Latest Posts

Damage Control for Bad Press

Bad press comes in many forms as you know. Historically, it was communicated through traditional media: print, TV or radio, thus allowing you the opportunity to tell your side of the story before the story hit the streets. Today, the media landscape has changed significantly with the advent of bloggers, consumer advocacy websites and the ever-expanding social media channels, and bad press can travel at light speed in a matter of seconds. How do you plan to protect your brand if your company was legitimately called out for wrong doing or error, or a customer received bad service and did not hesitate to share the adverse news with all of their friends? Do you have a damage control plan in place? (more…)

Online Reputation Management Cheat Sheet

Online reputation management is the practice of monitoring the Internet reputation of a person, brand or business, with the goal of suppressing negative mentions entirely, or pushing them lower on search engine results pages to decrease their visibility.
—Wikipedia (more…)

Support Your Local Marketing Group

 

What have you done for me lately? Well, if you pose that question to one of the advertising and marketing professional organizations, the answer is plenty…plenty that you may not be aware of. (more…)

Starmark Announces Opening of New Office in San Juan, Puerto Rico

Starmark President Jacqui Hartnett announces new San Juan office now open. At a recent opening party, dignitaries from private business, government and hospitality executives, joined Starmark’s management team including Brett Circe, V.P. of Interactive Services, and Mickey Espada, V.P. of Latin America & Caribbean Markets, who heads up Starmark’s Puerto Rico office. Photos from the reception are available on Starmark’s Facebook page.
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SMS and Email Marketing: Big Differences, Big Opportunities

Reprinted from South Florida Business Journal

Many marketers think using Short Message Service (SMS) for marketing on cellphones may be too personal and an infringement on the recipient. The good news is that it is both personal and very universal, since 98 percent of cell phones can receive SMS messages.

The other good news is that, from the beginning, the SMS system has had controls in place to avoid the proliferation of problems similar to those experienced early on from email spam.

The Mobile Marketing Association, with the help of the telecommunications carriers, agreed to a code of conduct that does not allow spamming. And, at any time, even if consumers have previously opted in, they can opt out by simply texting back the word “STOP.”

Marketers should feel secure about building their opt-in SMS lists. In essence, SMS lists cannot be bought, so marketers must build opt-in lists through their own contacts with customers and prospects. And, in doing so, they must be aware of the MMA code of conduct. The guideline is based on six “C words,” each of which could be preceded with the word “user”: choice, control, customization, consideration, constraint and confidentiality.

Apps can be expensive to produce, while a SMS code is very cost-effective and truly more personal.

Another misconception is that most cellphone users must pay per text. While some programs (like “American Idol”) charge for a text, most texters have unlimited message programs to avoid additional charges.

There are many productive ways to incorporate SMS into your marketing program.

The first and most important thing you can do is to use your SMS codes in your print advertising so you begin to build relationships and gather your SMS audience. Offering a discount or some information that’s valuable to your target prospect is a way to make them use the code, and thereby start the relationship.

Some local restaurants are aggressively gathering their SMS lists. Duffy’s Sports Grill in Fort Lauderdale asks for your phone number to text you when your table is ready – an excellent strategy to build a community of customers.

Visa’s SMS opt-in list serves up several text messages monthly from retail brands with coupons as high as $100, so there is no remorse about the opt-in.

Sports teams, podcasts and radio shows find great success in using SMS as a reminder that they will be airing during certain times, and can give an outline of programming details.

It is essential to determine a consistent pattern of usage for your list – not too much and not too infrequent – otherwise you will lose your audience to opting-out. Therefore, once you start a pattern of messaging, make sure that you pattern it in such a way that the material/messaging is consistent, succinct, entertaining and informative. If you accomplish this, your messaging will be a welcome addition to busy digital lifestyles.

To acquire opt-ins, use a keyword/SMS short code combination with a value incentive. An example is: PERKS/DUNKIN. With an incentive, it reads: “Text PERKS to DUNKIN for a free medium coffee.”

Whether it’s coupons, discounts or sweepstakes, you need to provide a valuable consideration in order for someone to opt-in to your list.

This is a marketing technology whose time is now that you can use creatively in your marketing. The amazing benefit is that the overwhelming majority of text messages are read, so your messaging won’t be missed. First, know the rules and begin building your SMS lists. Then create valuable messaging that will resonate with your audience and provide benefit to your company. The results of a well-planned texting effort will provide profits now and in the future.

Why Should You Keep Your Customers Engaged In Between Campaigns?

 

If you’re an advertising professional, then you understand the key components of sound marketing strategy: how to build and launch a campaign, install metrics, conduct postmortem analysis; in hopes of increasing awareness, consideration and conversion; and ultimately, reaching that pot of gold at the end of the rainbow – brand loyalty. But have you considered what to do during the critical time period “in between” campaigns to keep your brand alive? (more…)

Starmark Promotes Savvy Tourism Marketer Lisa Hoffman to VP, Client Services

With 14 years experience in travel, tourism and destination marketing, Lisa Hoffman has been promoted to Vice President, Client Services of Starmark International, Inc., according to an announcement today by Jacqui Hartnett, the marketing agency’s president. (more…)

The Google Golden Ticket: Is Google+ Really All That Glitters?

It’s no surprise in social media circles that the hottest ticket lately has been the Golden Ticket invite to the beta launch of Google+. That’s right, Google has finally stepped into the ring to take on social-giant Facebook face to face, so to speak. But is it ready for prime time? Well, that remains to be seen, but it’s absolutely worth a pilot run. (more…)

Best Practices in Business Blogging Cheat Sheet

When blogging for your business, you are not only representing yourself, you are representing the brand for which you blog. With that said and because it is critical to follow established guidelines in the bloggersphere, as well as the industry, we have prepared these guidelines to keep you on the right track. Remember, be yourself, be truthful and most of all, be authentic.

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Does Google Adsense make sense for your blog or website

Are you getting enough online traffic to your website or blog to benefit from placing ads on your content pages? Well that’s a good question. Experts say that if you’re getting more than 100 unique visitors a day, you should think about doing it. Using Google AdSense is fast and requires minimal knowledge to set up. (more…)

Social Influence Measurement (Klout, PeerIndex, EmpireAvenue)

With the rise in people utilizing social media for their brands, the number of tools to measure it has also risen. We now have a massive landscape of rising and falling levels of “Social Influence.” Much like the stock market, perceptions about businesses and brands go through a constant state of ebb and flow. This influence measurement is now being tracked by several online tools that can better enable you to understand who and what brands are the movers and shakers, and which are the duds. (more…)

Increase Creative Options and Continually Optimize

One of the most important facts that someone developing your website should convey is that it’s never completed. What that means to a marketer, client and user of that website is that it’s under a constant state of improvement or “optimization” as we refer to it. Unlike a more traditional medium like print or outdoor advertising that depends on using a predetermined readership, drive-by traffic or presumed user data, interactive sites allow for rich measurement with instant result to changes made. (more…)