You are currently browsing the tag archive for the ‘griffin integrated marketing’ tag.
We had our company retreat at Griffin Marketing last Thursday. Special thanks to @justinlevy of New Marketing Labs for giving us his insight on the future trends in social media.
Part of the reason for our retreat was to take a fresh look at our company’s mission, vision and goals as we are evolving into a niche practice marketing communications firm. As we were going round and round the room, we came back to our existing tagline – fresh ideas, powerful results – and the need to build on that. This reminded me of a phrase that we try to instill in our culture – Is this simple and easy? The idea is that when things start getting chaotic, we need to take a step back and ask this question to avoid over-engineering a solution.
In business and life, it’s easy to over-engineer things or over-commit. I’m sure you’ve heard of the K.I.S.S. principle – Keep it simple, stupid. I first heard this in an advertising class at Purdue. If you think about it, some of the most memorable ad campaigns are built on a simple concept or basic phrase (i.e., Just do it, Got Milk, etc.). But, too often, a company wants to try to tell their entire story in an ad or a tri-fold brochure. What we try to convince our clients is that you first need to grab a customer’s attention. And, you’re not going to do that with an exuberant amount of copy that no one has time to read. The beauty of the Internet is that your marketing tools can drive customers to your Web site, which can house more details on all your products/services (now, organizing your Web site content is another story for another blog).
The K.I.S.S. principle should also be applied when trying to create a work/life balance. I used to be called the queen of work/life balance here at Griffin, but lately, I have to keep reminding myself of this principle. I am a first-time mom of a now five-month-old, precious baby boy, and have much too often felt the overwhelm of trying to do it all. Finding the balance is harder than I anticipated, since I used to be so good at it.
It generally takes me about two hours to get out the door in the morning, and this includes and eating breakfast on the road. Sometimes less if things are going smoothly and my husband walks the dogs and drops off the baby. Sometimes longer if I need to add any of these things to my list. I have pick-up duty in the evening. It’s home, let the dogs out/feed them, feed the baby, fix dinner, occasionally get a work-out in (and that’s a big occasionally) or do a load of laundry, walk the dogs, give the baby a bath, feed the baby, put the baby to bed and then I need to get ready for bed if I want more than 5-6 hours of sleep.
There’s just not enough time in the day. So, I have learned to let things go and prioritize, which is hard for a perfectionist, over-analyzer. At home, things often wait until the weekend. At work, if there’s not a hard deadline, it often gets added to the top of the pile for the next day.
I would love to hear what tips people have out there. For me, it’s about focus. When I’m at work, I focus on work. And, when I’m at home, I focus on my home life. Now, of course, sometimes one spills over into the other, especially when I’m on deadline for something at work or if my baby gets sick at daycare. But, for the most part, it’s this separation that enables me to keep my sanity. I’m a very fast, efficient worker. Not the person you see hanging out by the proverbial water cooler. I try to use travel time between home and work to make personal calls – take advantage of every minute – so, I don’t have to interrupt work. Another thing is that I don’t get emails on my phone or get constant texts at work. For some, this is impossible, but it certainly makes the balance difficult.
I often hear people complaining about their chaotic lives – running here, running there. But, you have to ask yourself how much of that they bring on themselves by over-committing. I ask myself this daily…what am I doing that doesn’t really need to be done. What’s my priority. For me, I’ve taken the advice of many and am trying to enjoy the time with my son while he is a baby. I can get back in shape and volunteer when he gets older and wants nothing to do with me. 🙂
Send your tips, and remember…keep it simple.
Stacy Sarault
Last night, in reading a book and watching the news, the power of words and word choice hit me. First, the news, once again, covered the impact that President Obama’s comment and word choice (i.e., saying that the police in Cambridge, Massachusetts, “acted stupidly” in arresting a prominent black Harvard professor) had in stirring up racial passions across the nation. Granted, when the most powerful man in America comments on something, it is likely to get national attention. But, I think if the word selection was less abrasive, the controversy and media attention would not have been so dramatic.
Second, I’m in the in the final chapters of the book Marley and Me. For those of you who may not be familiar with the story, the book portrays a family’s 13-year life with their adorable and overzealous (and therefore, sometimes naughty) dog, Marley. The author’s vivid description of the final days with his beloved friend, and the months leading up to that day, brought me to tears on more than one occasion. Yes, I am a dog owner and lover, and the story mirrored my life on more than one occasion, but it is amazing how words on paper can evoke such raw emotion. I dread this day coming, though I pray it’s years from now. I only wish I could be so eloquent in telling a story.
In business, effective word choice and writing requires strategy. My colleague, Brooke Baumer Crawford, summarized a book, A Writer’s Coach: The Complete Guide to Writing Strategies that Work, for a company brown bag lunch presentation. Following are some highlights that I thought were worth sharing:
Writing with Force and Color
- Words have energy; more energetic they are, regardless of content, the more you’ll be believed
- Think of writing as personality. A strong, vibrant human being has the following traits:
- Active – need to master verbs which carry the most power and why
- Confident – don’t pussyfoot around in writing; cut to the chase; avoid frustrating the reader with long introductory phrases, meandering sentences and convoluted syntax
- Hardworking
- Lean
- Verbs – target verbs with inherent qualities that evoke action; also many verbs carry an image or a sound (i.e. squash, dazzle, poke, flail, swagger); strive for specificity (i.e. “dash” is more specific than “ran”)
- Nouns – use specific word choices that excite and paint particular images (i.e. use “chasm” vs. “very deep canyon)
- Adjectives – strong modifiers help paint pictures – “burn-scarred wooden spoon”….”glycerin smoothness and cathedral quiet.”
- Avoid passive voice – Puts the object of the sentence first in the sentence. For example, “The ball WAS HIT by him.” Rather than, “He hit the ball.”
- Expletives – words not needed in a sentence (i.e. there were, it is, it was, there are, there is). Deleting these words and playing with the verb choice can lead to a more colorful sentence
- Needless qualifiers – rather, somewhat, generally, virtually, pretty (as in “pretty much”), slightly, a bit, little. Sometimes they are needed, but in rare cases.
Writing with Brevity
- Don’t cram too much into your sentences and paragraphs; readers won’t be able to comprehend
- Avoid redundancy – for example, final resolution (a resolution is final); broad array (arrays are broad by nature); mutually agreed upon (mutuality and agreement are not different qualities)
- Avoid word duplications – for example, “The marketing department has submitted several interesting ideas and concepts.” Ideas are concepts.
- Abstract modifiers – worst offender is the word “very.” It is rarely needed in sentences and should be avoided as much as possible. It adds nothing. For example: don’t say “she was very mad.” Say “She was irate.”
- Creeping nouns – nouns that attach themselves to perfectly good nouns and clutter them up. For example, a “crisis” suddenly becomes a “crisis situation.” Isn’t a crisis already a situation? Another example: “The patient was battling the effects of a cold.” Instead, “The patient battled a cold.”
Stacy Sarault
I’m a planner. I like to have a goal, and a plan and timeline to meet that goal. So, I like it when a client says they want a marketing plan. This means they believe in the power of having a strategy and not just flying by the seat of their pants with last-minute, reactionary marketing tactics.
The first thing I always ask is, “What’s your budget?” You may be surprised at how often this question goes unanswered.
A marketing plan is an important part of your business. It’s an investment. Compare it to a significant investment in your personal life – like buying a house. You wouldn’t go house hunting without knowing how much you can afford to spend.
The same goes for your marketing plan. You don’t want to waste time and money creating a plan that you can’t afford. The key to an effective plan is figuring out how to most effectively reach your target audience within the constraints of your budget.
Another question that is sometimes surprisingly tough to answer, but one that needs to be answered early in the planning process is, “What are your goals?” If you don’t have a goal, then there is no way to measure the effectiveness of the plan. And, even tougher for some is coming up with a measurable goal. For example, “I want to increase sales” is not measureable, but adding “by 10%” is.
Knowing this is a primary goal for the plan will influence the tactics. I would focus on tactics that directly reach the end customer to generate measureable leads. The message would focus on the benefits that are most important to the customer.
And, you shouldn’t assume to know what those are. Have you or your sales people come right out and asked what keeps your customers up at night. There are a variety of ways to conduct inexpensive polls, if you have a strong customer database.
Other important aspects to a strong plan are assessing current market conditions, which often includes some type of market research and checking out what the competition is doing, and conducting a SWOT analysis (i.e., indentifying your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats).
It is important to know how you are perceived by your customer, and how that plays out with the competition and current state of the industry. For example, if your customer thinks you are expensive, then your messaging needs to address this perception. Talk about value and what the customer gets for their money…preferably something unique from the competition.
Once the plan is in place, it is equally important to stick to the plan. This may sound obvious…why would you spend the time creating a plan and not follow it. But, it happens more often than you may think.
There are going to be times, of course, when an opportunity presents itself that you don’t want to pass up. But, you should always make sure this opportunity accomplishes the goals set forth in the plan and determine how this impacts your budget. Did you build in adequate contingency to cover this expense, or do you have to cut something from the existing plan in order to stay within budget.
Marketing plans can be a lot of work, but you don’t have to overengineer the process. The key is having goals, setting a budget and determining what tactics will most effectively reach your target audience within that budget. It is better to have a two-page strategy than nothing at all.
Happy planning!
Stacy Sarault
We won two PRSA-Houston 2009 Gold Excalibur Awards
Griffin Integrated Marketing (Griffin) took home two 2009 Gold Excalibur Awards from the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) Houston Chapter, both for media relations activities for the Coalition for Space Exploration (Coalition).
The “Passing the Torch: NASA’s 50th Anniversary” satellite media tour (SMT) won top honors in the SMT category, while “America’s Space Program In Danger by James Lovell” captured first place in the op-ed/bylined article category. Winners were announced June 18 at Hotel Derek.
(Left to right) Jaime Napoli and Carrie Taylor accepted the Public Relations Society of America awards for media relations activities for the Coalition for Space Exploration work on behalf of Griffin Integrated Marketing.
“Space is Griffin Marketing’s passion; many of our team members grew up around the space program and know its importance and value for our lives here on Earth,” said Gwen Griffin, owner/managing director of the agency. “It is an honor to represent the Coalition and help them launch initiatives such as the SMT and op-ed to help assure the United States maintains its global leadership in space exploration.”
The Coalition is a group of space industry businesses and advocacy groups that educate and inform the public on the value and benefits of space exploration. The Coalition commemorated NASA’s 50th anniversary on Oct. 1, 2008 with an SMT to highlight the agency’s accomplishments over the past five decades, and its vision of the future. To create the “Passing the Torch” theme, Griffin secured spokesperson Capt. Eugene Cernan, the last person to set foot on the Moon, and Damaris Sarria, a young aerospace engineer who has applied to become an astronaut and chronicles her experiences through her blog. In the end, the SMT surpassed its goal of viewership by reaching 5.7 million people through 84 placements on radio and television outlets.
Similarly, the Coalition wanted to leverage the 40th anniversary of Apollo 8 as a means of building public awareness and support of U.S. space exploration. Griffin capitalized on the San Diego Air & Space Museum celebratory event to place an op-ed written by former astronaut and event speaker James Lovell in the San Diego Union-Tribune and on its Web site. A press release with excerpts from the op-ed was then issued over the wire, resulting in additional online coverage. Ultimately, the message reached more than 442,000 individuals, not including online viewers.
We are pleased and honored to win these prestigous awards! Thanks to our great team for all of their hard work!
We just posted about the importance of crisis planning. Well, Griffin’s crisis work is actually a finalist for a 2009 Crystal Award from The American Marketing Association’s (AMA) Houston Chapter.
We submitted an entry that chronicled our work dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Ike, which hit the Texas Gulf Coast in September 2008. Our task – raising awareness of the devastation to the coastal Bay Area Houston (BAH) region, which had been nearly shut out of predominant, post-storm editorial coverage. Within 24 hours, we coordinated a full-scale press conference for the region that featured the 11 out of the 13 regional mayors, and numerous other key business leaders, to update residents on recovery efforts and inform other cities outside of BAH on the state of the region.
The one-hour press conference generated extensive television and print coverage. Two TV stations even aired the press conference live in its entirety. The editorial coverage spawned two critical meetings with the Federal Emergency Management Agency that help speed much-needed assistance to the area. A true win!
The 2009 Crystal Award winners will be announced on May 29. We’ll keep you posted.
Meanwhile, in the coming weeks, Griffin plans to evolve its Hurricane Ike crisis strategy into an e-book for free download. Stay tuned.
gwengriffin.wordpress.com 