June 12, 2024 Comments

Starting out on social media?

Starting out, we at Stone’s Throw often coach clients with smaller and medium-sized businesses to use social media initially as a way to demonstrate vitality, interest, and enthusiasm by showing activity on social media platforms. Let the world see your public face – especially if your potential customers use social media. Ensure that your posts are consistent with your brand image and messaging, and please make sure that you have a system for post approvals, monitoring, and responding.

If social media advertising will indeed add value to your marketing efforts, there are a few terms you’ll want to know:

Awareness ads: Paid social media advertising is a way to create energy and push your posts into the newsfeeds of your selected audiences. These ads are often referred to as awareness ads; they boost awareness by allowing audiences to see your ad (“impression”). Awareness advertising is often the least expensive of social media placements.

Conversion ads: To encourage your audience to take some kind of action (visit your webpage, make a phone call, complete a form, etc.), social media ads have to work harder and typically cost more. They require the user to move from a passive audience member to someone who takes some kind of action. This is often referred to as conversion.

Engagement rate: Most social media platforms use metrics to describe the types of interaction your posts generate. Engagement rate refers to the number of likes, shares, and comments your posted content receives.

Hashtag: You can supercharge your posted content by tagging keywords with a hashtag (#) – what some of us used to call a pound sign. When a # precedes a word or phrase (without any word spaces), the social media platform sees the phrase as a searchable keyword. This can be especially helpful when looking for people talking about a particular marketing issue online. #smallbizmarketing

Should your business advertise on Facebook or LinkedIn? Here are a few things to consider.

June 12, 2024 Comments

Should we advertise on social media?

Unlike traditional print advertising in which we pay for the amount of space on a page and the number of issues in which an ad will appear (for example), social media advertising offers many avenues to get ad messaging in front of potential customers. The costs are determined, not just on a set amount per exposure to that audience, but in competition with others vying for that same audience. If it sounds like we’re talking about an auction, we are. For much social media advertising, you actually bid on getting your ad in front of your audience. You will notice terms like pay-per-click (PPC) associated with bid-based advertising. Other options of setting fixed prices to reach verified target markets on social media require a larger investment and are available mostly to big brand advertisers.

Social media platforms often say that cost is both the overall amount you spend on advertising and the cost of each desired result. This is overly simplified. However, if your desired result is to increase your number of Facebook followers or garner more LinkedIn comments, you could say that if you spend $100 a month and get five new followers each month, the cost of follower acquisition is $20 per follower. (We say this is overly simplified because there can be many other factors that influence cost, including your time, messaging development, ad and artwork creation, etc.)

When we at Stone’s Throw think of social media advertising as part of the overall promotional activity of a smaller to medium-sized business, we focus much more intently on moving prospects closer to you. How can we get that prospective customer close enough to have a conversation? That conversation can happen on a social media platform, yes, but for businesses like ours, we want to have that conversation privately. We want to ask questions that reveal challenges, exchange ideas, and answer questions as the consultative souls we are. So, one of our promotional goals is to spur a one-on-one exchange, either through email, telephone, video conference, or an in-person meeting. If social media advertising can get us to that goal, we think it could be worth a trial run. Start small. Assess. Branch out.

Just starting out on social media? Here are a few things you should know.

May 14, 2024 Comments

Why are brand style guidelines so critical for your business or organization?

By Janice Mondoker, Director of Design Realization

A brand is a valuable asset and consistency improves brand recognition. In the past few months I’ve come across several companies and organizations that did not have style guidelines in place. There are multiple benefits to setting standards for how to display your brand look and feel. Deviations can confuse, contradict, or erode your brand, diluting the impact you’ve worked to achieve. Using style guidelines is a way to ensure that your brand image is presented with the quality you intend.

To start, catalog your logo, brand colors, typefaces, sizes, and preferred placement. Do you use an approved one-color version? Stacked or horizontal? One or two pages of general guidelines will help reinforce your brand mark and keep other team members on the same page.

April 23, 2024 Comments

Once upon a time: Storytelling in marketing communications

I have been writing professionally for more than thirty years. For most of that time I’ve written communications for organizations whose teams seek engagement with educators, innovators, healthcare providers, patients, and students: a wide range, for sure, and an often-challenging one. With any writing assignment, I strive to bring the audience closer. That’s what successful communication does; it fosters a bond. Today, that bond-building communication is sometimes labeled storytelling. You’ve likely seen the word in the LinkedIn profiles of some highly regarded marketing gurus (or perhaps you’ve used it yourself). It sounds almost simplistic, easy, a child’s activity, but the act of storytelling is very far from inventing dreamlike tales about a product or service that the protagonist can use to slay the proverbial dragon. It’s serious writing that opens the door for your optimal audience to see themselves benefiting from a relationship with you. Although the language we use to describe it continues to evolve, storytelling has been at the core of good communications all along, like Dorothy’s power to get home.

Let’s turn back a few pages in time.

David Ogilvy, the British advertising innovator who came to wide acclaim in the mid-twentieth century, credited his success to deep and detailed research into the habits of consumers. He also created the concept of “branding”, linking the product and product name so tightly that it generated a loyalty to the brand. In his 1983 classic Ogilvy on Advertising, Ogilvy writes about storytelling: “Don’t write essays. Tell your reader what your product will do for him or her, and tell it with specifics. Write your copy in the form of a story, as in the advertisement which carried the headline, ‘The amazing story of a Zippo [lighter] that worked after being taken from the belly of a fish.’”¹

John Caples, another old-timey copywriting pioneer, developed advertising methods in the 1920s that suggested that using exact specifics (that means 52.7% rather than 50%) ensures your writing feels more authentic to your audience. In his groundbreaking book Tested Advertising Methods, Caples teaches how details help create a far more compelling and authentic story than vague statistics.² (Caples wrote the indelible ad headline, “They laughed when I sat down at the piano / but when I started to play!—” turning the universal fear of ridicule into effective storytelling that moved readers.)

Helen Lansdowne Resor, is not only credited as the first woman to design and implement national ad campaigns, she broke ground for women in the advertising industry (another story to tell there!), changing attitudes, minds, and business practices. Resor developed an editorial approach to her advertisements that read like a feature story, incorporating testimonials, emotional resonance, and carefully crafted descriptions of how the product benefitted the user. Resor’s 1911 copy for the Woodbury Soap Company is still quoted today: “A skin you love to touch. You, too, can have its charm…”³

These are just a few examples of copywriters who intentionally used the power of storytelling (and called it storytelling) to bring their readers closer…and all of them were writing nearly a century ago, once upon a time.

Deanne Napurano, Stone's Throw Partner — Deanne Napurano

References:

Ogilvy D. Ogilvy on Advertising. New York: Vintage Books; 1983:81.
Caples J. Tested Advertising Methods (4th Revised Edition). New Jersey: Prentice Hall Trade; 1980.
Burn D. “Helen Lansdowne Resor, Ad Legend”. Adpulp Website. https://adpulp.com/helen-lansdowne-resor-ad-legend/ Published July 9, 2020. Accessed April 23, 2024.

March 20, 2024 Comments

As with all marketing communications, set goals for your social media efforts.

Over the course of planning, we learn from our own efforts. As we being to articulate goals, we learn. We learn about the possible paths toward fulfilling those goals; we learn as we ask ourselves What will success look like? and How can that success be measured? Planning uncovers obstacles and opportunities. Planning teaches. Because it’s ongoing and subject to strategy shits and market influences, it will always require navigational tweaks (and sometimes even U-turns). Here are a few notes to consider when beginning to plan your social media activity.

Set general goals for your social media activity.

Increase website traffic.
Grow an audience.
Increase engagement.
Build brand awareness.
Generate leads.

Set goals specific to your organization.

Increase contact us form submissions.
Increase whitepaper downloads.
Attract your target audience to a special event.
Increase registrants for a seminar or conference.
Garner more donations.
Attract more qualified applicants.
Earn new business.
Grow email list.
Leverage as a real-time channel for improving customer service.
Increase video viewership.

For each goal, use the SMART framework – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Timely – or another goal-setting framework to help determine, record, and track expectations and achievement in a document or a preferred software program.

What does success look like?

For each goal, identify the key performance indicators (KPIs) and metrics (measurements) that will help show when that goal is reached.

General goal examples:

For a goal of growing social media audience, we would look to metrics that include:

Follower count
Impressions
Post reach

For a goal of increasing website traffic, we would look to metrics that demonstrate conversion, like:

Website analytics for social media referrals
Link clicks from social media post to website and/or blog

Look for correlations; ask questions.

In the two examples above, we would watch the numbers associated with each metric and their relationship to each post on social media.

Do those numbers show more people have seen the post? Engaged positively or negatively with a particular post?
Was that a positive performance based on our goals?
Should we increase or decrease a certain type of post? At a certain time?

Watching the metrics assigned to these general goals tells us a lot. But increasing this kind of performance may not get customers, partners, or applicants close enough to the organization to begin the kind of conversation that leads to doing more of what your organization is built to do.

Specific goal example:

A goal of attracting more qualified applicants is an example of a social media goal designed to bring a segment of your audience closer to you, so close that you would be engaged in a transaction that supports your organization’s purpose. The metrics to measure the effectiveness of social media activity around this goal may include:

Determining the criteria for qualified submissions
Tracking the number of qualified applicants received daily and overlaying that with the timing of social media posts encouraging submission
Tracking website analytics, click-throughs/referrals, post link clicks, and post-engagement metrics

We have to go outside the metrics provided by social media platforms or social media management software to understand the full story.

Beyond metrics: Listening for voice-of-consumer (VoC) data

Social media metrics can help bolster decisions that have been made based on more traditional methods of collecting feedback from your audiences
- surveys
- feedback forms
- roundtable discussions
- interviews
- process-related comments
- content-related comments
Be wary of relying solely on social media metrics to change course in business or communications strategy
- does social media capture all of your optimal audience?
- does your optimal audience use social media exclusively for its news and communications?
Use social media to listen and learn beyond your own posts’ metrics
- audit social media posts for topics relevant to your organization’s offering
- audit your industry’s thought-leaders for their hot topics
Despite its popularity, social media may not reach all of your market

What are you learning from your social media efforts?

Common social media terms simplified

New to social media?

Considering advertising on social media?

March 14, 2024 Comments

Is going “outside” worth it?

Where do you begin to determine if it makes greater financial sense to tackle marketing communications projects internally or to tap the services of an outside consultant? Evaluating the cost of a product may be straightforward – adding up the expenses of research, development, raw materials, manufacture, and packaging, for example. Evaluating the cost of services takes a more roundabout route requiring qualitative, rather than quantitative, assessment. If you’re considering hiring creative support from outside your organization, the following ideas may help you determine whether the move will represent true value.

Contract with specialists.

As marketing options simultaneously expand with today’s technological advances and narrow with new safety concerns, it’s challenging for all but the largest organizations to employ a full team of talented specialists in design, copywriting, photography, programming, illustration, and animation. One approach to curbing costs while keeping your competitive edge is through utilizing staff managers who are free to engage supplemental outside creative or contract marketing consultants who pull in team members as needed. In that way, your organization can leverage high-quality resources while staying lean and nimble.

Consider the actual money spent.

Contracting with outside creative talent can actually be less expensive than handling the same work internally when considering the actual cost of internal labor. According to Creative Business: “Most commonly, internal department cross-charges only accommodate actual payroll expenses with a small factor thrown in for overhead expenses. When all costs—salaries, benefits, and overhead—are included, studies have shown that charges for outside creative vendors actually average about 5% less than the same work done internally.” What’s more, creative fees often account for only a fraction of total costs of any marketing effort. Consider, for example, the cost of copywriting and design for an advertising campaign compared with the costs of the media space buy (paying for placement in online and print publications).

Do you have the in-house talent?

Some marketing communications projects require special know-how, some don’t. When it’s important to your business, the scales may tip in favor of engaging an outside resource. Many can attest to the experience of using available, well-meaning internal staff that winds up being an expensive choice in terms of failing to meet marketing objectives and missing opportunities. It also deflects internal staff from the jobs they’ve been hired to perform. “When effectiveness is critically important, hiring an outside specialist is always the least expensive and most productive alternative,” according to Creative Business.

Can in-house staff perform well under the extra strain?

Consider disruption, deflection, and squirrel chasing. When staff is already working at or near capacity, even a small assignment can clog the machine. We’ve seen situations in which the overworked employee simply gives the project her least attention and effort; she resents the imposition. We’ve also seen more enthusiastic responses in which the overworked employee drops her routine duties in favor of the special project, gumming up the works of the department. Unless your staff has excess capacity, think about bringing in an outside resource.

Do you want to retain more control?

Years of reports from many clients reveal that it’s just tougher to control marketing projects internally because management faces obstacles assigning tough deadlines or giving critical feedback to team members who have taken on special projects outside of their usual duties – forget navigating through office politics and disagreement around ultimate responsibility. “When you absolutely, positively have to have it done, your way, and on schedule, hire an outside vendor.”

Do you need a little objectivity?

If you’re looking for someone to stroll into the middle of your challenges and throw open the window to let in the sunshine, it may be hard to find that kind of perspective within your team. Working very closely with a product or organization over time may create blinders that you and your team no longer sense. An outside creative partner can help bring much-needed objectivity to your marketing communications and create fresh brand language that resonates with your target audiences.

Email us today and let’s get good things done. Click here to email us.

Where could you use help?

Advertising
Logo creation
Website design
Email and social media marketing
White papers and blog content
Marketing and sales materials
Press release writing and submission
Training and education materials and courses
Product and services literature
Telling your story well

February 27, 2024 Comments

Marketing your business?

Leverage our customized marketing plan roadmap to get you started.

Spend more time on what works and less time chasing white rabbits. MarketingCare provides smaller to mid-size organizations with insightful feedback and step-by-step recommendations for marketing with impact.

You’ll receive:

• A one-on-one interview with a marketing professional who knows the right questions to ask to help determine what your business or organization does, the market(s) it serves, where it’s been and where you’d like it to go

• A brief overview of your company background and general marketing objectives

• Recommendations for marketing and promotional activities geared to your business’s objectives

• Step-by-step suggestions for creating presence, softening the market, and building relationships with your clients, customers or members

• A review of your customized plan with a marketing professional

• An easy-to-follow guide

Use the plan in whatever way works best for you.
• Develop your marketing materials and promotional activities on your own.
• Contract Stone’s Throw for the support and services you need to develop and execute one or all of our recommendations. On request, we will provide you with pricing for creative and other services at no obligation.

“Clients get overwhelmed with the day-to-day demands of running a business or organization. Marketing can become a grinding necessity or is guided by bursts of energetic focus after weeks of neglect. It’s part of our job to help them feel some relief. When that space opens up, we can see clients becoming excited again. Everything begins to click.”

We’ll provide the careful devotion to the details.

For more than 20 years we’ve worked closely with clients in fields that range from professional services to education, and from biotechnology to healthcare. We understand the unique dynamics of working with smaller companies that have the ability to react quickly to shifts in market climate or sudden business development opportunities; you want to work with a team that will help you rise to the occasion. You also value a creative partner who provides checks and balances between planned activities and expectations.

Beyond a marketing plan, how can we partner with you to move your business forward?

For a select number, Stone’s Throw provides virtual CMO support, functioning as the business’s marketing department. As a Chief Marketing Officer would, we initiate and guide marketing plan recommendations and develop communications strategies that align with the company’s overall growth objectives. As a marketing manager and department would, we also provide the creative services, design and copywriting, art direction, production and programming that bring the company’s marketing plan to life. From broad goal setting, to day-to-day marketing tasks, we work side-by-side with you to build forward momentum. It all starts with a plan, even if that means determining a few loose parameters now, and establishing more focused guidelines later.

Over the course of nearly 25 years, we’ve had the privilege of working with many fine businesses and organizations. Those most successful at engaging their target audiences – and manifesting brand language that resonates with customers– have one important characteristic in common; they understand the power of planning.

Strategic marketing communications for your business are just a stone’s throw away.

Consultation • Strategy • Writing • Design • Integrated marketing programs • Individual projects

February 6, 2024 Comments

In a world of overwhelm, be enough.

In conversation with Deanne Napurano, Creative Director, Writer, Editor

Perhaps I’m being a little too esoteric with this line, but that’s even part of the point. We are all inundated with information and data. News flows constantly. We can dip our toe in the news river or dive in head first just by looking at our phones or our watches. Wherever we get our stories, the newsfeed continuously scrolls from critical global events to celebrity fashion to laundry-folding hacks to cute puppy videos and back again. Some marketers’ ads look like they could be personal videos of a friend of a friend giving you earnest advice on vegetable storage bags, lash-lengthening gels, or gaming apps. As a marketer, how can you hope to be noticed in the midst of so very much? My thinking? Stay in your lane. Do you. Don’t meet the overwhelm. Know the problem you solve. Communicate it clearly, honestly. Know that your efforts represent something worthwhile for your optimal client…and tell that story. That’s enough. Be steady, authentic, and clear. In a world of overwhelm, being enough stands out.

January 9, 2024 Comments

RFP go/no go

You’ve received an RFP. Great. Fantastic.

Oh, wait a minute…now what? While helping clients weigh their options, and determining the value of responding to RFPs ourselves, we’ve come up with a few guidelines that help make this process a bit less stressful.

1. Scan for response deadlines. Sometimes RFPs offer flexibility. Don’t allow scheduling conflicts to dictate an instant no thank you response. Before calling for extensions on deadlines or for alternate arrangements for pre-bid meetings, finish the Go/No Go decision process.

2. Scan for scope. Do the services requested fall within your company’s core strengths? If the majority of services requested are peripheral to your primary area of expertise, or would have to be outsourced, this contract may only be right for your company if the industry, or particular client, fulfill other business growth objectives.

3. Scan for contract value. If the services requested appear to be out of line with the contract budget, you may not be the only respondent to notice. If the scope of the contract otherwise appears to be aligned with your company’s core services, feel free to call the RFP contact (often the Contracting Officer) for confirmation of the facts presented. If your understanding is correct, you can choose either to decline or to modify the scope of services or the budget in your proposal. Including a succinct rationale for the revision in your proposal will underscore your professionalism and experience. It may also disqualify your proposal.

4. Scan for client industry, type and location. Do you have set parameters for appropriate clients? Audit current clients for industry, type and location. Edit the resulting list as a guide for business development. Add industries, business types and locations in which you’d like to grow business; delete industries, types and locations that have proven less desirable.

Okay, the RFP captured your interest. Should you respond? Can you respond well?

5. How did this prospective client learn about your company? Compare referrals from a trusted client to contacts made “blindly” through advertising or business directories. One of the comparison points should be the conversion rate (from proposal to signed contract to ongoing client relationship) of other companies contacting you in the same manner. Keep in mind that government agencies and some other organizations are required by law or institutional procedure to request bids from several resources.

6. Does the prospective client’s RFP process match your company’s standard process? How much customizing will the proposal require? What investment will you be required to make to deliver a quality proposal package consistent with your company’s image? (Employee time, resources, expenses, etc.)

From this point, you can either trust your instincts and your understanding of the project and its demands, or, if you’re still not convinced, use a simple rating process to help tip the scales.

Rate the following statements from 1 to 5 based on their accuracy. Award a 1 for statements that are not at all true and a 5 to those that are absolutely spot on.

__ The timing is right.

__ The services requested speak to your company’s core strengths.

__ The budget allows for the smooth and timely completion of all service requirements, advancing the client’s objectives, and providing positive revenue for your company.

__ The potential client requesting the proposal would be a good match with your company’s mission, culture, philosophy, industry focus, defining values, etc.

__ The RFP makes sense. It asks for information in a way that reveals good things about the potential client (intuitive, articulate, complete, industry-savvy, process-oriented, etc.)

__ Your company can follow its standard process for responding.

Once you’ve given each statement a rating, add ’em up.

A total of 24-30 means the RFP in question should likely get a green light. The client and scope of work sound like an excellent match for your company and its services. You should take the next step, which is to read the RFP thoroughly to ensure that the opportunity is as good as it appears at first blush.

A total of 20-23 may mean you need to dig a little deeper. RFPs that score in this middle zone may either require considerably more work to prepare, or require your company to make requests for alterations in budget, scheduling or approach. If alterations are not possible, or if they’d put your proposal at a disadvantage, RFPs with this score may not be a good match.

A total score of under 20 means there are too many red flags. These RFPs may not be worth pursuing unless special issues are at play. If you choose to say no thanks, be sure to decline by letter unless otherwise directed.

Let’s get good things done. Give us a call or drop us a line. We would love to hear from you.

November 13, 2023 Comments

Company naming and brand identity for a newly launched community for professional coaches

Assignment:

Create an identity for a newly formed community for professional coaches, which reflects the core benefits of membership and the supportive nature of the experience.

Process:

Stone’s Throw met with the community founder to develop a communications strategy and creative brief for naming the organization and designing its brand identity. By identifying strategic mileposts, we were able to provide name options with rationales and suggestions for each option’s branding potential.

Results:

Through the process of naming, a brand concept began to resonate, spurring the creation of “Coach Springs”: a brand, a community, a destination for professional coaches.

We enjoyed working with the community’s founder to capture the essence of her idea: to redefine continued learning, growth networking, and support in the coaching universe. As we began to explore names for this new venture, we realized we were engaged in world-building. Welcome to Coach Springs – a brand, a community, and a destination for professional coaches.