No free lunch in marketing. Or is there?

I was travelling across London yesterday when I found myself on a hot sweaty, claustrophobic tube train, sitting there wondering why on earth I hadn’t walked when… the emergency stop handle was pulled. The train came to a shuddering halt just before we pulled into our rightful stopping place at the station. Everyone in the carriage looked apprehensively around to see who looked suspect. As it was, when the guard walked through to investigate the cause and identify the culprits it turned out that some tourists in the next carriage, who didn’t read English, had pulled the lever thinking it was a grab handle. Which leads me off track to why on earth aren’t signs in London, a multi-cultural capital city famed for its tourists, printed in more than just English? But I’ll leave that thought for the moment as that’s probably a marketing rant for another time…

In a Goldfish Bowl

Anyway, back in the carriage, before our friendly, but careless tourists were discovered, and after all my new travelling friends and I had decided that we were not in the middle of a terrorist attack, I got back to the business of observing the situation. It felt like being in a goldfish bowl. There we were not knowing why we had stopped, but parked right next to the platform and looking out onto the bright and cool exterior, longing to be the other side of the glass. While outside, a platform full of travellers desperate to get on the train and not being told or understanding why they couldn’t get on, were peering through the windows at these strange, trapped creatures.

What it must have looked like to them I do not know. Slowly but surely the carriage was getting hotter and damper and strangely more claustrophobic – although there was exactly the same number of people and the same amount of space. But movement was becoming a little more frantic as if everyone had developed nervous tics – which come to think of it they probably had. But soon the old British Bulldog Spirit kicked in and seated neighbours started talking to one another and became resolutely stiff upper lipped assuring each other that it would all be over soon. Everyone friendly, joking, laughing and then…. the train started up, lurched forward a good foot or two, came to a more controlled stop and the doors opened – we had finally arrived at our destination.

And then it happened. Selfish Chaos.

People stood up staring straight ahead not talking, grabbing for handles to support themselves as they made their way speedily out of the train. iPod earphones went back in and, lost in the world of music, their owners shuffled out onto the platform. Others reached for bags and quickly rushed for the exits – everyone, it seems, eager to get on with their solitary lives and not giving anything of themselves. In fact a 180 degree turn around from just 30 seconds ago when it seemed that everyone had opened up to become a single unit. The throng of people became faceless passengers once again ignoring each other and giving nothing of themselves to anyone around them.

Help Costs Nothing

There in the midst of this thrusting, rushing, pushing crowd, right next to the door was a slightly worried, not quite yet distraught lady, vainly trying to lift a suitcase from the train onto the platform before the doors closed once more.  And no-one stopped. They didn’t have time. They had to get away. They had places to go. People to see. Things to do. So did I; but I stopped, lifted her case, placed it on the platform, asked her if she was OK and helped her with some directions. A few seconds given freely. In that split second I wanted to turn around and scream at the fast disappearing crowd and ask why they couldn’t give up some of their time. But I didn’t, I just turned and went on my way, because another time, another day, that would have been me, rushing ahead, not noticing what was going on around me.

And that brings me back to the topic of this article (about time you say!). Because of that famous quote ‘there’s no such thing as a free lunch’. When I helped that lady, she didn’t suspect me of anything. She didn’t think that I would ask her for money. And I wasn’t expecting anything other than thanks. She just knew I was giving my time and assistance freely, to help her. And so in that instance there was a free lunch (okay a free helping hand). And that has been, and always will be my philosophy, help someone out today and you will get your just rewards in the end.

In business and in marketing this is so true.

If you are in need of marketing help and someone gave it to you free of charge, then you might be suspicious. But if it worked for you then you would be grateful and hopefully remember the person that helped you out.

If you are in need of marketing again and the same person gave you FOC help, then you are definitely going to remember them. Then when you are in a position to spend on marketing you will go back to that person as a first port of call. If you never have marketing budget then you will still remember that person fondly.

And that’s what that lady reminded me – give something freely and you will get your just rewards, simple gratitude or the possibility of future business relationships, both are worth having. So, this blog is the first in a series of marketing tips that will save you marketing money and time. And no I’m not mad, if it helps you, then I’m hoping that you will remember where you got this advice and will remember me and should the need arise, come back and employ our agency when the time is right.

So where better to start than #1 – a free web site

OK, there are lots of ‘free’ website options around. But in general, in my experience, the free website options that I have come across just aren’t worth having because they don’t actually give you anything (well not a lot anyway), and/or they are crammed full of advertising, which you can’t control an din a business environment this is suicide as your top prospect views your site to find out that it’s advertising sex toys!. But this latest initiative brings a reputable website package together which includes:

• Design
• Hosting
• Domain registration
• Content Managed website
• Search Engine Promotion
• Business community promotion

And all in one package and all supported and promoted by some very big names: BT, Google, e-skills & Enterprise UK. These folks all got together under the “Get British Business Online” campaign to package all this – for free.

But is it any good?

Well yes actually it is. We tested it ourselves and created our own dummy website in just five minutes – have a look at it here, and it was very easy to get everything setup, and built in literally just a matter of minutes.

Is there a catch?

Well, not really, because it’s good at what it supplies, you can manage it yourself and it gives you a web presence quickly and for nothing. OK, so it does have its limitations, as you’d expect. Like the designs are fixed (there are ways to overcome this but then you’d be a web designer anyway), you can’t create things like online forms to capture visitor details and it’s branded with Google links and Get British Business Online logos – but then if you get something for free shouldn’t you, ethically display these logos as a thank you?

However, if you don’t mind any of that, it’s a great way to get started with a simple, attractive layout.  And by taking this route, I reckon you could have saved yourself around £1,500, when you take into account how much you’d usually pay for hosting, website design & build, SEO tools and all the rest of the things you’d need to get a new website up and running.

So, how do you get this free website?

Just visit the special Get British Business Online website and get started straight away.

So there. As a marketer that has an agency that designs and develops websites, I’ve pointed you in the direction of a solution that earns my agency, Insight Group, no money whatsoever. But, it does help out those people that can’t afford our services – today. And is there is an ulterior motive? Of course, I want you to get online and experience how marketing can help you. I want you to succeed through online marketing. And I want you to say ‘what a swell guy’ he just helped me get my business off the ground; or he helped me investigate a new venture without the cost associated with getting the business online. And then, hopefully, when your business outgrows the basic website functionality and when your business needs you to focus on it and not spend time managing a website, you’ll remember ‘that guy’ and come back to get your web presence to match your business aspirations.

There’s No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

Well that’s true, but you can still go out and eat for nothing, and in this case with lots of trimmings, but when you come to order from the main menu, don’t forget me. I’m ‘that guy’ and I run a hell of a good kitchen!

That was #1 – was it useful? Whatever you think leave me a message because I have some more tips in the pipeline and need encouragement!

Marketing in a recession – you can’t afford not to

“You can’t ignore marketing’ when you are coming out of a recession.”

While, as a marketing agency owner, I am somewhat biased when I hear statements that promote active marketing campaigns, I need to stress that it wasn’t me who made the statement. It was actually one of the delegates that I met at a recent Thames Valley Chamber of Commerce event.

We had just sat through a presentation from the Bank of England, which was surprisingly entertaining – considering the subject matter and the recessionary oriented topic. But the speaker made the stats and trend analysis come to life.

It was after this that my newfound colleague (who does not work in marketing) stated the text-book argument, “Surely the best way for any company to get out of the recession ahead of its competitors is to market their way out?”

She’s right, but being right and actually doing it, are, as we all know, not always the same thing.

But it did remind me that I had now run a marketing consultancy agency through three recessions ; first in the late ’80s (just 2 months after we started the consultancy), then in the ’90s and now again in 2009. And in all three I can remember easily the number of companies that took the step of actively marketing their way out of the recession. I can remember them easily because they were the ones shortly after the recession ended that were smiling like Cheshire cats. They were very pleased with themselves and were reaping the benefits of their activities. Nice memories. 

But of course it wasn’t easy to do.

Text book marketing is a wonderful thing, mainly because there is no emotion involved. Look at facts and figures and yes it all makes sense. Add in a spoonful of people and that odd thing called a personality and it all goes haywire. But, the text books are normally right because they, themselves, have been produced without emotion. Commonly by very clever people that produce analysis and statistics to define what works, what doesn’t and what trends are created in every situation.

But the one thing that is common within marketing out of a recession is that the people that really succeed tend to be the same people that succeed in business. Purely (in my humble opinion) because they are: Entrepreneurs; Mavericks; Gamblers. They wouldn’t be running a business or responsible for a major piece of a business if they didn’t have that risk taking mentality. Those people that sit back and play it safe tend not to make many mistakes. The maverick personality works on the basis that if you don’t try it then it won’t ever happen.

And that is just the mentality that you need when it looks like everything around you is collapsing in a heap. As I write this, I can look back on last week and how Dubai added to the recessionary pressures, how RBS are playing silly wotsits  and talking about massive bonuses and how the government is cutting back it’s spenindg budgets. Faced with another dose of bad news it is easy to shut up shop or bury your head. But, during the same time I was able to see that new clients are coming on board because they want to ‘do amrketing’ to get as many people into their sales pipeline as they can ready for the new year. Many of our existing clients are beefing up their marketing because they feel they can’t sit back. All good news if you are sitting where I am.

So that led me to thinking. Is it just because we are in marketing that we are seeing this. Or, as I think is more likely, are we just surrounded by people (clients) that have the same mind set as us ‘Just Do It’? The reason I think it’s the latter is because marketing is a people business and anyone who has endured the marketing pitch situations will know that the right campaign, for the right company, at the right time and at the right price, doesn’t always win if the agency presentation team and the prospect just don’t hit it off. People matter.

So the moral? Within reason, Just Do It and do it hard and fast, mistakes and all, because if you just sit there ‘not doing anything’ it will come and bite you in the butt when you least expect it.