Creative Marketing: Making Brands Stick
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Published in U.S. 1 Newspaper on June 7, 2000. All rights
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Making Websites Sticky: NJ CAMA
Marketers use the word “sticky” to describe
a website that can retain its clientele. It requires a lot of
imagination
— and technological prowess — to do that, says Nicole Katz,
marketing manager of ePresence (www.epresence.com), a web solutions
company headquartered
in Westboro, Massachusetts, with an office in Red Bank. “It’s
a huge challenge because there’s so many sites out there now,”
says Katz, who speaks on “Building Relationships to Make Your
Site Sticky,” on Tuesday, June 13, at 8 a.m. at NJ CAMA’s Tech
Day 2000 conference at Rider University.
Also in the line-up: “Keeping up with eLaw,” with Bruce
Vargo, Friedman Siegelbaum LLP; “eService with a Human Touch:
Developing Profitable eCommerce Relationships,” with David
Shapiro, president, Source 1 Communications; and “Hot Gadgets
for the New Millennium,” with Michael Panesis,CIO, Charles
Jones LLC. Cost: $45. Call 609-799-4900.
Ironically, face-to-face relationships are more important than ever
in the tech-driven world, says Katz, who has a BS in communications
from Syracuse, Class of 1993, and worked in marketing for a nearby
architectural firm. “This business works a lot better in
relationship
type settings — one-on-one — than by math marketing,”
she says. This becomes evident when she tries to explain some of the
technology behind her marketing ideas. “When you say architecture,
everyone can picture it in their mind,” she says, “but when
you say web solutions, most people don’t know what that is.”
One of ePresence’s projects, Definedfunds.com, was a coordinated unit
investment trust website designed for Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley
Dean Witter, PaineWebber, and Solomon Smith Barney that gave customers
up to date information on securities. “It was the first site of
its kind to feature daily pricing information, and that was a huge
deal in the financial world,” says Katz.
On the marketing end, Katz handled a “virtual classroom” that
uses Flash to help visitors understand defined assets. “It’s what
we call curriculum marketing — trying to educate the public rather
than sell them,” says Katz. “Marketing through education.
I think that using interactive modules to educate the public is
big.”
Katz also managed an E-postcard campaign enabled through one of
ePresence’s
proprietary technologies. “It’s just like direct mail only through
the Web,” she says. A tracking system lets the company sending
the E-mails know if they have been opened, but it doesn’t cross the
privacy line, Katz says.
Since in E-commerce there is no such thing as local, the first thing
companies need to do for marketing is to define their audience, says
Katz. “This means world-wide,” she says. “But if you try
to go after everyone you will undoubtedly be unsuccessful.”
The second most important rule: build relationships. “It’s still
the foundation of marketing,” she says. The key is personalization
on the Web. “When people feel comfortable, they feel you know
something about them, and it adds value to their life. If you can
make your site personalized, and offer information directly to people
on subjects they said they want information on, then you’ll get their
trust.”
— Melinda Sherwood
Top Of PageLegal Traps on the Web
Be careful what words you use in your metatags —
it may be a legal snag, says Bruce Vargo, an attorney at Friedman
and Siegelbaum (recently changed to Goodwin Proctor & Hoar) who speaks
on “Keeping Up With E-Law,” at the NJ CAMA’s “Tech 2000:
IT Power That Impacts You,” on Tuesday, June 13, at Rider. Call
609-466-9702. Cost $45.
“Someone could be using a person’s trademark in an attempt to
steal business or to have their business appear related somehow to
another business,” says Vargo, a 1987 graduate of the Rochester
Institute of Technology with a BS in computer science, who designed
computer systems with BellCore for 10 years before attending law
school
at Seton Hall. Another illegal practice that Vargo often sees is
cybersquatting.
In general, says Vargo, don’t try to ride on the coattails of another
company’s name.
Top Of PageCreative Marketing: Making Brands Stick
When you see the slogan, “the slow ketchup,”
what company comes to mind? Heinz, of course. And you can probably
name the brand of “breakfast of champions” (Wheaties) or
“Tony
the Tiger” (Sugar Frosted Flakes). These slogans have been around
for decades, but they are still “working” on everyone’s minds
to “position” a product, says Blaine Greenfield.
Greenfield teaches “Creative Marketing Techniques to Increase
Sales,” at Mercer County College on Saturday, June 10, at 9 a.m.
Cost: $25. Call 609-586-9446.
Greenfield was named by the New Jersey Small Business Development
Center network as one of 18 regional “Small Business Success
Award”
winners. He heads the statewide advisory board for the Small Business
Development Center, is a volunteer consultant for Mercer County
Community
College, and teaches at Bucks County Community College and Thomas
Edison State College. His East Windsor-based consulting firm provides
marketing and management assistance to small and mid-sized businesses
(609-443-3781, E-mail: bginnj@aol.com).
Perhaps the best example of positioning, says Greenfield, involved
Ronald Reagan, the first time he ran for President. “He was
running
against Jimmy Carter, and if you recall, we were going through a
period
of high unemployment and high inflation. So Reagan got himself elected
by asking this great positioning question: Are you better off now
than you were four years ago?”
On an entrepreneurial scale, he tells of a former client who ran a
successful pizza business in Princeton for several years. “We
wanted to make him different from other similar businesses, and we
succeeded. One technique tapped an idle work force.
“We were slow one afternoon. Rather than have everybody sit around
and do nothing, we sent employees up and down Nassau Street asking
folks if they knew where the Witherspoon Eatery was and mentioning
that the place had the absolutely best pizza they had ever
tasted.”
Most of the people they accosted did not know the exact location of
this eatery, though they were able to point out the fact that
Witherspoon
Street was not too far away.
Says Greenfield: “As you can imagine, we were able to generate
some very nice word of mouth publicity and resultant sales.”
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