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By Derek Smith, August 28, 2011 10:16 pm

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By Derek Smith, June 1, 2012 2:31 pm

We’re now in the Facebook post-IPO era, but the financial and marketing communities are still buzzing with questions about the valuation, current share value, recent profit performance and future projections.

Nevertheless, Facebook still has a lot to be pleased about; it’s still the behemoth of social media in terms of users, and the recently re-designed Facebook Timeline page has created a stampede of engagement. Facebook’s growth and ability to attract a large and loyal global network is mind-boggling.

The expression “word of mouth on steroids” is often attached to social media and Facebook epitomizes that. This is based upon a belief that online conversations will spread to many thousands of people, all with just a mouse click! While this steroidal word of mouth to the global multitudes is theoretically possible, it’s not the way online sharing usually works. Read more

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By Derek Smith, May 1, 2012 6:59 pm

As the number of Social Networks expands, seemingly by the year, and the number of social media options expands accordingly, those of us who use them cannot be faulted for being a little baffled by which platforms are doing the best job for us, and on which ones should we spend the majority of our time.

The Social Network category is more active today than it has ever been.  Facebook has recently revamped its pages and introduced its new main feature, the Timeline, causing a flood of engagement to the platform as users re-design their pages.  Pinterest, a pinboard-style social photo sharing website, launched in 2010, is gaining traction.  Twitter, as recently as 2007, was the new favourite messaging platform of celebrities and politicians, is now being used by small businesses as a marketing tool.  MySpace, a network that receives little airtime from the pundits these days, although most definitely in decline, is still surprisingly active. And, of course, there’s YouTube, the behemoth, which continues to gain users across the world. Read more

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By Derek Smith, April 16, 2012 9:15 pm

Some new research spearheaded by Jeff Mancini, Interbrand’s New York-based senior director of digital strategy, reveals how companies are guilty of ‘social notworking’. This just-released broad-based survey of 672 companies is spread across 10 sectors.

Read the following and see how you and your company shape up!

The report, entitled “From Digital Strategy to Brand Mastery”, highlights some very interesting data and takes the pulse of corporate social marketing efforts with some telling results:

• 16% of the companies that responded classified their social marketing efforts as non-existent, or “digitally inactive.”
• 68% of respondents believe they are ahead of the competition. But are they? Read the following research results and judge for yourself! Read more

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By Derek Smith, April 10, 2012 3:22 pm

While this fictional tale features a law firm start-up, it could equally be any type of professional services firm.

Here’s a familiar scenario:  Two lawyers, Greg Loftus and Roger Mason, leave the blue-chip law firm of Fasken, Ogilvy and Goodman LLP, to open their own shop.  They bring some business with them, business that the FOG LLP mother-ship, for reasons of conflict, could no longer handle.  Within six weeks of opening its doors, the newfound firm of Loftus Mason LLP immediately witnessed the benefits of immense goodwill of their friends and former associates who referred them to their friends and former associates.  Business rolled in and within six months the partners were obliged to staff up, not just with additional support staff, but with additional lawyers.  At the end of year one, the partners could reflect on their year with a great deal of satisfaction.  It was a perfect start for the start-up!  Read more

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By Derek Smith, December 15, 2011 8:47 pm

Professional services firms today face many challenges such as fierce competition, ever-demanding clients who want more for less, and a somewhat less than buoyant economy. Revenue growth is likely to continue to get tougher to achieve over the course of the next few years.

The keys to growth, however, remain the same! 

You can break them down into four categories. 1. There is base retention, or holding on to clients. 2. There is share growth; expanding your business through the acquisition of new clients or new client engagements. 3. There’s market expansion, or directing the firm into dynamic areas or segments where growth is occurring or going to occur, but not currently targeted. 4. And then there is adjacency; moving into offering services currently not offered, but related to the core service.

Of course, there’s a fifth key to growth and that is marketing!  Marketing a professional services company by focussing on the services offered, and the benefits to prospective clients of hiring these services.

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By Derek Smith, December 6, 2011 10:39 pm

 “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results” is a quote most often attributed to Albert Einstein and sometimes Ben Franklin, but there is no evidence to suggest that either said it.

In the Narcotics Anonymous paper ‘Basic Text’, released in 1981, the quote “Insanity is repeating the same mistakes, but expecting different results” appeared.  While two years later, in 1983, the author Rita Mae Brown in her book ‘Sudden Death’ wrote “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results.”

No matter who first coined the phrase, (personally, I’m going with Rita Mae Brown) there’s more than an element of truth to it. Read more

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By Derek Smith, November 21, 2011 3:11 pm

I continue to be surprised by the number of CEOs and decision-makers I talk to, who have the specific objective of attracting new business or new clients, but have no plans in place to achieve this.  Yes, they would certainly appreciate winning new business, and have likely visualized the exact business that they would like to win, but they haven’t spent the time to plan an effective program to do this, nor do they intend to spend the time to implement such a program.

They would certainly appreciate new business coming in and they certainly could use it, but there are other priorities in the day and spending time to carry out a new business program gets shuffled to the bottom of the deck.

So, how is it going to happen?  How are new clients going to be attracted to their respective companies?

It’s as if decision-makers are placing the realization of this goal in the hands of some supernatural being.   Now, I confess to never having met a supernatural being, but if I ever did, I doubt if I would entrust my new business program to one!

So, when a company has a goal or objective of attracting new business, but doesn’t have a program in place to meet this objective, then it’s really only a wish!  Isn’t it?

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By Derek Smith, November 18, 2011 12:54 pm

The Interbrand study, referenced in my August blog, further reveals some surprising information about brand marketing in the digital age.  While marketers agree that creating a strong digital brand strategy is important and can drive new revenue, the report also uncovers that putting such a strategy in place is still a challenge and an opportunity for many brands.

Amongst the findings; forty percent (40%) of companies interviewed state that developing more effective digital and social media strategies is a critical challenge, and of note, 32% feel that they are not using these channels effectively.  That’s a third of all companies.

It’s important to note that the companies interviewed were, by and large, international in nature, and market well-known brand names, but yet almost one-third feels that they are behind in the game by not using digital and social media channels to their fullest effect!

Stating the obvious, all successful brands must respond to change and if they become too inflexible they will not be able to turn the corner quick enough. Moreover, although the path to growth has become more complicated to navigate, the principles behind creating a strong brand remain true.  The same holds true for professional services companies.

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By Derek Smith, September 4, 2011 7:52 pm

More than a few people have asked what ‘positioning’ a product means.  In this blog, I’ll try to shed some light on the subject. 

Positioning, in the context of marketing, is what a product or company can hang its hat on that no other product or company can. 

Firstly, a bit of background:  In a magazine article in June 1969, Jack Trout, an advertising executive, first explained the concept of positioning as “Positioning is a game people play in today’s me-too market place”.  This explanation had less to do with products competing with one another, and more to do with the fact that typical consumers are overwhelmed with superfluous advertising, and have a natural tendency to discard all information that does not immediately find a comfortable and unused slot in their minds.       

Later, the concept was popularized by Trout and fellow adman Al Ries in their best-selling book “Positioning – The Battle for Your Mind”, published in 1981.  (I still have my copy!)  Here they defined positioning as “an organized system for finding a window in the mind”.  The definition evolved from there to “a strategy that aims to make a brand occupy a distinct position, relative to competing brands, in the mind of the consumer”    

Today, positioning has come to mean “the process by which marketers create a unique, benefit oriented position in the minds of their target audience; a position which reflects one of the key product attributes”.  To be truly successful, effective positioning should reflect a meaningful product feature. 

More and more often, the word ‘positioning’ is being replaced by the word ‘differentiation’, but this is a misnomer, as differentiation is the result of good positioning!  A company, product or brand can differentiate itself by creating a unique positioning for itself.  This is a business imperative, not only in terms of a company’s success, but also for its continuing survival.    I hope this helps to clarify!

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By Derek Smith, August 27, 2011 3:53 pm

According to a recent report “Unfit for Growth” developed by Interbrand, businesses have emerged from tough economic years ready to reclaim their losses but the economic landscape has changed dramatically. Sustained growth will require a disciplined and strategic approach that focuses on both internal and external stakeholders. In order to gauge whether or not today’s brands are really ready for the growth they are seeking, Interbrand asked marketers at all levels across 20 industries what challenges they were facing and how prepared they were to meet them.

And the results were surprising. It appears that many companies are neglecting two of the most important qualities of strong brands that deliver growth; responsiveness and relevance. Only 37% of brands polled, think that being responsive to the needs and desires of their consumers is important and only 41% think it’s important to maintain relevance in a changing marketplace. According to the Interbrand research, many marketers are not developing new customer experiences due in large part, to the fact they are not actively inviting their customers to participate in shaping the brand. Less than 20% of companies interviewed encourage customers to participate in shaping the brand and less than 10% of brands feel that achieving a consistent experience across all touch points is important.

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