Your logo tells your story

Have you visited a Web site with so many flashing animations that you leave? The same principle applies with logos: simple is good.

Here are 5 litmus tests for your new logo:

Does it look good in black and white? If not, re-think it. Even with dinosaur technology like the fax machine, your logo will show up as a one-color wonder sometime. A crisp graphic can pull this off with ease.

Can it be reproduced on a hat, t-shirt or mug? Wearables and promotion items help give your brand visibility. If you cannot reproduce your logo on these items, it means lost opportunity for getting your name out there.

Does it require metallic ink, or any other special finish? Inks are expensive, and do not translate well to other mediums. (see #2)

Will it look good on a cell phone? Mobile access means customer access – if your logo doesn’t translate to digital media easily, it works against you.

Will it look good on a billboard? Logos show up in all sizes and scale. An excellent one will translate in any medium.

With easy design packages, animations and “do it yourself” kits available, the temptation to get carried away with all of the bells and whistles is common. But just because you can do it, does not mean you should. Technology special effects do not equal solid design.

Your logo communicates your brand in an instant. It is worth the extra time and investment to get it right. Then it can tell your story well.

Later on, I leveraged technology as a competitive advantage. Even with a legal disclaimer as the landing page (I kid you not) we managed to sell a roof within 24 hours of launching a new Web site in 1997!

Today, I am all over social media, online video and slide shows, and effective Web presence for my clients.

So, when I found this test to see if I really am a geek, I couldn’t resist! My score: Total Geek. Not bad. Enough to get this official badge.

What kind of geek are you?

Quite honestly, many of these folks build terrific looking Websites. But are they really saving you money? Or are they costing you “hidden”  money by lost opportunities you will never see? Chance are, with no marketing expertise in their skill set, it may be the latter.

The top five reasons a Web designer may cost you money:

1. Great Web design. No business context.
2. Cool design. Needs analytics and optimization.
3. Too many clicks for customers
4. Differs from all your other stuff
5. No call to action

Great Web design. No business context.
If your site looks terrific, but lacks  context to your business ,  chances are it will not sell for you. A productive site will clearly communicate what you do, and show value to your customers.  Does your designer understand what business you are in, and what will appeal to your customers? If not, consider moving on – even if the initial layout costs more, it will at least work for you.

Cool design. Needs analytics and optimization.
Behind the design are dozens of support codes that make your site visible to search engines and get data on how visitors interact with your site. Does your designer do these things? Are they optimizing your content, images, and PDFs to be visible to search engines? Can you look at traffic patterns to see what pages visitors look at, how long they stay and if they forward anything to others? Building the site is the first step, but the real results come from active management of the site over time.

Too many clicks for customers.
Information is why people look at sites. What are your visitors looking for? What do  they want to know? This should dictate what goes first on your site. If the information requires hunting around and looking for what they need through click after click, most visitors simply bail to another site. Don’t you? : )

Differs from all your other stuff.
If your site looks like an Apple iPhone® site, it looks very cool indeed. It also looks like someone else’s product line, which confuses people. You want people to be very clear about who you are and what you offer, so it is critical that everything you do looks similar – like it goes together. Does your site look like it belongs to the same company as your store, sales brochure and packaging? Boring maybe. Effective, definitely.

No call to action.
Down to business: you want people to do something when they visit your site. What is it? Sign up for a newsletter? As for a quote?  Call you or email you? This is your call to action. Make it easy for your visitors to take that action. Put it right up there on every single page. On the top of the page.

Even the best Web designer may not know your full market strategy. A bang-up Web site that does not tie in with your companies message, or have the right context for your customer will cost you much more money in the long run. By including a marketing professional in the process, who sees the bigger business and sales picture,  you will have a much more effective set of tools to bring customers in.

This new post by Peter Shankman and Sarah Evans (both experts) nail the differences between those who claim to be experts and those who really are experts in social media. Social media is, of course, the hot marketing topic de jour, surrounded by tons of hype and more than a few charlatans. Peter and Sarah do a great job (as usual) of showing how to spot the posers.

Social media may not fit every organization’s goals and does require on-going attention. And the elements may vary from business to business. Not everyone needs to be on all of the “latest and greatest” platforms. Beware of anyone who makes a blanket claim to that effect.

Initial reports from Stat Counter claimed Bing exceeded Yahoo! traffic. Search engine land posted a great article Did Bing Leapfrog Yahoo? Not exactly. which compares tracking metrics for Bing’s performance compared to Google and Yahoo!.

In the world of online marketing, few things compare with a good search presence. Bing certainly adds a new face for the world of search. How it catches on, and how people use it, will affect a good SEO strategy in time to come.

I’ve noticed many people want to skip this part. Eager to get to the “fun” parts like graphic design, tag lines and soundtracks, they barrel ahead at full tilt – often in the wrong direction.

It’s irritating as sand sometimes. The market and competition seem more active during the homework phase, and business owners often feel they are wasting time and their money with little to show for it. But, like oysters, it takes time for the discovery process to yield the pearls. By doing the work up front and learning as much as possible, you can avoid costly mistakes and instead capture opportunities you may not have known existed.

How many times have people said that when they ask what I do, and I respond “Marketing.”

The truth is, many people, including some clients, view marketing as advertising. In their defense, it is a tangible part of marketing that they can see. But advertising is a small slice of marketing – one way to get the message out.

Marketing, on the other hand, encompasses everything from creating a new product or service, to the price points and distribution channels to PR/advertising/promotions and events. It encompasses a lot of behind-the-scenes-get-your-hands-dirty work and a great deal of strategy. For advertising to work, a strong marketing plan comes first.

Advertising is one tool in the toolkit, and considered part of a larger category called “promotion”. Other activities in promotion include publicity (PR), events, sweepstakes, coupons and many others. If a marketing firm sells itself as advertising only – beware.

Why the post on job seeking?

Simple: looking for a job is pure marketing. Research the market, distill what your area of brilliance is (core competency) and refine your “one liner” about what your offer to the market.

Once you’ve done this, its time to “go to market”.

Center on your customer

Smart marketing centers on the customer, always. Laser in on where your customer lives. In this case, recruiters, HR managers and business owners seeking qualified candidates to interview. Where do they go first? The Web.

I know an excellent HR consultant who  engaged in multiple hiring searches recently. Over lunch, she described to another colleague and I how she used LInkedIn, Facebook and other Web gathering places as her first stops to find candidates.  At the other end of a recruiting search,  most companies do a background check before extending offers.  And these days, that includes a Google search, Facebook scan and other on-line checking.

You may want to visit the “best practices for recruiters” guidelines on LinkedIn for an insight into how recruiters look for candidates.

The lesson? Go to where your target market goes. In this case – online. Social networking sites may not replace your current efforts – nor should they – but certainly can complement them, and increase your options for finding a great next job.

“Venture capitalists like hiring second or third time entrepreneurs because they understand process, not because they can do a spreadsheet.” – Seth Godin

You can purchase individual press releases, sales collateral or white papers all day long, but if you do not have a master market mixer, then you lose the magic that translates to sales and and enduring brand. That’s what you are really hoping to buy, isn’t it?

We used to call it the Blackberry test. If your colleagues faded to check their Blackberry, the point was not compelling or relevant enough to stay engaged in the conversation.

Social media seems like that. 140 characters or less to Twitter a relevant message. Is that so different from headlines? Not really.

Effective marketing has always been about earning attention. Fast. Because if you do, most people will stop and learn more. If you miss, then they move on.

And rightfully so.