle) as well as Traffic spots and very targeted day & times on both country stations: Kissin’ 92 & KQFC.  We are going to direct people to the station websites with the keyword COBALT where listeners will sign up to be on Cobalt’s monthly eNewsletter list. Jeff is going to use MailChimp – keeping those that opt in “in the know” for sales, new products & company news.  Increase awareness and stay in front of the customer.

Future:
FaceBook business page presence with objective to interact and create community with the off-road & accessory enthusiasts.
Open House in April to celebrate Off Road Center
Possible affiliation with The Eagle’s broadcast of BSU Football games for 2011/2012

Here is how I would use FaceBook Places:
(of course I would have the following IN PLACE already…)
1.  Great reputation already WITH OUT FaceBook
2.  A scheduled and impromptu editorial & promotional calendar on what is communicated “out”
3.  Policy & procedures on how to deal with negative nilly’s (be kind & treat others the way you want to be treated)

With the above…
1.  Have a tool that allows you to see INSTANTLY when someone “checks in” with Places.
2.  Do one of the following with-in MINUTES of #1-
a. respond to the person with a “Thank you! Be sure to sign up for our eNewsletter at the front desk with Alice – we give away all kinds of good stuff every month! If you tell your server ‘I love Kermit the Frog’, appetizers are on us! Cheers!”
or BETTER
b. go find that person, thank them, bring them a drink, a flower, a $5 off coupon, a hug…..do something! What kind of appreciation would YOU want from a place that you love?

Why?
Hind site is 20/20.  Wouldn’t you LOVE to be that guy who discovered how to sell on the internet FIRST?  This is that opportunity.  FaceBook (along with the many other location base services) are figuring out how to tell you who your customer is, where they are & when they are ready to buy. Information is power – you are the superhero!

ESP with a tad bit of opt in voyeurism at its finest.

This post was inspired by an eMarketer interview with Emily White, Senior Director of Local at FaceBook.

On Monday, November 29th, 2010 I started my new job as an Account Executive with Citadel Radio. I will be consulting with clients about their marketing practices (love that!) and why a combination of radio, web, text is a fit for XYZ business.  I will be representing 96.9 The Eagle, 93.1 Hit Music Now & 92.3 Kissin’92.

I have always believed that Radio is a good fit in a marketing mix when messaged properly.  (although Jeff Caves stated on Tuesday “so, your going to take a crack of selling traditional?”)  I truly do believe, and always have, it is your messaging, honesty, integrity, reputation and service that will make you successful – whichever medium you choose to be successful on.

I will not be out there selling to selling. I have this desire and need to help people make a difference on their bottom line…it’s the Mama in me: help & change & help & change.

Success is not a matter of luck, it’s a level of happiness that I will achieve.
All my love,
-jen

I did this diagram for MPC in October 2008, right before I was laid off (literally days before) and 2 months before they closed their doors.  It was a very wide-reaching plan for the company social media plan that I was developing.  The plan was rogue since the VP of IT didn’t believe in social media at the time and controlled the website, so this was our plan to go “out there” and make a presence for ourselves based on our new internal bloggers and the success of Michael Boss’ podcasts.  It sort of reminds me of looking at my daughters writing two years ago and thinking “whoa, you have come a looong way baby!”  But what is funny is that so many SMB’s are not even close to understanding how this non-linear approach works and how it can benefit their pipeline and business bottom line.

Thank goodness I save all my notes!  This was originally white boarded, diagrammed out on paper then I believe I used Publisher to make it pretty…in a stick figure way.  I printed this out quite large and wrote “THIS IS WHAT MY BRAIN LOOKS LIKE” where people passing by my isle cubicle could see it…

What I find funny two years later is how we avoided the MPC Corporate website so blatantly! Our “go to” web page all landed on Diigo.  I would have to conclude that I wasn’t buying into FriendFeed at the time & I was seeing that Diigo was going to give us better SEO feedback.  I was obviously throwing “everything” at the wall and hoping that one way would stick.  It would have been so cool to ride this out…hopefully I have my chance here soon.

Ummm, didn’t we all take the test when we are 15/16 years old…shouldn’t we KNOW not to drink and drive, or speed in a school zone or tailgate/drive crazy?

The PR side of story telling and what happens when people drink & drive etc. is differernt – those are almost scare tactics, you know: Oprah-esque stories that scare us into doing the right thing.

My thinking is that if you don’t warn the public where you are going to pull them over (like in the major construction area,  on the very well posted 55 MPH freeway) you might just make some more money by getting those that are not “in the know” of the rules that we learned at 15.  Wouldn’t that increase the number of tickets and hence the budget for the Police Department where it could be used on training, hiring more officers to catch bad guys and better PR stories?

My first PR/Marketing campaign would be reminding people how to use a 4-way stop sign when there are 4 cars. (BTW: the person that is going straight HAS THE RIGHT AWAY, not the person turning)….and when there are only two cars next to each other: yes, the first car to arrive goes first.

Takeaway & Question to you: Do you think the Boise Police Department is using their marketing dollars in a responsible way where we are getting the most use & information from it?  What would you suggest?

I admit, I don’t have a personal social media plan (other than getting hired somewhere) but if you are a business and have publishing rights (blog, FaceBook, Twitter, yadda yadda yadda) you should know what is going to be published and where it’s going to be published (because it doesn’t belong everywhere) for the next two to three months.
Here is how I have done it for multiple clients:

I do a POST strategy that solely belongs to the authors of Groundswell: Charlene Li & Josh Bernoff.

It takes about 2 hours and my clients have come out with blog topics for 2-3 times a week for about 8-10 weeks.

After you have organized your blog posts that correlate with your industry, put them where it is appropriate.  Please, please, please: don’t put it everywhere – it doesn’t belong everywhere.  If you haven’t figured out WHERE you belong or WHERE your customers are at – I can help with that too.

How do you come up with your blog posts? If you had a schedule, would it be easier?

I complained recently that there are certain individuals out there who are sub-contracted by businesses to RUN their FaceBook & Twitter accounts.  From our similar “circles of influence” I have heard people complain that his one person’s followers are getting pretty annoyed of getting a Fan Request from every new client of theirs.  Kudos to the businesses for trying something new – boooo for letting someone “do it” for you. Would you let this same person represent you at a meeting with the press or your board of directors?  Nuf said.

So the question for the person that doesn’t know and/or understand these social marketing ways is: If I “go” where the people are at, how do I attract them with-out annoying a bunch of people?

Here is what I would do if I were a business owner and wanting to get on FaceBook and Twitter (of course I have done a strategy to decide if these are the right outlets for my customers):

1.  Make sure that my current customer lists are up to date and include all the vitals:

• Name, Physical Address, Phone Number of Choice, eMail, FaceBook, Twitter Handle

2.  How do I make sure I have ALL THIS before I start on the social sites? ASK.  Have a conversation with your customers in person or via email and tell them you have a plan to be on FB etc in the next month & you want to make sure that you have all info ready to better serve the customers with support,  promotions, contests, stories etc.  (which of course they will have the option to opt-out of being sent info via FB)

3.  Have a plan: strategy (includes Who, Why, What you want to accomplish, Who else is on board (can you use co-op dollars?) What kind of response time will you have, How will you deal with negative comments?)

4.  Now share this plan with your customers via your updated email list.  Let them be part of the process, let them Opt-Out!, Ask them what they want to see from you (and don’t see…because we have all seen and received crap from being a “fan” of someones business that sends you 2 messages a day).

5.  After you have refined your plan (set a timeline for feedback/ideas), set up your accounts.  Have a reason for people to “fan” you (contest, feedback, discount etc)

6.  If you have a personal FaceBook account, don’t invite everyone (this would be the ANNOYING part) but do post a note and a link saying “I now have a fan page for my business where my goal is X, if you would like to become a fan, thank you – if not, I totally respect that!”  You get the idea…treat people the way you want to be treated.  Unless you are an arrogant jerk with a chip on your shoulder thinking that the world owes you something…and everything YOU post anywhere is relevant – ummm, never mind.

Good luck and don’t be afraid to ask questions to those that are doing a good job – learn from others mistakes and successes!