History--' yours, mine, and ours

History - Historia (Photo credit: Aloriel)

     
         Most people think that marketing is hard and it certainly can be.  But "hard" is not the "H" word that I want to deal with in this post.  The word I'm thinking of is "history".

        Why would I connect history to marketing?   We all learned some history in school and now and then we might watch a history show on television.  What's this have to do with marketing your product?

         What I'm referring to is your own personal history, the history of your marketplace, and our history together as a provider and client.   To jump into a marketing venture without making it personal can lead to a cold relationship with no loyalty.  This is a recipe for failure.

         As you head into the strategic zone of creating a buzz for your product and building a customer base, you need to take a personal inventory of strengths and weaknesses.  Assess your past success and honestly admit your failures.  What have you been best at in the past?  Where will you need help?

         Once you have a clear understanding of your own history, start evaluating the histories of your associates in business--your vendors, partners, consultants, or whoever is helping you to get your venture off the ground and moving forward.  You want the best on your team--or at least those who are capable of providing you the knowledge and skills you will need in achieving your goals.

          When you've gotten the team in place and the venture going, keep track of the history.  Remember your customers and what it was that brought them your way in the first place.  Listen to what they have to say.  Pay attention to them especially if they stop paying attention to you.

           But don't let the team you've assembled fail you either.  Make sure they are staying in the same race that you are running.   Your history with them needs to be monitored and kept on the track you are on.

           Running a successful program is like conducting a orchestra.  You can't play all of the instruments yourself.  Your musicians all have histories that have made them masters of their crafts.  As the conductor you have to put everything together and work with it over time to make it into something presentable for your audience.

           Success has a history and is a product of many consolidated histories.   Ongoing success results from nurturing the history of the enterprise in which you are involved, whether it be getting a book published or a product mass-marketed.

            Heed the words of George Santayana, "Those that fail to learn from history, are doomed to repeat it." If you flounder blindly through what you're doing and don't learn from any one's mistakes, the odds of finding success will be slim.    Knowing history and tracking your progress along your journey makes reaching goals a more sure thing.

Here's a blog for the letter 'H':

Someone who knows about history is Hilary.  Many of you know Hilary Melton-Butcher who writes at the blog Positive Letters...Inspirational Stories.   Her connections of historical events and trivia make for fascinating reading.

Related articles

• A Brief History of Content Marketing and the Elements of Success (v3im.com)
• Prepare a business plan for growth (tinysolution.wordpress.com)
• Building Fewer, Deeper, REAL Relationships (williecrawford.com)
• Ways to Build a New Customer Base (noobpreneur.com)
• Why Your Marketing Isnt Working - Selfish Marketing [Fraser Hay] (ecademy.com)
• Become More Customer-Loyalty Focused With Microsoft CRM (CustomerEffective.com)

Commercialization: Is it a bad thing?

Coca-Cola Water (Photo credit: @mjb)

        Critical acclaim is something you have to earn, but if you've got it why not flaunt it.  Even if you haven't gained the acclaim, but you believe you're good enough and the right people have reinforced that for you, why not take it to the next level?

          Commercialization is often perceived as a bad thing.  This is something a lot of artists should try to get over if they are trying to sell product.  Even an author of literary fiction, serious poetry, or scholastic non-fiction needs to think in commercial terms if they want to sell their products for money.  Stop looking at all commercialization as tacky glitz and clamor, and see it as merely a process of creating attention for whatever it is you want to deliver.

           Producers of consumer goods and providers of service know the importance of using commercialization to build business.  Those of you who are in the arts need to consider whether you're in it to make a living or otherwise.  If it's otherwise then have fun, but it's the former then start thinking with a business mind.

            Don't compromise your values to obtain what you want, but accept that you need to take action to reach your market.  Commercialization doesn't have to be crass or in your face.   Adapt your marketing campaign to reach your desired target audience.

             If you've produced something that's worth having then realize that you or somebody is going to have to sell it.  Selling is an action that can take many forms, but those actions all fall under commercialization.

  A blog to C:

Club Creative Studio looks like a blog that might endorse the concepts of commercialization.    

   

Related articles

• Traditional Marketing vs. Online Marketing: You Shouldn't Have to Choose (findyourtippingpoint.com)
• Picking sides in the fiction wars (writingthemuse.wordpress.com)

Advertising -- ABC's of Marketing

Badge art by Ada Z from Collagepodge.com

       Advertising is an integral part of promotion.  Typically advertising is  paid for or at least requires some sort of investment in materials.  The purpose of advertising is to create awareness of what I will refer to as product throughout this series.   The advertising also provides knowledge, branding, intrigue, and hype.

       For the A to Z Challenge I started a blog devoted to the event and gave the event a name that was easy to remember.   In November I enlisted the creative skills of artist Ada Z to develop a logo that we could use as a badge to be used on the A to Z Blog and for participants to use on their own blogs to identify them as part of the A to Z community.   This event has been being advertised on the A to Z Blog, the blogs of the Challenge co-hosts, and many of the blogs of participants.  All advertising in our case has been free.

        If you are an author or a creator of some unique product you will need to resort to various forms of advertising in order to get your name out in the public eye.  This is likewise true if you are a business owner or even involved in an organization such as a church or social service provider.

         Free advertising is nice but not always easy to get.  In order to get your product before more people you will need to decide on an advertising budget.  Start small and choose your advertising platforms wisely.  Do as much research as you can before making a decision so you don't squander your budget in useless places.

My Letter A honoree is Ada Z.   

         Ada Zdanowicz is an multi-media artist in New Jersey.  Her specialties are collage and video.   She can be found at her website collagepodge.com.  Thank you Ada for the A to Z logo, promo video, and other additional help you have given to the A to Z Challenge.

A also stands for Alliterative Allomorph:

At her blog Alliterative Allomorph Jessica Bell will be having a drawing every two days during April.  She will be pulling lucky winners from the comments on her posts.  Be sure to stop by her blog and also visit her music website.

Related articles

• Going into Advertising (tugbaski.wordpress.com)
• Small enterprise Blog site Advertising and marketing: Precisely what does This Include? (evilmasterreport.com)
• Wonderful Television Advertising Promotions From The 21st Century (technologyofcomputer.wordpress.com)
• A number of Techniques to generate From Your Web site Employing Advertising (boldstate.com)
• Facebook advertising - Test if you Like it. Test if you don't! (marketing.yell.com)
• Reblogged: Blogging Tops Advertising as Highest ROI for Online Marketing (zemanta.com)

Halloween: Clout in Costumes and Candy

           Halloween is a major economic driving force in the U.S. economy.  Yes, the concept of this October day is based on frivolity and that which is not vital to survival, however a broad segment of the business world  has grown dependent upon the celebration of Halloween in order to remain strong and experience growth. If Halloween were to disappear, the economy would not collapse but it would be set back. The immediate effect upon businesses is obvious when related to the actual chain of the merchandising from creation of the goods, to the delivery to the point of sale, in providing incentive for customers to buy through the promotion of the products, and finally in activities of putting the merchandise on display and selling it to the customers.  Yet there are still more aspects of the economic driving force of Halloween that many people don't even consider.
         Now before we get into these other aspects I would like to address the argument: One day isn't going to make or break these businesses, all the merchandise will eventually get sold throughout the year. True to some extent, however much of the merchandise produced for Halloween is specific to the event and there would be no reason to produce it otherwise, such as Halloween cards and decorations. Also, creating the continuity of habit that I had mentioned in the previous post is essential for building a clientele that will feel compelled to return for similar items not only for Halloween, but also New Year's, Mardi Gras -- in other words if people derive some sense of pleasure or fulfillment or some other reward then they may develop a pattern that will keep them coming back.  The merchandisers need to take initiatives on their own to cultivate this following, but they also need the events like Halloween to bring in new clients. Halloween serves as a noticeable stimulus to elicit a desired reponse -- buy this stuff now and have fun and get hooked ( or feel obligated in some cases).
         Taking it one step further for the Halloween aversionists, let's look at a business relating to a different type of special event.  Flower shops may sell their product steadily throughout the year.  This is what they want, of course, but typically they want to increase business. They might encourage more people to buy their flowers through advertising and spreading word about their businesses.  It's those boon times that really give most of these businesses impetus.  How many florists would be excited about getting rid of Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, or Memorial Day?  Very few obviously.  They have their year-round business to survive, but for many of these shops the special flower days are where they make their profit.  When customers gain the rewards of giving the flowers on the special days, they may be more apt to fall into the continuity of habit of buying flowers on other days as well.
         Small business is one of the most essential components in the economy. When one business is hurt or fails there is a chain reaction. The current state of the economy alone is enough to illustrate how this chain connects each of us to the other, one business to the next.  Several economy watchers have pointed to the problems with American auto companies which  led to dealership closures which had economic impact far beyond the communities they served.  In relation to Halloween costume buying, a survey by the National Retail Federation found that this year young adults, who typically spend the most on a costume, will spend $68.56 this year on a costume as compared to $86.59 in 2008 :
(  http://www.nrf.org/modules.php?name=News&op=viewlive&sp_id=790  ) 
Overall, survey findings show that consumers plan to spend an average of  $56.30 on Halloween merchandise.  Even with the drop in spending among the young adults, we're talking billions of dollars of spending in honor of one day.  This is nothing to look down on.  Much of this spending is with small local business.  If this sector of the economy were to go away, we would all feel the negative effect.  Who would like to see Halloween banned?  I may not enjoy Halloween like I used to and maybe I don't participate in the festivities, but I like to see business do well.
        I haven't even't covered all of the ramifications of the merchandising subject of the Halloween economy yet, but I do want to explore some of the other ways that Halloween contributes to the U.S. economy.  I'm not writing a book on this subject so I don't want to go on too much about it.  Though looking at it all it seems one could write a book on the topic. On the next post I do want to get into some of the other ways that Halloween impacts the economy.  If anyone has another viewpoint, I'd love to hear it so please leave a comment if you feel motivated enough to do it.  Thanks for reading.

What's With Halloween Anyway?

           Halloween is coming!  I keep mentioning Halloween and a reader who has been following this blog might say, "Okay, I get it, but what's with this Halloween obsession anyway?".  In some of my earlier posts I did promise that I would eventually get to the whys and wherefores of my interest in Halloween and now it's probably a good time to finally get to that business. After all, the first week of October is almost over and Halloween is coming very soon.
         As I have indicated in previous posts, I have been unemployed since the end of February. It was a position I had held for the past 18 years.  I was managing a regional warehouse for one of the largest wholesale costume and other related merchandise distributors in the United States. It was a process of downsizing and facility consolidation -- not really a factor of the national economy, but one of business economics. Not wanting to relocate I chose instead to end my relationship with the company and stay where I have been living and had established roots so to speak. After 18 years of working, being unemployed has been somewhat intriguing-- a time when I've been able to open new doors, like writing this blog, and explore some of the opportunities for rediscovering old dreams, like writing in general.
        Still old habits are hard to let go of.  There were many aspects of my job that I savored. I wore many hats which made for a lot of job variety, which I enjoy.  As the one in charge I had a lot of freedom within the workplace.  Yet at the same time, being the manager, I was in many ways a willing slave to my job.  All year we would be either be preparing for the next Halloween or recovering for Halloween recently gone by.  The months of September and October were a madhouse of seeming non-stop work except for a few hours of sleep each night. During those months there was a level of intense excitement and a usually positive stress level.  Now with all of this no longer a part of my life I tend reflect upon these old habits now and then. And due to my past immersion in the Halloween season I maintain an interest in that final day of October.
          Last Saturday as I was out and about I drove past several Halloween stores and naturally took notice of them to see what their presentations were like and how many cars were in the parking lots.  All but one store were temporary stores that are only open for 2 or 3 months.  That is the nature of much of the business these days.  Many of the small year round costumes shops have closed over the past decade and more close every year.  It's a tough business.  And it is made even more difficult by the proliferation of online stores.  In fact, most of the shops that have remained in business have out of necessity opened their own web sites in order to compete.  It's like any highly competive business -- you have to adapt to the changes of the modern age in order to survive.  The old schoolers usually just don't make it.
         Not working at a job that I have been used to doing for many years feels somewhat odd.  There is a poignancy that envelops me when my thoughts fall back to my old position.  However, I don't stay there long.  There is a sense of freedom also that sets my thinking in new directions.  As is often said, when one door closes, another one opens --- the end is an opportunity for a new beginning.  For me it is time and though at times uncertain, I am excited. 
          For me Halloween is past -- a fun memory of childhood and an important resume entry in my adult life.  Halloween now has a new significance which is possibly that it will no longer be very significant to me.  But still Halloweeen is coming and I will have some more things to say about Halloween.