Ryan Barton's Blog, page 2

When & Where Word of Mouth Marketing Happens

Anywhere and anytime.

Yesterday, it happened at my nephews' flag football game.

It happened spontaneously and without warning.
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What You Get By Copying Competitive Marketing Tactics

Just because your competition does "it," doesn't mean it's worth it, warranted, or necessary for you to do "it," too.

Blindly copying competitive marketing tactics means you're assuming they have the same budget restraints, performance indicators, checks, measures, and analytics in place that will indicate there's a beneficial return.

But a beneficial return to them, not you.
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Target Using Targeted Marketing in New Back to School Campaign

Target recently launched its 2013 back-to-school ad campaign.

Sure, they're targeting parents of kids going back to school. That much is obvious.

But it's the way they're doing it that impresses me.
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Social Media Currency (A Reminder)

You've improved your Facebook page engagement significantly.

So much so, you now see three times the number of comments you did previously.

And on Twitter, you were really clever and timely and saw a tweet get retweeted six times more than anything to date.

Here's the problem...
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Where "Opportunity to Spend" Meets Reality

You see this a lot in paid search campaigns, and more recently with Facebook and Twitter's ad platforms.

You're presented with ways to target your audience (great!) -- geotargeting, demographics, keywords, etc..

But once you've done so, they'll likely recommend ways to broaden your reach (which means you ultimately end up paying more in ad fees).
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Why Customer Service is a Race to be First

A few weeks ago, I left a voice mail for my optometrist requesting a call-back to schedule an appointment.

Last week, I left a voice mail and sent an email to an ad agency asking for their new business rep to give me a shout back.

Just yesterday, I sent a couple emails to local lenders requesting info on refinancing my home.
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The Single Best Way to Differentiate Yourself From Your Competitors

Over 14 million businesses were surveyed.

And of those, only 24% had a website.

That's shocking to me.

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Small Business Strategic Marketing Tactics (Yes, Even for a Church)

I've written before about how small businesses are notorious for trying a new marketing tactic and expecting to see immediate results.

Frustrated, small business owners often abandon their marketing plan before it has a chance to actually resonate with their market.

So it's refreshing to see innovative, new approaches to marketing, done right.

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Understanding the Very Basics of Marketing for Small Businesses

This is Julie.

Julie's a beautician, and a good one at that. Right now, she's creating a Facebook check-in deal for her salon.

She clicks “Save,” looks up from her desk and taps her fingers, expecting new customers to come pouring in.
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How to Make the Worst Marketing Idea Slightly Better

The flyer, the business card, the tri-fold brochure, the faux newspaper tucked under your windshield wiper... you've seen this before, right?

It's advertising confetti.

And it might be one of the worst marketing ideas around that's still so widely used.

While this tactic isn't something I recommend to my clients, there's still a few ways to make this slightly smarter.
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