Business Management - Marketing/Sales

The marketplace has been making companies jump through hoops partly because there are so many service providers to choose from and partly because the economy has made them extremely cautious. Companies want to make sure the firms they are hiring and contracting with are expert in their field, their skills are up to date, and they have a strong track record of delivering what they promise. All good practices to keep in mind when developing your company’s strategic market plan.

How do you become more successful in 2013? Well, it is certainly not about buzzwords. Moreover, it is not about creative acronyms or snazzy catch phrases. Success is actually quite simple. Be YOU! Treat others the way you want to be treated. Communicate with others the way that they like to communicate. You see, people can duplicate what you say and do, but they cannot replicate YOU.

The best design reflects the culture of its time. And that's what I love about this invitation for the annual Luminocity Gala 2012, which is known for being a fashion-forward event. Drawing inspiration from the fashion forecast, the designers incorporated trending colors and styles.

I have learned more about direct mail, variable data, and personalization from the Xplorers than any other group or event I have attended to date. What I once believed had nothing to do with me is now one of my favorite gatherings of the year, and this April will not only be my third time back but I am also on the Xplor Education Committee under the social media/marketing umbrella.

Ask anyone who has worked their way through college what they learned from that experience and you are likely to get an earful. This week in Bill Farquharson's blog, read about the effect of working his way through UMass at a liquor store.

The first thing we need to sell in any situation is ourselves. But how do we get people to trust us if we are not given the opportunity to prove ourselves to be trustworthy? In this week's Short Attention Span Webinar, Bill and Kelly teach you how to sell trust.

China has become a country with a huge printing market and it is still growing. Its transformation into a world-class manufacturing industry with world-class printers is still evolving. As the cultural and creative areas of Chinese society start booming, the printing industry will have a new opportunity. More affluent Chinese will demand top-quality products of all kinds, and the packaging market will take the lead in creating a huge incentive for companies striving to reach these "well off" Chinese consumers.

Rookie salespeople buy lists. Savvy, veteran salespeople look around them and generate leads from the opportunities that they come across on a day-to-day basis. The result of this sales curiosity is returned phone calls, appointments and orders earned on the basis of a good idea, and not the lowest price. Oh, and they get a free cup of coffee out of it to boot. Eventually.

I'll be writing about specific ways that companies in our industry can market their services to people who need them. Mostly, I'll focus on corporate end users: the buyers, designers and marketers who have a hand in choosing print along with other media to promote their businesses. Marketing to consumers is, as they say, a whole different kettle of fish.

A multi-niche strategy spreads your risk among many markets and protects you from the Win or Lose scenario a single-market company can experience. Graphic arts and printing companies often make this mistake by “specializing” in one market. Usually, the reality is, these specialties occur because the company doesn’t have a proactive growth plan so they naturally tend to attract the same type of customer in the same market. Great in good times, bad if that market goes away.