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Friday
July 16, 2010 Back to SchoolFiled under: LogoMall, Logomall features, Marketing, Member Benefits Not even a week after my daughter’s last day of kindergarten, I received the Pottery Barn Kids “Back to School” catalog. What perfect timing. I have been looking forward to buying a new backpack and lunch bag for months. Her filthy, falling apart, disgusting back pack went in the trash the last day of school. Can you say “Goodbye Hello Kitty lunch bag”? If you target the education market, your clients are probably eager to get started with fresh new ideas and programs for the 2010 – 2011 year. Get your clients thinking about back to school programs on your LogoMall web site. The tools and content that we have developed for the Back to School season will help you take the work out of promoting and help boost your Q3 sales. Back to School Featured Products We pre-selected school items into a mini-store for you to promote specifically to the education market. The Back to School featured product set will appear in left navigation on your site and you can have a selection of those products appear on your home page. All you need to do is add the set to your site which can easily be done through ASIsecure.com. Back to School LogoMall Categories Highlight school related categories in your navigation so shoppers can get ideas and start browsing your vast selection of products. If you can search for it on LogoMall, you can add a link to it “school”, “cheering”, “backpacks”. Take a look at the navigation at sales.logomall.com. The Select-a-Search links can be added to your site through ASIsecure.com. Back to School Product Collages Showcase products for Back to School right on your home page. We created crisp product collages that show a sampling of the type of products that you can offer your clients. Visit www.getlogomall.com/collages for collage options.
Back to School Videos Video is an effective way to get your message across. It engages your site visitors and encourages shopping. Our video spokesperson can be added to your site when you upgrade to our LogoMall marketing package. View a video sample at sales.logomall.com. Email Marketing Drive your customers to your online back to school promotions through an email marketing blast or e-newsletter. You can feature articles about effective Back to School promotions and the power of promotional products. ASI members can take advantage of great pricing with our email marketing affiliate, RatePoint. For a free trial, visit www.asicentral.com/ratepoint. As always, our support team is available to assist you with updating your web site. Call us at 800.546.1350 and ask for your eMedia Coordinator.
Thursday
June 17, 2010 Coffee with Karyn Coates and Jake KrolickFiled under: Marketing Let’s pick up where I left last month when I shared how to start a business FaceBook page to promote your web site. This month I sat down with Jake Krolick, ASI’s digital marketing expert, to discuss how to build relevant content and promote your business page. My original intent was to record my interview with Jake on my iPhone for the purpose of remembering all of the good tidbits he offers and write up my normal blog. Jake’s take on how to run a successful social media page is so chuck-full of valuable information I thought it would be better if you just heard it for yourself. BTW – Jake happens to be a celebrity. Think back to the blizzard in Philadelphia in February. If you watch Nightline or World News with Diane Sawyer you might have caught an adventurous fellow who skied down the famous “Rocky” steps at the Art Museum. Yep, that was our Jake and I am lucky enough to work with him every day. Click Here to listen
Thursday
May 20, 2010 Facebook.It’s not just for looking up your old college flames.Filed under: Marketing At the start of spring, my family and I were on our way home from a Sunday outing. Addicted to my iPhone, I clicked on the Facebook app to glance at the latest status updates. And there it was. A post from my favorite ice cream shop, Goodnoe’s in Bucks County, PA, that the mocha fudge flavor was back and to get over to the store. I immediately told my husband to turn the car around and to step on it. In a few minutes, I was enjoying the best ice cream on the planet and Goodnoe’s was enjoying the sales. Yes, Facebook can actually work for your business. With the right mix of content, you cangenerate interest, educate your audience about the power of promotional products and drive sales. Through the network of fans that you build, you create a direct channel to grab their attention every single day, for FREE. It’s a marketer’s dream. If you are not on Facebook yet, you should start off by just getting your own account, build a friend base and learn the protocols for posting status updates, photos and video. Get comfortable with Facebook and how it works first before committing to a fan page. If you have a Facebook page and you are ready to create a page for your business, here are some tips for getting started. By the way, this is a perfect Friday afternoon or late night project when you have some uninterrupted time. Creating a Page Spend Time on Settings Review Business Pages Populate Before Promoting Next month, we’ll share tips on how to promote your business page and increase the number of fans. Just saw a Facebook post from Target. Lawn chairs are on sale this week. Gotta run….
Thursday
February 18, 2010 More Eyes on YOUR MessageFiled under: LogoMall, Marketing, Member Benefits, New Features, Tips and Tricks Email marketing is powerful. No other medium gives you the instant results that an email marketing campaign can produce. You know immediately who is opening your email and what they clicked. However, now your promotions and informational content no longer need to be limited to just the email addresses on your list. With social media added to the mix, you significantly expand your audience exponentially (think: Twitter and Facebook!). RatePoint, ASI’s email marketing member benefit, has just announced a new feature that easily helps you combine email marketing and social media. RatePoint’s social media option will automatically post your email marketing content such as newsletters, coupons, specials and announcements about new or hot products directly to your Twitter and Facebook accounts. With very little effort you can push out content in one location without having to go to each social media site to send your posts. RatePoint easily connects your Twitter and Facebook accounts. You select by campaign if you want to publish your content to social media sites and then create a personalized text status message for Twitter and Facebook that will link back to your email. Social networking sites are increasing the exposure of your marketing campaigns and stretching your marketing dollars. And the audience is not limited to the number of contacts or followers you have. Search engines like Google are quickly indexing social media content such as Twitter posts. By pushing out good messages with valuable content, you enhance how your potential customers will learn about your business and how you can provide promotional product solutions for them. More eyes on your brand, more eyes on your web site, more potential for sales. It’sthat simple. A Free account is now available for up to 125 contacts. When you upgrade to a paid subscription with more email contacts, ASI has negotiated great pricing for you. The new social media tools are free to use with the trial and any paid subscription. Visit www.asicentral.com/ratepoint to sign up for your Free account today.
Thursday
November 5, 2009 Logomall Marketing VideosFiled under: LogoMall, Logomall features, Marketing, New Features, Video At our yearly Halloween party my neighbor yelled over asking if my son, who is 18 months old, knew sign language. I raised a skeptical brow as she claimed he was signing the word “more” while eyeing up the cookies on the table. I politely told her she had enough wine and to put the bottle down. Of course, my husband later confirmed with my son’s school that, yes indeed, they had been teaching sign language. Why? Little tots can’t communicate everything they want and need other ways to get noticed and express themselves. The same holds true in business – especially on the Internet. How else can you speak to your LogoMall visitors, get their attention and communicate the benefits of promotional products? Video marketing A professional, short video can reach out to your audience in a way that words on a page can not. A welcoming message personalizes the visitor’s experience while bringing your web site to life. Brief and concise, a video can quickly express what you do and how you can help visitors. Use video to encourage shopping throughout the LogoMall site and direct them to featured items or themed categories to promote buying. Producing a video on your own could be a daunting and expensive task. To produce quality videos on your own, you need the expertise, the time and the equipment. If you don’t have the resources to write, design and edit a video, hiring a costly production service may be your next step. Great news! LogoMall is now offering “ready to use” marketing videos for your web site. The videos are created by professional designers and actors and can be quickly added and changed. Choose from the various themed backgrounds, select an actor and message from the video library.
We are now featuring our holiday videos targeting shoppers looking for the perfect gift giving idea. Check out an actual LogoMall video. You’ll notice when you go back into the site or refresh the page that a new actor with a new message appears that gives your visitor a new experience each time they come back. LogoMall has bundled the video collection with a subscription to RatePoint, an email marketing service, in an exclusive marketing package. Sign up for more information and to view additional video samples.
Tuesday
September 1, 2009 How will you be promoting this holiday season?Filed under: LogoMall, Marketing, Member Benefits, New Features Spark holiday shopping on your LogoMall site with email marketing. It’s a highly effective way to communicate your creative gift ideas, recognition and award programs. Email is a cost effective vehicle for reaching the right customer, at the right time, with the right product or special offer. Not only is it affordable, but email marketing delivers immediate results. ASI’s newest affiliate, RatePoint, makes it easy for you to create and send your own email marketing campaigns. They offer over 100 ready-to-go designs to create professional email marketing campaigns on your own without a designer. You simply add in your own copy, company logo and sharp product images that you can pull directly from LogoMall. Or, your designer can create an html email and upload it. RatePoint helps you to build and manage your email contact lists including requests to unsubscribe which is a mandatory process to abide by Can Spam. Once your email campaign is sent you can monitor the activity using their at-a-glance report. You’ll know how many prospects opened your email and exactly who clicked links to your web site. In addition to an easy to use email marketing tool, RatePoint also helps you to build your online business credibility by collecting and publishing feedback from your customers. You can easily post this valuable content on your LogoMall site to help turn prospects into customers. Powerful customer testimonials establish your online business reputation and build confidence in your online visitors. RatePoint is offering a 30 day FREE trial. Try it out for yourself at www.asicentral.com/ratepoint. You don’t even need a credit card number for the trial period. As an ASI member, you get great pricing on their subscription service. It’s less the $10 a month, to send unlimited email marketing campaigns to a list size of 500 or less. So…how will you be promoting this holiday season?
Friday
July 24, 2009 Paper or Silicon? How savvy distributors turn catalogs into LogoMall leadsFiled under: LogoMall, Marketing, Tips and Tricks, Uncategorized Contributor: Jack Flohr, Director of Marketing, Membership Services One of the best drivers of Web traffic is the tried and true paper catalog. From LL Bean to Victoria’s Secret to the Counselor Top 40, businesses continue to rely on catalogs. In fact, “50 -70% of online sales are driven by catalogs,” said George Hague, senior marketing strategist at J. Schmid & Assoc. Inc., a catalog consulting company in Mission, Kansas. As a distributor with a LogoMall site, you can easily and immediately drive customers to your site using imprinted catalogs that are personalized with your Website. When followed up with an email that links to your site and a personal call, this integrated program has proven to increase sales. Kayla Tollen, of Kayla Advertising asi/239482 has seen real world results using integrated campaigns, “I’ve been using catalogs for 24 years. One or two orders cover the cost of my investment. ASI’s fulfillment service is an added bonus and creates additional savings in time and money.” The challenge of course is finding the time to market your business effectively doing all of the things you already know you are supposed to do. One suggestion is to block out a ‘Marketing morning’ once every two weeks and dedicated at least 6-8 hours/month to marketing efforts. You can also use ASI services directly. Not only does ASI do all of the work for you, often times it saves money due to our leverage and position. Services include catalog fulfillment, prospect lists, email marketing, self promotions, and telemarketing. If you’re looking for a great program to drive traffic and sales from your site you should consider 4th quarter gift giving. Start by featuring gifts on your LogoMall site and doing a fulfillment program with ASI’s Gift Book catalog. There’s no better time than now as nearly 40% of annual sales are made in the gift dominant 4th quarter. Will you be ready? Get help today, get leads tomorrow, and grow your business now. Call Dan Brown, ASI Catalogs Manager, today to learn more at 800-546-1392. P.S. In these challenging times history proves that those who advertise not only make money right away, they wind up with significantly more sales as things improve. This is your chance to win big! Jack joined ASI in 2005 and is the Director of Marketing for Membership Services at ASI. He is a direct marketing veteran with over 25 years of diverse sales & marketing experience in international business. Jack’s previous experience includes owning a marketing consulting firm with clients that included firms such as NutriSystem and SmartBargains.com. Prior to that he was in charge of the catalog division at The Franklin Mint, and has held numerous positions in operations, purchasing and finance. Today, Jack specializes in multi-channel marketing and is adept at creating vision, strategy and execution across multiple mediums.
Thursday
April 23, 2009 Getting Started with SEO: Can Your Customers and Prospects Find You?Filed under: Marketing Contributor: Dale Denham, Senior Vice President at ASI It’s amazing to me how many people I can’t find on the Internet when I’m looking specifically for them. When all they would need to do is a very small amount of work to optimize their website. Yet, because people are intimidated by terms like SEO, they don’t do anything. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and it is one of THE most incredible options for distributors to increase exposure on the web. In fact, 80% of users click results on the first page of Google only. Thus, if you aren’t on the first page, you only have a 20% chance of getting clicked. SEO can be free when you do it yourself or cost thousands of dollars per year for a professional to do it with/for you. But don’t go and spend thousands of dollars to optimize your website just yet. There are quite a few things you can do on your own using the new ASISecure.com and free tools on the Internet that can let you optimize your site yourself. Start by identifying the most important keywords that you want people to find you with. Don’t use Promotional Products or other industry jargon, go with the basics. Your company name, the name of your salespeople and words like "marketing" or "trade shows" combined with your local town (such as "marketing ideas Trevose PA"). Once you’ve identified your basic keywords, work them into copy on your LogoMall website several times and do so professionally (Remember, people read these pages). I’ll share more tips on how to optimize your site to gain additional customers in the upcoming weeks. (side note: SEO is often confused with SEM which is Search Engine Marketing which involves a paid component such as Pay Per Click (PPC). Pay Per Click campaigns can be very costly so I recommend that distributors start with the basics of SEO to start gaining additional business using their LogoMall website.) I recently conducted a web marketing seminar at the ASI Show. You can listen to the entire seminar FREE as a special offer to our LogoMall customers by clicking HERE. Join me for my full seminar "Web Site Marketing: Simple Strategies That Work" at the ASI Show Chicago July 21st. Or, send me your SEO questions to dale.denham@asicentral.com andI’ll respond promptly with information including the handout I share at the session. Dale Denham is a Senior Vice President at the Advertising Specialty Institute(ASI). Dale joined ASI in 2000 and is responsible for ASI’s information, technology and business development, including strategic relationships with key partners UPS and OfficeMax. |
