How to Keep Your Brand Up-to-Date in the Digital Age
Whether you’re prepared or not, the Digital Age of marketing is upon us. To avoid getting lost in the crowd, it is imperative to transition your brand into the digital world. If you’re stuck in traditional marketing and haven’t yet opened your company up to the many ways to market yourself digitally, you’ll go nowhere fast.
Digiday, “The Authority on Digital Media, Marketing and Advertising,” has published an article that explored the battle of brands to stay relevant and embrace digital. They talked about five things companies do that takes them off track when it comes to moving forward with digital marketing. Here are our takeaways from their article:
1. BE CUSTOMER-FOCUSED
Building relationships and keeping the customer as your main focus has always been key in traditional marketing, and it continues to be true in digital brand marketing as well. Instead of going for the quick buck, look to the long-term. A loyal customer is worth much more over time than a dissatisfied one-time buyer.
2. BE OPEN TO CHANGE
Be flexible to try to new things. Don’t get lost in the printed collateral clutter, but open up to also sharing your company via social media, your website and digital advertising. Make your presence known both online and off. After all, many people now find companies online and first get to know them there. Don’t you want to give a good first impression?
3. TAKE RISKS
No one is ever remembered for “playing it safe.” Sure, it might be a risk to try something out-of-the-ordinary —but all press is good press, right? In the digital world, it’s much less costly to take a risk. If a social post or digital ad campaign isn’t performing, you can change strategies and messaging with the click of a button. So give it a shot!
4. ANALYTICS ARE YOUR FRIEND
Don’t just make reports, read and learn from them. Listen to customer complaints and suggestions, then make changes. One of the greatest benefits of digital marketing is the ability to see and hear almost immediate feedback. That may be scary at first, but truly listening to customer complaints and praise can help take your company in a new, stronger direction.
5. DIGITAL BRAND FOR ALL
Digital should be infused into all aspects of your brand, not just here and there.
How is your digital brand keeping up? What advice can you share for being successful? In today’s world, your brand is often known first by its digital footprint, so make sure there’s a strategy behind your digital presence.
How is your digital brand keeping up? What advice can you share for being successful? In today’s world, your brand is often known first by its digital footprint, so make sure there’s a strategy behind your digital presence.
And if you’re interested in learning more about Brand Consistency, register for a FREE Online Seminar by Marketing Profs
Click here to read Digiday’s article entitled, “5 Habits of Unsuccessful Brands in Digital.”
Marketing that Doesn’t Suck: Part 4
/in Branding, Digital Marketing, Featured, Marketing, Outsourced Marketing, Web StrategyExample #4: Companies that Utilize an Outsourced Marketing Partner as a Part of their Growth Strategy
I just had a call today with the Director of Marketing for a mid-size technology company that is looking for an outsourced marketing resource to help them update their company’s positioning in order to be more relevant in today’s market. She has been with the company for six years and felt they needed professionals that specialize in technology marketing to take a hard look at their company and competitive environment and provide them with insights and strategic guidance. She said they were too close to be unbiased. I asked her if they have an in-house marketing department and she said, “I am it.” She works with a variety of freelancers in order to make their marketing happen. I asked her if it was hard not having a dedicated team that was all working from the same sheet of music and she said “it’s exhausting.” I bet it is.
There is a way to utilize outsourced marketing services to support a company’s growth and there is a way not to. The modern, effective way is to have a Director of Marketing or Marketing Manager at the helm internally at your company and then an outsourced marketing partner that provides all of the possible talent needed to market efficiently and effectively. This partner is dialed into your company, offerings, target audiences, customers, competitive environment, team, business objectives and strategic marketing plan. They have one or two people that are your everyday points of contact and that orchestrate all of the initiatives that you have underway. This way, your Director of Marketing or Marketing Manager, can focus on wrangling what he/she needs internally to keep things moving without having to make heads or tails out of communication from an unintegrated team of freelancers. Ultimately, the dynamic between your internal marketing person and your outsourced marketing partner becomes yin and yang, where each is using their strengths to make your marketing machine hum while getting each other’s back.
The other, more “exhausting” way is to piece things together with a hodge podge of freelancers who don’t typically interact with one another and are task driven instead of strategy driven. Sure, many of the freelancers are talented individuals who do a good job but that’s just it, it’s a job, a project, not an integral component of your strategic marketing program that they are actively living every day.
It’s understandable that companies today don’t want to staff an entire marketing department with all of the talent that is really required. They don’t want the headaches or the overhead. So they find one person with a marketing background, give them some sort of budget for freelance talent and expect marketing miracles to happen. Piecing things together is penny wise and pound foolish. If you’re going to outsource your company’s marketing, find a partner who can become an extension of your company, a participant in your total success. Otherwise you’re just treading water. and limiting your company’s growth potential.
Don’t Let Your Company’s Marketing Suck (and stop being mean to your Marketing Manager).
Contact us to learn more about our Outsourced Marketing Services >
Marketing that Sucks: Part 4
/in Branding, Digital Marketing, Featured, Marketing, Outsourced Marketing, Web StrategyCompanies outsource a whole lot of stuff today and this includes outsourced marketing services. But outsourced marketing services still haven’t caught on as much as they need to with small to mid-size businesses. The most common situation we see out there in Marketing Land today is small to mid-size companies that embrace marketing but terribly understaff this function in their business. They hire one Marketing Manager and expect them to function as their entire marketing department. Let me tell you, it isn’t pretty. These are some of the most stressed out people you will ever meet. They are wearing so many hats and are responsible for having more specialized skills than any human should be required to have in a lifetime.
On top of all of this, these very same Marketing Managers are expected to prove their worth by making sure their marketing efforts are producing ROI. Sounds like fun, huh? That’s why so many of these talented individuals last for a year or two and then find a healthier, more supportive work situation. But then there are the savvy Marketing Managers that seek out agencies like ours that provide outsourced marketing services to small to mid-size businesses. They work with us to help make the case to management that they can’t do it all on their own and that their company can have the benefit of a dedicated marketing department for significantly less than the cost of staffing one simply by retaining an outsourced marketing agency. Plus, this type of arrangement will up their company’s marketing game on every level, enabling them to achieve the results they are seeking.
The moral of this story is one person does not a marketing department make. Marketing in today’s complicated world requires a massive amount of different skills and talents to be done well and achieve results. If you’re a company that embraces marketing but doesn’t want to staff up, seriously consider outsourced marketing services so you don’t have a revolving door of marketing managers.
Don’t Let Your Company’s Marketing Suck (and stop being mean to your Marketing Manager).
Contact us to learn more about our Outsourced Marketing Services >
Marketing that Doesn’t Suck: Part 3
/in Digital Marketing, Featured, Marketing, Strategic MarketingMarketing that Sucks: Part 3
/in Digital Marketing, Marketing, Strategic MarketingExample #3: Flying-by-the-Seat-of-Your-Pants Without Marketing Goals & Objectives
Marketing without clearly identifying marketing goals and objectives is not only pointless but a big waste of money. Yet it’s amazing how many companies — of all shapes and sizes — are doing things this way. It’s not their fault, really. Most marketing departments are operating in a state of perpetual overwhelm and simply reacting to the deluge of random initiatives that land on their plate. Maybe they started the year with a list of strategic goals but, more often than not, they haven’t looked at this list in months.
What is the secret to keeping your company’s marketing goals and objectives top-of-mind even with all the one-off requests and initiatives that come your way? We say use your marketing goals and objectives as the navigational system for your marketing program. Keep them front and center in your workday. And, when random, miscellaneous projects come your way, ask in a direct yet always nice manner how this fits in with your company’s marketing goals and objectives. Maybe even cut and paste them for easy reference. This doesn’t mean you won’t ever have to do things that aren’t on course but it’s a way of helping to keep your marketing goals and objectives front and center for everyone in your company so you can continuously steer your efforts in the defined direction. You may even want to keep a log of the initiatives you tackled that weren’t on track along with any notes about their effectiveness.
Now what if you’re a company that is running your marketing without any goals and objectives? None. Zilch. You’re just doing stuff and hoping for the best and maybe not even monitoring the results of your efforts. The message to you is STOP! This is just no way to market in today’s day and age. It’s a huge waste of time and money. Find yourself a strategic marketing partner — ahem, like us — to guide a discussion with the key stakeholders in your company about what they want your marketing to achieve. A good strategic marketing partner knows how to ask the hard questions in order to define realistic, achievable marketing goals and objectives. They will also have the chops to create a strategic marketing plan that is aligned with your goals, objectives and, most importantly, budget. And, they can help you “police” your marketing program so that it stays on course with the marketing goals and objectives that were defined.
Don’t Let Your Company’s Marketing Suck.
Sign up for a Complimentary Online Presence Assessment and download our handy 6-Month Content Planner.
Put POM on it >
Marketing that Doesn’t Suck: Part 2
/in Social Media, Web Design, Web StrategyMarketing that Sucks: Part 2
/in Web Design, Web StrategyExample #2: Social Media for Business to Business that Has No Strategy Behind It
Social media for business to business is pretty much a total wash without any strategy behind it. Sure you can show a pulse for your company online by posting articles, videos, infographics, etc. (we do this) but to really reap the big benefits of social media for business to business, think Search Engine Optimization. Search engines are always hungry for fresh, relevant content. The more relevant (keyword-focused) content you put out, the more links there are driving people to your website. You want to create a web of relevant links online that drive people to your website for your offerings. There are lots of ways to put out content online —blogs, social media, directories, public relations, etc. If you’re serious about being found online, SEO should be factored into your social media strategy. They key to this is to make your blog the heart of your social media strategy. A blog provides a central channel for you to push out content to all of your social media channels. To make life easier come up with a 6 to 12-month strategic content plan that is aligned with your business goals. Then, do 6 months of keyword research for all blog post content. Develop a list of words, phrases and questions by looking at your website, reviewing social media sites your prospects use, looking at your competitions’ websites, analyzing industry blog posts, having sales staff provide you with the FAQs they hear the most, etc. Use Google Trends (unpaid), Word Tracker (free 7 day trial) and SerpStat (free and paid options) to find keywords with good search volume and low competition. Then, plan your content by using a content planner (you can download one here). Post your content according to the schedule on your blog. Be sure to consistently optimize the URL, the title in your blog post and make sure keywords are in your first paragraph and that any images are also optimized.
Don’t Let Your Company’s Marketing Suck.
Sign up for a Complimentary Online Presence Assessment and download our handy content planner.
Put POM on it >
Marketing that Doesn’t Suck: Part 1
/in Web Design, Web StrategyExample #1: The “We Put Our Money Where Our Mouths Are” Responsive Website
Hopefully you saw our first “Marketing that Sucks” email a couple of weeks ago featuring our agency’s old, non-responsive website. If you didn’t, you can check it out here.
To launch the “Marketing that Doesn’t Suck” version of our campaign, we are featuring our new, 100% responsive website. We finally put our money where our mouths are and hooked our agency up with a website that tells our story, communicates what we’re really good at and provides a great user experience on all devices.
Did you know that having a website that is responsive on all devices will improve your SEO rankings with Google? It’s a fact. Also, responsive websites load faster than a mobile website, so fewer people will abandon such sites. Plus, as we discussed in the last post, no one wants to maintain multiple sites – the old way of doing things, having a mobile site and main site – has gone the way of the dinosaurs. Responsive is the present and the future!
Here’s another fact for you: 75% of Americans bring their phones to the bathroom. That’s gross. But no matter where you browse, you should at least have a positive user experience. Go responsive!
Check out our new, responsive website:
Are you reading on your desktop? Your phone? Maybe a tablet? If you have a second, open our new site up on a couple of different devices to really see what we mean by responsive design. If you’re on desktop, shrink and then increase the size of your browser window. You’ll notice how text wraps differently, modules align in new ways and image size changes to adapt to those adjustments. That’s high quality responsive design!
Here’s a recap of some of the many reasons to go responsive:
1. Increase your overall traffic (not split between a mobile and main site)
2. Lower cost and maintenance with just one site
3. Provide a seamless user experience across all devices
4. Adapt to any screen or device size
5. Improve SEO rankings
So what are you waiting for? If you need a partner to help you design a new responsive site, reach out now! Put Pom on it.
Don’t Let Your Company’s Marketing Suck.
Let us transform your website into the business tool it’s meant to be.
Put POM on it >
Marketing that Sucks: Part 1
/in Web Design, Web StrategyExample #1: “How Does A Marketing Agency Have a Non-Responsive Website?”
To launch our “Marketing that Sucks/Doesn’t Suck” email campaign featuring, well, marketing that sucks and doesn’t suck, we thought it was only fair to start with ourselves.
Until about a month ago, we were a marketing agency that had an old-school, non-responsive website. What is a non-responsive website? It’s what pretty much every website was until a few years ago. It’s a site that was designed to look good on just one screen size – the desktop. If you increased the size of your browser window, you just got extra white space. If you opened our site on mobile devices, it wasn’t user-friendly there, either. You had to do a lot of fancy finger work to actually read our site, and often, section of the site got cut off.
This is a big no-no in this day and age, especially since 55% of web traffic today is from mobile devices. Many people will immediately leave your site if it isn’t easy to view on mobile, so it’s important to develop a site that works on all devices. You may remember (and may even still have) when mobile sites were developed and maintained separately from main websites. This is not only a pain (who wants to maintain and optimize more than one site!?), but it also just doesn’t make sense anymore. Responsive sites, when well-designed, look great on all platforms, so you can put your time, money and focus into building just one awesome website.
Our only excuse for not having a responsive website until now? We’ve been busy creating ones for our clients! Not a great excuse, but there you are. Here’s what we mean about our old site:
Here’s what we mean about our old site:
See how the site is either too large or too small to fit the various screen sizes? Notice how difficult it can be to read certain sections? That’s old-school, non-responsive design.
But we’ve finally put some time into ourselves (you know what they say about the cobbler’s kid who has no shoes), and we’re excited to show off that shiny, new, responsive design in our next blog…
Don’t Let Your Company’s Marketing Suck.
Stay tuned to read our post about our newly launched, responsive website. In the meantime, if your company’s website sucks, we’re here to help.
Put POM on it >
Pomerantz Marketing, Annapolis, MD B2B Marketing Agency, Changes Things Up
/in Digital Marketing, Marketing, News, Web Designhttp://www.prweb.com/releases/pomerantz-marketing/b2b-marketing-agency/prweb14329353.htm
ANNAPOLIS, MD (PRWEB) MAY 16, 2017
Pomerantz Marketing (formerly The Pomerantz Agency) announced today that it has changed its address, name and web presence. After 15 years of being located on the Annapolis Neck Peninsula, the B2B marketing agency has moved to 175 Admiral Cochrane Drive, Suite 104, in the heart of Annapolis’s business district.
It was high time for a change, according to Kathy Floam-Greenspan, Pomerantz’s President & Strategy Director. “I was feeling kind of bored and uninspired in our old space after so many years, and knew I needed to change things up to infuse new energy into myself and my business. Being in our new light and bright space made a difference immediately, inspiring me to revamp the agency’s brand and website,” said Floam-Greenspan.
As far as the name change goes, “I felt having the word ‘agency’ was a bit old-school in our name and decided to cut to the chase and say what we do, which is marketing,” added Floam-Greenspan. “This also gave us a reason to freshen up our logo and identity.” Next up was revamping the agency’s website, something Pomerantz had been trying to do for the last couple of years in fits and starts. “We had a non-responsive website, which is a big no-no since 55% of all web traffic today is from mobile devices. It meant that our old site didn’t look good on mobile devices. Our only excuse was that we were too busy creating responsive sites for our clients to focus on one for ourselves.”
Six months after moving into the new space, Pomerantz has changed everything. “Never underestimate what a change of space can do for you,” says Floam-Greenspan.
About Pomerantz Marketing
Pomerantz is a highly regarded B2B marketing agency that supports the marketing efforts of regional, national and global companies in a wide range of industries including technology, construction and channel marketing. Pomerantz’s services include Strategy, Branding, Content, Graphic Design, Web, and Integrated Marketing. They also serve as the outsourced marketing engine for small to mid-size companies that embrace marketing but don’t want to staff up. For more information about Pomerantz Marketing, visit https://pomagency.com or contact info(at)pomagency.com
How to Keep Your Brand Up-to-Date in the Digital Age
/in Branding, Digital Marketing, Featured, MarketingHow to Keep Your Brand Up-to-Date in the Digital Age
Whether you’re prepared or not, the Digital Age of marketing is upon us. To avoid getting lost in the crowd, it is imperative to transition your brand into the digital world. If you’re stuck in traditional marketing and haven’t yet opened your company up to the many ways to market yourself digitally, you’ll go nowhere fast.
Digiday, “The Authority on Digital Media, Marketing and Advertising,” has published an article that explored the battle of brands to stay relevant and embrace digital. They talked about five things companies do that takes them off track when it comes to moving forward with digital marketing. Here are our takeaways from their article:
1. BE CUSTOMER-FOCUSED
Building relationships and keeping the customer as your main focus has always been key in traditional marketing, and it continues to be true in digital brand marketing as well. Instead of going for the quick buck, look to the long-term. A loyal customer is worth much more over time than a dissatisfied one-time buyer.
2. BE OPEN TO CHANGE
Be flexible to try to new things. Don’t get lost in the printed collateral clutter, but open up to also sharing your company via social media, your website and digital advertising. Make your presence known both online and off. After all, many people now find companies online and first get to know them there. Don’t you want to give a good first impression?
3. TAKE RISKS
No one is ever remembered for “playing it safe.” Sure, it might be a risk to try something out-of-the-ordinary —but all press is good press, right? In the digital world, it’s much less costly to take a risk. If a social post or digital ad campaign isn’t performing, you can change strategies and messaging with the click of a button. So give it a shot!
4. ANALYTICS ARE YOUR FRIEND
Don’t just make reports, read and learn from them. Listen to customer complaints and suggestions, then make changes. One of the greatest benefits of digital marketing is the ability to see and hear almost immediate feedback. That may be scary at first, but truly listening to customer complaints and praise can help take your company in a new, stronger direction.
5. DIGITAL BRAND FOR ALL
Digital should be infused into all aspects of your brand, not just here and there.
How is your digital brand keeping up? What advice can you share for being successful? In today’s world, your brand is often known first by its digital footprint, so make sure there’s a strategy behind your digital presence.
How is your digital brand keeping up? What advice can you share for being successful? In today’s world, your brand is often known first by its digital footprint, so make sure there’s a strategy behind your digital presence.
And if you’re interested in learning more about Brand Consistency, register for a FREE Online Seminar by Marketing Profs
Click here to read Digiday’s article entitled, “5 Habits of Unsuccessful Brands in Digital.”