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10 Prime Time Benefits of Blogging for New Business

September 22, 2011

Photo Credit zoutedrop

The majority of ad agencies have yet to comprehend what huge benefits a blog can make and why it deserves to be “prime time” for new business.

With help from American Business Media and the Business Marketing Association, Junta42 and MarketingProfs surveyed over 1,100 North American B2B marketers from diverse industries and a wide range of company sizes. The survey revealed that content marketing, including blogs, is a key lead generation source for 63% of the respondents.

Brand Awareness – 78%
Customer Attention/Loyalty – 69%
Lead Generation – 63%
Website Traffic – 55%
Though Leadership – 52%
Sales – 51%
Lead Nurturing – 37%

Here’s the story of how my blog helped launch my business

I started my consulting business just prior to The Great Recession. We had three kids in college at the time. I didn’t have a lot of funds to promote my services nor the time to play around with social media. But, I sensed the potential of social media for building awareness quickly and creating new business opportunities. So I jumped in, immersing myself in it as if I were back in grad school. From early mornings until late at night and even weekends, I spent time trying to get my head around this new communication channel but always from a new business perspective.

From the start I was compelled to monetize social media, forced to press the envelope beyond the way the early adopters of social media had intended for it to be used. Within a short three months I was already securing new clients as well as an income that matched my previous salary.

From the beginning, the centerpiece of my social media strategy was my blog

My blog, Fuel Lines, literally launched my consultancy. If I had promoted my business using traditional methods, there is no doubt in my mind that I would have spent a substantial amount of money and it would have taken much longer for my consultancy business to be where it is today.

Once I created my blog it became a never-ending cycle of content development and learning curves based on the fast progression of social media. It has been a process of “learn as you go”. I came upon an old adage in the early days of my writing, “you don’t know what you know until you write it down”. This is so true. My blog has served as a key tool for my personal continuing education program. It brought focus to my reading and writing along with the discovery enriching online resources that fuel both content created from other sources and original content.

Content marketing, through my blog, quickly became one of my most effective marketing tools. Instead of the typical “once and done” traffic of a website, my blog has provided a much better platform for repeat traffic and search visibility.

Here are the benefits that I hope will give you reason to devote Prime Time to your agency’s blog:

1. Generate more online traffic

“Businesses (agencies) that blog, get 55% more website traffic than those that don’t,” According to a social media study by King Fish Media, HubSpot and Junta42

Your blog has the potential to create more web traffic than your agency’s website ever could. Your blog can attract a high volume of quality traffic from the pool of prospective clients you are trying to reach.

Blogs develop more visitors by:

Search visibility – blogs are organized to be search engine friendly. Plus the more content you have (well-linked), the more chances there are of attracting search traffic.
Click-through traffic - by posting interesting articles, a blog gives a reason for other people to link to you.
Repeat traffic – regularly updated content and comments bring visitors back … and back … and back. Most agency websites are not conducive to repeat traffic, particularly if your website hasn’t been updated in 5 years.
Personality - Put a face with your agency. Create a blog around a person(s) and let your personality shine through. People will be attracted to you. People like to associate and work with people they know, trust and like. It’s hard to make friends with a business, but easy to warm to an individual with a welcoming personality.
Viral effects – you create something cool and visitors share it with their friends, who share with their friends … and so on.

2. A blog is a great place for your best prospects to easily find you

MarketingSherpa reported that a CMO Study, 80 percent of decision makers said they FOUND their vendors (not the other way around).

New business for ad agencies has been going through a paradigm shift; instead of chasing after prospective clients, it’s now more important for your prospective clients to find you. Blogs allows you to take full advantage of this paradigm shift for new business, shifting a good portion of your time and energy from outbound lead generation to implementing an inbound lead generation strategy.

A content marketing strategy is a major feature for inbound lead generation and a blog is a central component.

3. A positioning tool

Most ad agencies struggle with narrowing their target audience and thus have great difficulty in positioning and differentiating themselves. A blog is a tool that allows agencies to more easily define and adopt a differentiating new business strategy. Agencies are more comfortable with a narrower niche through a blog than they ever would be with their website.

Here are some examples of agency blogs with a strong target focus and differentiated positioning:

momentum: Moms rule the social web. Does your brand have momentum? - Big Fuel, Manhattan, NY
Off The Shelf: Helping private label food brands take advantage of all the opportunities the market offers – Barkley, Kansas City, MO
Park Howell: Sustainable Storyteller. How sustainable are you and your green marketing - Park & Company, Phoenix, AZ
Roxanne Joffe: Helping women to start, run and grow their business - Cap Brand Marketing, Sarasota, FL
Tradesmen Insights: Marketing to the professional tradesman in the Construction, Industrial and MRO markets - SONNHALTER, Berea, OH
Creative Triage: Market your community hospital efficiently – ABZ Design Group, Charlotte, NC
The Matte Pad: Marketing Know-How for the legal profession – MAX Advertising, Atlanta, GA
Turn Up Your Volume: Strategists and marketers that are looking for ways to drive high-contribution patient volume – The Heavyweights, Indianapolis, IN
Healthy Conversations: Inspiration, Insights & Ideas for Creating New Value – Trajectory, Morristown, NJ
MARKETINGHOMEPRODUCTS: Marketing strategies and communication tactics related to the home and building channel – Kleber & Associates, Atlanta, GA
The One Thing Blog: The casino marketers guide to understanding gamers - Littlefield, Tulsa, OK
Fifth Gear Analytics: Accerlarting sales through analytical insights – SIGMA Marketing Group, Rochester, NY
Ask Smarter Questions: Data drive marketing & business intelligence – Levelwing, Charleston, SC

4. Your own focus group for new business

I have been enriched by having this online, ongoing, personal “focus group” that has provided real-time feedback and insights. My blog readers provide me with an ongoing education. They help me to help them. They let me know whether or not I’m clearly communicating with them. They help me to take my experience and expertise with agency new business and social media and become better at meeting their specific needs.

5. The recycling of older content for a greater ROI

You will continue to generate a great return on your time investment, writing for your agency’s blog, by recycling older content. As you write your posts, learn to write “ever-green” to give the content a long shelf life.

Here are some ways to repurpose your blog content:

Twitter: This isn’t like your email inbox. People are on and off Twitter rather quickly. Often they are scanning for helpful resources to their advertising/marketing challenges. The odds that the majority of your followers would see a post that you published at 11 am on a Thursday is remote. It’s about reach and frequency. SocialOomph is a great program to assist with repurposing content through your Twitter account and allows you to control your publishing schedule knowing what post is being published when.
Email Newsletters: Posts from your archive will find new life by way of your newsletter. You can group older posts around a particular category or theme. Highlight the “best of” your online content. Here are a couple of examples: Fuel Lines, Convince and Convert’s Vault
Facebook and LinkedIn: Another way to repurpose content is through other social media platforms such as Facebook and LinkedIn. These are not with the same frequency of posting as you would with Twitter.

6. A pipeline for consistent lead generation

You can keep your prospective pipeline full even when your agency is busy with client work or you are away.

At the beginning of the summer, while my wife and I were vacationing in Key West, I wrote a post and published it along with a photo while on the beach. I wrote,“Vacationing with Social Media and Still Generating Ad Agency New Business,” to illustrate how content marketing through a blog can keep your new business pipeline full even when you are away.

7. Leading with client benefits instead of agency capabilities

Blogging keeps your agency focused on what is important to your prospective clients. It’s not about YOU it’s all about THEM. It forces you speak to their benefit instead of talking about your agency.

If you don’t have a passion to help your audience succeed, you wont success with blogging. As soon as you start to “sell” your agency or brag about your credentials and awards, you will lose your credibility along with your audience. Instead, provide content that helps your prospects with their marketing challenges and build trust. Then new business will come.

8. A professional enrichment tool

Blogging will enrich your professional life, keep you up to date with the freshest thinking and help you to be acquainted with the newest and best trends. Writing to a specific audience to help them with their needs will focus your reading and your writing. You have direction to begin each day and that makes blogging easier.

9. Enhances Network and Referrals

A survey of advertising agencies conducted by Fuel Lines, reveals that 50% of the 430 responding agencies generated new business from two primary sources last year: referrals and networking.

Agencies have long understood the importance of individual connections to generate new business. It has always been the lifeblood of small to midsize agencies. Thankfully, albeit slowly, agencies are starting to understand the potential of social media to enhance networks and referral opportunities.

A blog, as the centerpiece of your social media strategy, will greatly enhance your capabilities of networking within your local market plus far beyond it.

Over the summer, I wrote a post from my hotel room in London, England. I was reflecting on how far I’ve come since I created my blog. I have worked with new clients all across the United States from Costa Mesa, CA to Port Clyde, Maine and this year had my first overseas client in the UK. I’ve recently been invited to speak to agencies across South Africa in the cities of Cape Town, Durban and Johannesburg.

I’ve generated these personal networks and referrals by blogging from my home office which is located above my garage in Alabaster, Alabama. It’s absolutely amazing.

10. A Call-to-Action converting blog visitors into new business opportunities

A strong call to action is a clear, simple and compelling offer that persuades your readers to take the action you want. Just having a “Contact Us” form on your blog site is not very appealing to your blog’s visitors. It doesn’t count as your call to action.

I would suggest creating an offer for a particular service, usually a first-step that you normally conduct with every new client, like a brand or marketing audit. Price it in lower than normal, a clear value to the prospect. This will do 3 things:

Render a quicker decision from your prospects. They are not having to make a major financial commitment at this point. They’re just committing to take a small initial step.
Identify the true prospect from those that just want to pick your brain for free and will never pay for your services.
Pay you, at least for a portion of your time, for important face time with your prospective clients.

3 Comments | Agency Blogs, Fuel for Thought, New Business Trends, Social Media | Tagged: ad agency, advertising agencies, blogs, business development, content marketing, Michael Gass, networks, new business, referrals, Social Media | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

The 2011 State of Inbound Marketing for Ad Agency New Business

September 19, 2011

Photo Credit Hubspot

Inbound marketing techniques are rapidly becoming more important for agency new business.

Over the past four years I’ve seen a steady progression of agencies embracing social media as part of their new business program. Primarily because of the way their prospective clients are making decisions on how they are finding their agency partner. Traditional, “outbound marketing” methods are getting less and less effective.

CMO Survey: 80 percent of decision makers said they found there vendors, not the other way around. MarketingSherpa

Social media is now mainstream and has greatly advanced the importance of “inbound marketing” techniques. Your agency’s prospects are more in control of what information they receive and how they receive it. They are able to get a considerable amount of information about your agency without ever interacting with you directly.

Those agencies that have adapted to this new business paradigm shift from “outbound marketing” methods to “inbound marketing” have an distinct advantage over their competition.

A helpful resource on how companies are generating business through inbound marketing is the “2011 State of Inbound Marketing” report. This is a study, conducted by Hubspot., and is based on responses from 644 marketing professionals.

Here are the reports top 10 key takeaways:

Inbound consistently delivers a dramatically lower cost per lead than outbound. In 2011, the average cost per lead for outbound-dominated businesses was $373, while inbound businesses reported their leads cost on average $143.
The gap between spending on inbound v. outbound continues to widen: In 2009, inbound marketing had a 9% greater share of the lead generation budget; in 2011 inbound’s share was 17% greater.
Blogs and social media channels are generating real customers: 57% of companies using blogs reported that they acquired customers from leads generated directly from their blog.
More and more business are blogging: Businesses are now in the minority if they do not blog. From 2009 to 2011 the percentage of businesses with a blog grew from 48% to 65%.
Three out of four Inbound Channels cost less than any Outbound Channel: In 2011, the average cost per lead for outbound-dominated businesses was $373, while inbound businesses reported their leads cost on average $143.
Businesses are increasingly aware their blog is highly valuable: 85% of businesses rated their company blogs as “Useful”, “Important” or “Critical”; a whopping 27% rated their company blog as “Critical” to their business.
The majority of businesses are increasing their Inbound Marketing budgets:54% of those surveyed are increasing their inbound marketing budgets. Among the 54% of respondents with increased inbound marketing budgets, the most commonly cited reason was ―past success with inbound marketing.
Social Media and Blogs generate real customers:57% of those using company blogs have acquired a customer from a blog-generated lead; this is an increase of 11 percentage points since 2010. Facebook and Twitter users reported customer acquisition rates of 48% and 42%, respectively.
Company blogs are increasingly valued. The blog is the channel most frequently reported as critical or important, both in 2009 and 2011. Higher Education, Professional Services & Consulting, and Software & Biotech found blogging was highly effective. All of those industries had over 50% of respondents indicating customer acquisition through their blog.
Most company blogs publish at least weekly. 71% of respondents indicated they blog at least weekly. Despite the evidence showing that increased blogging correlates with increased customer acquisition, blogging frequency remained relatively steady between 2009 and 2011.

HubSpot’s 2011 “State of Inbound Marketing Report” is now available for download.

Additional articles that may be of interest:

8 Comments | New Business Trends, Social Media | Tagged: ad agency new business, Hubspot, inbound marketing, Michael Gass, outbound marketing, Social Media, traditional marketing | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

Ad Agencies: 7 tips that will prep social media success for new business

September 15, 2011

Photo Credit Maxey

“It’s not the will to succeed, but the will to prepare to succeed that makes the difference.” Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant

It wasn’t until 2010 that most small to mid-size ad agencies gave up fighting against the social media tide and decided to dive in.

When most agencies finally jumped into social media, they had a check list that merely showcased how they were a bona-fide member of the social media community. From the get-go they were not prepped for success.

“We have an agency blog – check; Twitter account with the agency’s logo – check; Facebook Fan page – check; LinkedIn account for the agency – check!”

No strategy. No specific audience. No positioning and no appeal. Instead of using this new communication channel as an opportunity to showcase how they were different, they ended up looking just the same.

They are positioned online the same way they were offline – as a generalist instead of a specialist and once again following the “safe-way” instead of the “smart-way.”

Is there any wonder why most agencies are not having much success using social media to create new business opportunities?

As a new business consultant. I understand the need for acquiring new business NOW. But short-term solutions will not provide long-term results.

To be prepped for success using social media for agency new business, here are 7 tips that I hope you find helpful:

Identify and connect with a specific target audience. Face it, most agencies are afraid to put their stake in the ground and even identify their target audience. You would never recommend a marketing campaign for a client without first identifying who they are trying to reach.
Lead with benefits. Social media helps agencies to talk in a new way from the self promotional agency speak of the past. For success with social media, it’s about them not you. Your communication and content should be focused on your prospective client audience and be of benefit too them.
Differentiate from your competitors. You wont win any significant business by showcasing how you match up with the rest of the agencies. You must un-level the playing field. Set yourself apart. What would give a company a reason to fly across a number of states and over hundreds of other agencies, to do business with your agency? Social media provides a great opportunity for your agency to stand out.
Become a specialist instead of a generalist. Our world is becoming more and more specialized and the internet and social media allows you and your agency to become more specialized than you dared offline.
Create chemistry. Remember that social media is about people. You lead with a person, not the agency. People want to work with other people that they know, trust and like. Social media is the greatest networking tool in my lifetime. I’ve built my consultancy utilizing it; building a network with agencies all across the U.S., Canada, Europe and South Africa from my home in Alabaster, Alabama. How incredible is that?
Develop appeal. One of the great benefits for using social media for new business is the instant feedback from your audience. It allows you to easily test your message and hone your appeal. It forces you to give up the “agency speak.” Analytics will provide insight into the needs, challenges and objectives of your prospective client audience. Your community of prospects will let you know whether or not what you communicate is of value to them.
Earn positioning as a “thought leader.” Thought leadership is a critical component in using social media for new business. But you will never attain such status without a platform and focus. Social media provides a great platform. You much choose your area of focus if you are to have success.

Additional articles that may be of interest:

Leave a Comment » | Agency Blogs, New Business Trends, Social Media | Tagged: Ad Agencies, Bear Bryant, Michael Gass, Small to Midsize Ad Agencies, Social Media | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

A Tribute to Trey Pennington Through His Own Words

September 8, 2011

I was moved watching this video created by Ben Cope, founder and president of Epic Web Strategies, a full-service web design firm and wanted to share it with the readers of Fuel Lines.

Trey left an indelible impression upon my life and the lives of thousands of others. I know he will continue to be an inspiration beyond his untimely death.

“Why I do what I do (and why I need to do a whole lot MORE of what I do!).” Trey Pennington

Here are some of Trey’s quotes that are included in this video:

“”What I admire most about my 6 children – every one of them looks out for the rest. They are immensely sweet people.”

“What drives me is a philosophical world view:

Everyone wants to be heard
Everyone wants to be understood
Everyone wants his or her life to count”

“It’s fun to encourage others and help inspire them to boldly make a difference with their treasure.”

“We cannot solve our problems or seize upon our opportunities with the same way of being we enjoyed last year”

“Just like most of an iceberg is hidden, so a human being’s backstory is out-of sight.”

“There is a certain level of grieving when we know that our expression of ‘I love you’ falls on deaf ears. That hurts at the soul level.”

“Storytelling captures the essence of what it means to be human”

“One day, it was probably around 11 o’clock at night, I was sitting at my computer and my 13-year-old daughter came in and she said, ‘How are you doing daddy?’

I said, ‘Well, okay,’ and I was looking at my to-do list and I said to her, ‘I wish I had a couple of more hours on this thing.’ And she, with great enthusiasm and zest said, ‘Yep, that’s why God gives us a whole new day tomorrow.’

“These are still scary times. You’ve been through them before. Opportunities are ahead. Focus on that one thing in the present and take action on that today. You’ll make it through.”

Additional Tributes to Trey:

2 Comments | Agency Leadership, Fuel for Thought, Social Media | Tagged: Ben Cope, Epic Web Strategies, Intergenius, Trey Pennington | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

An Important Question is Raised as Social Media Loses Trey Pennington to Suicide

September 6, 2011

The Sunday of Labor Day weekend was a very sad day for the social media community. We lost one of our All-Stars and that raises the question; ” Just how real are online relationships created through social media?”

According to news sources, on Sunday morning, around 11 am, Labor Day weekend, Greenville, S.C. Police received a call that there was a man in possession of a gun at the Second Presbyterian Church on River Street. Police found social media personality, Trey Pennington, in the church’s parking lot. Police repeatedly asked him to put the gun down but Trey turned the gun on himself and fired a single shot, committing suicide. He was 46 years of age.

Trey Pennington was a Greenville, South Carolina businessman, author, international speaker and a thought leader in social media. He created such an appeal because of his genuine desire to help people.

One of the people he most admired was Zig Ziglar. Last year he shared the stage with Zig and a highlight of his life was conducting an interview with his mentor. Trey’s favorite Ziglar quote was also a summation of his attitude when it came to helping others:

“You will get all you want in life if you help enough other people get what they want.”

Ironically, I never met Trey in person but he was indeed my friend.

My first connection with Trey came when he asked to conduct an interview for his Blog Talk Radio program, Social Media Professor.

Later, he was a huge help when I was planning my first business trip to London. He co-founded Like Minds, a social media conference that launched in England. He traveled there on many occasions and was kind enough to share his knowledge of the area and prepared a detailed list of resources and contacts for my trip. He was always glad to be of help, never expecting anything in return.

Trey called me several times. I knew what his personal struggles were. We talked about his ongoing battle with depression and how he was trying to cope. I tried my best to instill hope. Before our conversation ended, he wanted to know if there was anything he could do for me. Typical of Trey.

I received my last correspondence from Trey at 8:46 on Friday evening. He let me know in his final note that he was still struggling, but was hopeful for the future. Traveling on Sunday, I didn’t learn of his suicide until later that evening. I was stunned to say the least. I immediately checked out Trey’s Twitter account and found this:

Trey posted that message at 10:21 a.m. on Sunday, just minutes before ending his life. Trey had a Twitter following of over 111,000 people, but no one could help him at his greatest time of need.

When I checked Trey’s Facebook page, I saw where he had posted more than 70 photos before taking his own life. Photos of happier times spent with his family and friends. He shared some of his most treasured memories with us.

Trey’s suicide raises many questions. Among them, just how real are the relationships created through social media?

I know personally that Trey drew strength from his social media community. Many responded with support and expressions of genuine affection for him. Willing to do whatever they could to be of help. Just as did his family, friends and church community.

At Trey’s memorial service, his pastor shared that Trey’s problems weren’t from lack of support or that people were not aware that he was having difficulties. Trey reached out and many of us were aware and there for him, but in the end, powerless to help him.

We probably won’t ever know what was going through Trey’s mind on that Sunday morning for him to commit the ultimate act of letting go of life. But I think that we know that the many relationships that he established through social media are real. He had friends throughout the world that he most likely wouldn’t have made had it not been for social media. We are all grieving for a friend that we lost, someone special, that always showed that he cared.

My heart goes out to Trey’s family. He leaves behind a wife, six wonderful kids, two grandchildren, mother and brother. I know they will draw strength from the rich memories Trey leaves with them.

My hope, in the coming days and weeks is that his family will be able to draw real strength and support from his online family of friends.

Here are some additional special tributes to Trey:

7 Comments | Social Media, Twitter | Tagged: Greenville S.C., Social Media, suicide, Trey Pennington, Zig Ziglar | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

Ten Toughest Content Marketing Challenges for Ad Agency New Business

August 28, 2011

Original content is by far the most difficult and important tactic to fuel ad agency new business through social media.

Speakers for Content Marketing World 2011, recently shared some of their biggest content marketing challenges in a pre conference Q&A orchestrated by Content Development Director of the Content Marketing Institute. I’ve pulled some of the best challenges and insights from among these speakers.

Here are the top 10 to help with your content marketing challenges:

1. Quality Content

‘The very act of staying focused on quality is one of the most important things you can do if you’re serious about your craft.” Susan Blue, @susangrayblue.

Lots of agencies soon become lazy in content creation. If you can’t see the value and won’t commit the time you won’t have success with content marketing for new business.

2. Understanding Your Audience

Understanding your customers well enough to develop content that is useful and relevant for them. Allison Bolen, @alisonbolen.

One of the first things you MUST do is to identify who your audience is. Most agencies are generalists. They want to appeal to EVERYBODY. If you try appealing to everyone you won’t appeal to anyone. No appeal, no online traffic = no new business leads.

3. Keeping Your Objective Top of Mind

It is critical to always keep your business objectives top of mind and use them to guide your content strategy. Cam Brown, @CamBrown1.

If you want to greatly boost agency network and referral business, social media is key and the cornerstone for your social media initiatives should be in content development. If not, social media can be a great waste of time.

4. Empowering the Time and Resources

Being allowed by their superiors to take the time, energy, and resources to do it right. CC Chapman, @cc_chapman.

Agency principals must first be convinced of the value of content creation for agency new business, then be willing to commit the right person(s), time and resources toward it.

5. Resources and Focus

Unless a marketing organization has the resources and focus to get content created, it will always be difficult to accomplish content marketing goals. Pawan Deshpande, @TweetsFromPawan.

The tighter your niche, the easier content creation will become. Less time, a better focus and a greater return on the time invested.

6. Creating an Internal Process

With content, and the evolving forms of content for customer engagement, it’s critical that there’s a process internally that enables successful creation and delivery. Barbara Gago, @BarbraGago.

Content creation will require a system for your agency to have success. Create and implement a plan of action: One person who is responsible, realistic goals and objectives set, resources gathered and organized, plan your work and work your plan.

7. Having an Initial Base of Content

It’s incredibly difficult to develop interesting and relevant campaigns if you’ve not built a library of content that you can pull from throughout the fiscal year. Nate Riggs, @nateriggs.

When I consult with agencies, creating a new business program fueled through social media, the first thing I have them do is create 60 blog posts in 60 days. It then gives us our library of content that we can repurpose through many other channels and have a base that fresh content is consistently being added. Also, when you create this initial library of content within a short time frame, helps to work out the bugs of your internal processes.

8. Writing Content that Will Relate

Learning to write and communicate in a way that is completely and utterly on the level of their audience, not the level of the industry professional.Marcus Sheridan, @TheSalesLion.

Agency’s are bad about using agency speak, when talking and presenting to prospects. Agency speak doesn’t resonate with prospects and isn’t very appealing. They tend to carry over this habit when creating online content. They will need to learn to write in a manner that is reflective of the audience you are trying to reach.

9. Just Doing It

Most people seem to know what they should be doing; the trouble is actually getting it done. Consistency counts for everything.Todd Wheatland, @ToddWheatland.

If you can’t be consistent, your efforts are going to be in vain. As you create a program for content creation you should think in terms of “what is sustainable when our agency is at its busiest”. So begin this process with an action plan, using the K.I.S.S. principle. A plan is just a plan until its executed, so set dates and get started.

Consistency is much more important than perfection. It will be much easier to make changes if you get the process moving.

10. Presenting the Right Content, to the Right Audience in the Right Ways

Consistently coming up with new, timely, interesting ways to present the right content to the right audiences. Arnie Kuenn, @ArnieK

Currently an agency blog is one of the best platforms for delivering content to your prospective client audience. This will evolve and change over time. Other ways that you can disseminate content landing pages, email newsletters, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google +, etc.

For additional information and helps, click on the following link to read Michele Linn’s article, Content Marketers Reveal Their Toughest Challenges, written for the Content Marketing Institute. I would also encourage you to explore the Content Marketing, a great resource for how-to of content marketing.

Additional articles to help with your agency’s content creation:

Image credit: Hubspot

11 Comments | Best Practices, Content Marketing, SEO, Social Media | Tagged: ad agency, Content Marketing Institute, Content Marketing World, Michael Gass, Michele Linn, new business | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

Social Media: 10 Idea Starters to Keep Fresh Content Churning

August 9, 2011

Content creation is an important part of social media success for ad agency new business, but it is also difficult to maintain without a little help.

I’m going on my 5th year of creating content for my blog. I’ve found that my reading always seems to help fuel my writing and inspire ideas.

So first and foremost, establish a focused reading program that is centered around a specific target audience. When you do, finding resources and developing content becomes mush easier because it is focused.

Here are 10 additional idea starters, along with examples, to help keep you going:

Take non-relevant content and make it relevant to your audience. This is one of the most important tips that I can share with you. There is so much great information online. Most of it won’t be related to your readership but you can easily make it relevant as I did in this post, “When it comes to new business Ad Agencies are ADHD.” I was reading about multitasking and ADHD from a number of online resources, and knew this type of information would be very helpful for agency new business, particularly given the working environment and culture typical of most agencies.
Become a reporter at events you attend by conducting on site interviews, take photos and video. Compile a top 10 highlights’ post of the event. You probably will come away with enough material for several blog posts. I was able to interact with attendees of Ad Age’s first Small Agency Conference. From my social media interactions I wrote this article: 50 of the Best Insights from Ad Age’s First Ever Small Agency Conference. The amazing thing – I wasn’t there!
Create a bulleted list of things to avoid. I’m currently working on a list of “Top 10 Non-productive Office Traps and Solutions for Avoiding Them.”
Use a celebrity to enhance a top 10 list. One post that generates the most traffic to my site, “Steve Jobs 10 Presentation Tactics for Ad Agency New Business.” Be sure and connect the benefits to your particular readership. Make it specific to them and their needs.
Provide resources. Share resources that are specific to your readership’s industry. Here are a couple of examples of resources that I’ve shared: “10 Reading Resources for Ad Agency New Business” and “The Top 14 List of Advertising Agency Networks for New Business.” I wrote a post about agency networks because so many agencies were asking about them and I found very few online sources. I researched and grouped this information conveniently together for my readers. This also helped put me on the radar of many of these agency networks.
If you’ve been writing for a while, revise an older post and beef-it-up with current information, stats, etc. A lot of the information for this article, “3 Quick Tips for Developing a Consistent Program for Ad Agency New Business”, was gleaned from a post that I had written in 2008. I took some of the more important elements to highlight and expand upon in this post. It isn’t copying a pasting, having mirrored content. This takes some work but much easier and quicker than developing a post from scratch while still creating content that is of good value to your readers.
Conduct an industry survey. You can generate some great PR by conducting your own primary research and propagating the results through your social media network, online tools such as PRNewswire and PRWeb. You can generate a number of post as you expand upon pieces of the survey in various posts. Here’s an article that was written on a survey that I conducted, “Ad Agency Survey Finds Traditional New Business Methods Aren’t Working.” The survey became a magnet for a significant amount of web traffic to my site as other bloggers and columnist wrote articles based on my research.
A quick turn around of research and a post can come from conducting a simple online poll. I wrote this post on an ongoing poll being conducted by Mirren Business Development, “The number one reason ad agencies new business plans fail.”
Develop your own online contest. A great jump-starter for my blog’s traffic occurred when I conducted an Ad Agency Blog of the Month contest. Agencies submitted their blogs, readers would review them in a post I created and they would cast their vote of their favorite. A follow-up post announced and highlighted the winner from each month. At the end of the year, a blog synopsis of the 12 Agency Blog of the Month winners was created and vote taken for the Ad Agency Blog of the Year. Here’s a sample article from 2010, “Vote for Fuel Lines’s Ad Agency Blog of the Year.”
Set up an editorial calendar for guest posts. Solicit industry experts who are glad to contribute if you give them enough lead time. Guest posts’ can be a huge help and provide some relief during summer breaks and holidays and keep good, helpful content churning out for your audience. Here’s a guest post, written specifically for my audience, by Jay Baer, “Ad Agencies: Don’t Turn Your Back on Digital”

The content that you create will propel your positioning as an expert so it’s worth the price of your time investment.

Here’s a good example: Kelly Fiddner, Business Development Director for Littlefield Brand Development, Tulsa, OK, writes the agency’s blog, “The One Thing: The casino marketer’s guide to understanding gamers.” Within just a few months, Kelly is being recognized for her thought leadership.

Kelly was recently featured in a gaming industry publication iNTERGAMING in this New Technology Interview, because of her content development that is specific to the advertising/marketing needs of the gaming industry.

Additional content marketing articles that may be of interest:

15 Comments | Content Marketing, New Business Tips, New Business Tools, New Business Trends, Social Media | Tagged: Ad Agencies, ad agency new business, blogs, content curation, content development, Jay Baer, Kelly Fiddner, Littlefield Brand Development, Michael Gass, PRNewswire, PRWeb, twtpoll | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

Vacationing for Ad Agency New Business

July 18, 2011

Hopefully my personal experience can provide you with some ideas for you can keep your social media | new business program churning even while on vacation.

As I was preparing to write this post, I noticed that Edward Boches, Mullen’s Chief Creative Office, had disconnected for a short period from his social media activity and described his experience in this blog article, “Random Thoughts from a Summer Vacation.”

Edward writes, “Ironically while social media connects us to strangers it isolates us from the people we’re closest to. I got a taste of my own medicine last week as I watched my daughter disappear into her Facebook and YouTube communities, half unaware of my presence. Now I know what my family feels like when I’m saying “uh huh,” but staring at one of my screens.”

New business is tough, especially in this economy plus the acceleration of communication’s technology, just keeping up can be exhausting. Life in the trenches for your agency’s new business is nonstop, hard work. For your family and your personal well-being, it is important to take some personal time off from the rigors of new business as well as a refreshing break from social media.

Recharging your batteries with personal time away is always good and often needed to avoid burn-out. But just because you are taking some much needed time off doesn’t mean your agency’s new business has to suffer. Utilizing social media, with a few select tools and tactics can keep your new business pipeline full even when you are away.

For the past couple of weeks, I’ve cut back on my social media engagement, unplugged myself for a period to reflect, rewind and redirect my energies. I’ve spent less time online over the past couple of weeks than anytime over the past 4 years. But, even while I’m off unwinding and off the grid my social media program continues to churn out new business opportunities.

Here’s are a few tactics that I employ to keep my social media | new business program working for me while I’m away:

My blog continues to generate traffic throughout my off period because it is highly optimized for search. I was also able to repurpose my blog’s content through multiple tools through other social media channels such as Twitter and Facebook.
Schedule Guest Post for content creation for your blog while you are away. John Sharpe, CMO of the BOHAN agency, created this post that was used for FUEL LINES while I was on sabbatical: How did YOU get into ad agency business development?
I created my email newsletter in advance and preset it to publish during my break time.
I use a variety of social media apps to add some personal touches to my social media stream using my iPhone and iPad. It only a few minutes of my time per day while vacationing. Most of my followers wouldn’t even know that I’m mostly off the grid during this time.

Additional articles that may be of interest:

Leave a Comment » | Best Practices, Fuel for Thought, New Business Tips, Social Media, Time Management | Tagged: ad agency new business, business development, Edward Boches, Michael Gass, Mullen, Social Media | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

Cause Branding: It is Now B-2-WE for Ad Agency New Business

June 8, 2011

WE -habilitating Capitalism – How valuable your agency will Be to ME no longer depends on b2c or b2b but on b2we

Simon Mainwaring is founder of We First, a social branding consulting firm that helps companies use social media to build communities, profits and positive social impact. A highly recognized creative director, he has worked at many of the world’s top creative advertising agencies in Asia, Europe and the U.S. including Wieden & Kennedy, Portland, on Nike and as Worldwide Creative Director for Motorola at Ogilvy, Los Angeles.

Simon’s first book, entitled We First, presents a new vision for business. An answer to Bill Gate’s “Creative Capitalism” challenge, a practical and actionable plan for how brands and consumers use social media to create a partnership that provides sustained prosperity for business and our world.

Ad agencies could learn much from Simon’s approach where clients are expecting their agency partners … to contribute to the social good, where the future of profit is purpose and agencies that thrive … will be will be those that put the well-being of their brand community and the world at large first.

Enjoy the We First video, how brands and consumers use social media to build communities, profits and positive impact. WE-defining Me written and performed by Sekou Andrews (sekouworld.com). Design and animation by Troika (troika.tv). Original music and sound design by Machine Head (machinehead.com).

Edelman Goodpurpose Survey measures consumer attitudes about corporate responsibility. The survey was conducted in 13 countries among more than 7,000 adults. It is the only global study of its kind. Here are some highlights from that report:

71% believe “brands and consumers could do more to support good causes by working together”
65% say they “have more trust in a brand that is ethically and socially responsible.”
73% agree government and business need to work together more closely to ensure the environment is protected
62% would “help a brand to promote their products or services if there is a good cause behind them. (compared to 53% in 2008 and 59% in 2009)
62% of global consumers “would switch brands if a different brand of similar quality supported a good cause”
64% believe it is no longer enough for corporations to give money; they must integrate good causes into their everyday business

4 Comments | Agency Branding, Agency Leadership, Fuel for Thought, New Business Trends, Positioning, Social Media | Tagged: ad agency, Bill Gates, cause branding, creative capitalism, new business, Simon Mainwaring, Social Media, We First | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

Use Social Media to Build Relationships Before the Pitch for Ad Agency New Business

May 20, 2011

Social media allows you to achieve a high level of familiarity and validation before your agency’s next new business pitch.

Prospective clients are looking for chemistry and likability in their ad agency partners as part of the pitch process. Chemistry doesn’t have to be a crap shoot.

One of the great things about the internet is that you can develop relationships with people without ever meeting them. Use this to your agency’s advantage to build relationships prior to your new business pitch.

You can get on a prospective client’s radar by commenting thoughtfully on their posts, retweeting and replying to them on Twitter, and submitting helpful tips to them for articles that have nothing to do with your agency.

Don’t promote, engage by being client centric in your conversations. Focus your attention on them, not your agency. well in advance of the pitch.

Here are some 10 quick tips to implement prior to your agency’s next pitch opportunity:

Ask for a list of the pitch attendees from the client’s side, along with their titles.
Do some intel ahead of the pitch on the various pitch participants and make a list of each person’s social media accounts in LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, 4 Square, etc. and engage them.
LinkedIn: look for connections from the client side with your agency’s pitch team such as previous employment, college, friends that are in their network. Your searching for the kind of information that will help build chemistry.
Twitter: follow and engage each person who has an account. Let them know you look forward to meeting them. Tweet the kind of content that would be of interest to the prospective client.
Monitor the Twitter hashtags within their community.
Facebook: You could Friend select members from the client side’s personal accounts and ‘Like’ their companies Facebook page.
Blog: If the company or individual members of their pitch review team has a blog, subscribe to its RSS feed for regular updates to keep up with what is being shared.
Read and research before you pitch. Conduct a search for any writing, press releases or other intelligence their team members may have shared through online publications.
Be sure to share intelligence with other members of your pitch team and help them form relationships with the client’s agency review team prior to the pitch.
Focus on benefits. Your audience only care about how your service will improve their lives. Make the connection for your prospective clients. Don’t leave it to your audience to figure it out for themselves.

Additional articles that may be of interest:

9 Comments | Pitches, Social Media | Tagged: ad agency new business, advertising agencies, Michael Gass, Pitches, Social Media | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

Social Media Has Changed My Life and Ad Agency New Business

May 9, 2011

The single greatest impact upon my life professionally has been social media. It has changed the way I conduct my day, it has changed my perspective, it has impacted my intellectual outlook and it has become the best new business tool that I’ve ever had as a business development professional.

I’m writing this post from my hotel room in London, England reflecting on how far I’ve come since I was introduced to social media over four years ago when I started my consultancy. I have worked with new clients all across the United States from Costa Mesa, CA to Port Clyde, Maine and now my first overseas client located in the UK.

From my home office located above my garage in Alabaster, Alabama, I have built a global awareness for my services and established an international network of prospective clients solely through social media.

Almost every new business opportunity has come about the same way. Usually a prospective client is introduced to my blog ‘Fuel Lines’ by searching for “ad agency new business” through Google or they will click on a link to one of over 600 articles that has been repurposed through Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or through a bi-weekly email newsletter. A growing audience helps to make my content viral. Acting as your brand ambassadors they fan these articles through their personal networks.

After becoming a reader, when a prospective client has a need for my type of service, they initiate the contact. This is a new business person’s dream because you’re not having to constantly chase business. You merely read and write, providing helpful content to your audience. The ones who are drawn to you will initiate the contact when they need help with their new business and social media efforts. I have yet to make a single cold call for any business since starting my consulting services.

A prospect who initiates a call and talks to you as if they know you. That’s because they do! Social media has allowed them to get to know a great deal about you. In their own time frame, they check under the hood, kick the tires and check out the upholstery so to speak. Rather than going through the dating process you’ve moved directly to engagement shortening the purchasing cycle.

You need to look at social media as a savior not a nemesis, an asset rather than a liability and time saver rather than time killer for ad agency new business.

Agencies were reluctant to participate as social media was becoming mainstream because they saw it as a major commitment of their time without much value to show in return. Fortunately a lot of negative perceptions of social media has been changed. But I don’t believe the majority of agencies have yet to appreciate the huge benefit that social media can actually make new business easier.

Most agencies generate new business through networks and referrals. Social media can greatly accelerates this process. It is networking on steroids. Taking its offline networking expertise online, an agency can now affordably create an international reach for its services.

“Kudos to all! Our social program is generating leads and business from around the world. Earlier this year got a client out of Australia and currently talking to a company in Japan that follows me on twitter” – John Sonnhalter, CEO, SONNHALTER

Utilizing social media can help you to be more consistent for new business. You can keep your prospective pipeline full even when your agency is busy with client work or you are away.

At the beginning of the summer, while my wife and I were vacationing in Key West, I wrote a post and published it along with a photo while on the beach. I wrote, “Vacationing with Social Media and Still Generating Ad Agency New Business,” to illustrate how social media can keep your new business pipeline full even when are away.

With very little effort I have created, maintained and am growing touch points through social media networks with my best prospective clients and all I’ve had to do is read and write.

Click here to view some of my London trip photos I’ve shared on Facebook.

7 Comments | Agency Leadership, New Business Trends, Social Media | Tagged: advertising agencies, business development, London, Michael Gass, networking, new business, referrals, Social Media, UK | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

A Top 20 List of Ad Agency New Business Articles for 2011

April 29, 2011

Information regarding new business and social media continues to be the top interests of advertising agencies.

There were over 100,000+ page views for FUEL LINES in the first few months of the year. As signs of economic recovery are on the horizon small to midsize ad agencies, digital agencies and PR firms are even more focused on new business. Because many agencies were late to get on board the social media wagon, they are also searching for social media resources that will help them get up to speed quickly.

Agencies are also in a hiring mode and a lot more attention is being given to best practices in hiring, training and retention of their staff. Lots of questions and interaction regarding new skills needed, particularly when it comes to agency new business.

In the order of their rankings, here are the top 20 Fuel Line articles that generated the most traffic in the first few months of 2011:

4 Comments | Best Practices, New Business Talents, New Business Tips, New Business Trends, Social Media | Tagged: advertising agencies, Digital Agencies, FUEL LINES, Michael Gass, new business articles, pr firms, retention, Social Media, training | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

New Roper Study: 9 in 10 CMOs See Value in Content Marketing

April 20, 2011

To create new business opportunities for your agency through social media, content is critical.

“… marketers will need to rethink their approach to advertising and marketing and intensify their focus on creating magnetic content that will naturally attract consumers, rather than relying solely on the interruption model of advertising, which consumers are responding to less and less. Think pull vs. push.” Geoff Ramsey, CEO, Co-Founder of eMarketer.

New research from Roper GFK and presented by the Custom Content Council highlights the point that content should be a significant part of a marketer’s mix.

In a survey of more than 100 CMOs, respondents were measurably more accepting of custom-content solutions. Among the survey highlights:

More than 8 in 10 (83%) say they are receptive toward using custom content in their marketing plans, representing a 16 point increase since the last study.
Almost 9 in 10 CMOs say they see value in the service provided by custom content, representing a 15 point increase from 2006.
More than 9 in 10 CMOs believe that custom content has a positive effect on audience attitudes, strengthening the bond with consumers.
9 in 10 say that they believe a majority of consumers find useful information in custom media and 85% believe that consumers who receive custom content will be more likely to buy from the sponsoring company again.
A majority of CMOs believe that custom media will capture a larger proportion of marketing budgets over the next couple of years. 59% percent report having shifted marketing funds away from traditional advertising in the last year toward custom content, representing an 18 point increase from 2006.
Close to half (47%) strongly agree, and 91% strongly/somewhat agree that custom content should be an integral part of the marketing mix for any business. 84% strongly/somewhat agree that custom content represents the future of marketing.

“While print remains the choice du jour for most custom media programs, new media channels are providing more growth opportunities for the custom content industry,” said Lori Rosen, Executive Director, Custom Content Council, “Content has become the mantra for today’s savvy marketers”

Click on the following link for additional resources from the Custom Content Council and the article: What CMOS Think About When They Think About Custom Content

10 Comments | Agency Leadership, Content Marketing, New Business Trends, Social Media | Tagged: ad agency new business, Custom Content Council, Geoff Ramsey, Lori Rosen, Michael Gass | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

16 Signs That Social Media Isn’t Working for Ad Agency New Business

April 18, 2011

If your agency’s social media participation isn’t generating traffic and new business leads, it is important to know why.

How can an agency help a client monetize their social media when it doesn’t have a handle on how to use it for itself? As more-and-more agencies jump on the social media band-wagon, clients are beginning to ask them,“what has social media done for you?”

Gone are the days when an agency can get by “talking the talk but not walking the walk.” Clients will be able to discern between the agencies that truly get social media from the ones that don’t with just a few clicks of their mouse.

100% of our clients are online and all they have to do is take a quick look and they can easily tell that most agencies have no plan with regards to social media. Agencies may have a blog, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn accounts, but those accounts often hide behind the agency name and tend to be blatantly self promotional with little value to an undefinable audience.

Used correctly, social media makes new business easier not harder. It is an incredible communication’s channel for easily generating new business leads and creating personal networks far beyond your local market.

No traffic + no leads = no new business. Here are 16 signs that most likely indicate your social media isn’t working for your agency:

No social media strategy, no plan. 60% of companies using social media have no plan. I would say from my own experience that is probably true of most agencies.
No clear objective for using social media. The first step in creating a social media strategy for your agency, you MUST have an objective. I suggest it should be for new business.
There is no focus on a particular target audience. The second step in creating in a social media strategy is to identify who you are trying to reach.
A lack of positioning for agencies. The FOUNDATION of an ad agency’s new business program is its positioning.
“The common failing among agencies seeking new business is the inability, or unwillingness, to name what they stand for,”Bob Lundin, Agency search consultancy Jones Lundin Beals. Social media provides a great opportunity to showcase how your agencies are different.
Agencies using social media for blatant self-promotion. Credentials and capabilities belong on an agencies website but shouldn’t be the driving force of their social media program. Social media should be centered around benefits.
No integration between blogging, Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. When the majority of agencies finally ‘jumped into’ social media, they just jumped in with a check list of channels. Yes we have a blog, Facebook Fan page, Twitter account and LinkedIn. But there was no convergence, bringing them together into a single social media strategy.
Agencies are waiting passively for prospective clients to them. If you build it, doesn’t guarantee that prospects are going to come.
Many agencies lack appreciation for those that are willing ambassadors for your agency. Zig Ziglar’s statement, “You can have everything in life that you want if you just give enough other people what they want.” His philosophy works well in the arena of social media.
A lot of social media efforts fail because of the lack of value/benefit for the intended audience. Your audience will be your judge and jury as to whether you have an appealing position, post titles that spur interest, content that is beneficial.
A lot of agencies obviously don’t care about anybody but themselves. To successfully build an online community, you must staf focused on the perspective and interests of your prospective clients. You have to genuinely care about their challenges and obstacles.
There’s no SEO strategy for your agency’s social media presence. According to Marketing Sherpa, 80-90% of business to business transactions begin with a search on the web. A CMO survey, 80% of decision makers say they found the vendor, not the other way around. “Content Doesn’t Win. Optimized Content Wins” – Li Evans, search marketing guru
Your agency’s social media ship has no rudder. Getting your staff on the same page and keeping them there is like herding cats. Empower the person charged with your agency’s new business to keep your social media efforts focused and directed.
Followers instead of leaders. Most agencies are still using social media the way the early adopters of social media intended. Instead of pressing the envelope for lead generation and networking for new business. This in no way means that you are SELLING.
A mindset of income first. Just like in our offline networks and referrals, it’s relationships first. People want to work with other people that they know, trust and like.
Attending offline events such as trade shows and conferences without inclusion in your agency’s social media efforts. Social media has transformed offline events and can maximize the personnel connections with prospective clients. Your involvement with blogging, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn can change your whole experience.
No social media training for their staffs. According to a recent 4A’s and Arnold Worldwide survey, 90% of agency staff say they have to figure things out on their own due to the lack of training.

Additional social media + ad agency new business articles that may be of interest:

6 Comments | Best Practices, New Business Tips, New Business Trends, Social Media | Tagged: Ad Agencies, Advertising, Jones Lundin Beals, Marketing Sherpa, Michael Gass, new business, Social Media, Zig Ziglar | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

The Future of Ad Agency Promotion at Events Through Social Media

April 1, 2011

Social media can enhance your special event experience and make networking for new business easier.

Without a doubt an industry trade show or conference has been a beneficial professional networking event for business opportunities. Social media has transformed these events and taken them to a new level.

“I think social media is changing the nature of interaction surrounding conventions,” said Steven Paganelli, vice president of business development-DMOs/CVBs for the Washington, D.C.-based, TIG Global. “Certainly, the opportunity to connect on a higher, more meaningful level face-to-face has always been at the heart of meetings and conventions, but social media tools and new technologies are making it easier for delegates to move beyond their comfort zone to meet new contacts, share ideas and engage in these events in deeper ways.”

In an American Express OPEN Forum article, Scott Belsky, Founder and CEO of Behance, shares insights from his 4-day experience at this year’s South By Southwest Interactive Conference. I’ve taken Scott’s main take aways regarding the future of advertising and self promotion to highlight the future of ad agency promotion at events through social media for new business:

1. Curation is a great tool for agency self-promotion.

Scott identifies one company that stood out above all others at this year’s SXSW event by serving as a curator of of event information.

“AOL set up a booth where they sorted through the day’s news at the conference and streamed channels of information for particular interests. In effect, AOL was serving as a curator of the overwhelming amount of stuff, and people gravitated toward the booth.”

This is a great social media strategy for ad agency promotion. Become a curator of information by allowing your agency blog and website to be a repository of helpful information for your prospective clients. Scott says, “If people like your taste—or just the way you display information—they will tune into your message.”

I was able to interact with attendees of Ad Age’s first Small Agency Conference. From my social media interactions I was able to create this article: 50 of the Best Insights from Ad Age’s First Ever Small Agency Conference. The amazing thing – I wasn’t there!

I was able to create this list of the 50 Best Insights in an article for my blog and propagate it through my 50,000 + followers on Twitter before the conference was even over.

I also helped spread the word of the conference, create buzz and assisted in generating traffic for the conference sponsors: AdAge andAOL Advertising.

It put me on Ad Age’s radar: @adage And it’s not even over! RT @michaelgass 50 of the Best Insights from Ad Age’s First Small Agency Conf #smallagency http://bit.ly/bTZqhL

2. The Future of Advertising (networking) is Education.

I wasn’t able to attend this years SXSW event, but according to Scott, the future of advertising was one of the main topics of discussion.

“With brands in the hands of the people, a new genre of advertising will arise that is more authentic and borderline educational. Companies will tap their expertise as a way to win people over. For example, GE knows a lot about the future of energy and jet engines, Pepsi knows a lot about marketing and beverages, The New York Times knows a lot about journalism.

While you would likely skip over any commercials from these brands, you might be interested in their perspectives in areas where your interests intersect.”

Social media can play an important role in defining your agency’s brand. To be successful with social media you are compelled to lead prospective client engagement with benefits and value rather than agency capabilities and credentials. Check out these “Top 10 Benefits of Social Media for Ad Agency New Business.”

Education provides a great networking platform to build value for your prospects and positioning of leadership for you and your agency.

3. The value of attending conferences lies with personal connections, not panels.

Some people believe that we are so connected online that offline conferences, seminars and trade shows are losing their importance. Scott’s takeaway is just the opposite:

“In a world of increasing remoteness and virtual relationships, the benefits of physical engagement only increase. I would argue that conferences will become MORE essential as our lives become more digital.”

Social media has transformed offline events and can maximize the personnel connections with prospective clients. Your involvement with blogging, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn can change your whole experience. You can “get to know” many of the exhibitors, speakers and event attendees from your online interactions that will propagate and enhance meeting them in person.

I recently received this note from Tom Matter, CEO of MAX Advertising in Atlanta. Tom’s agency specializes in law firm marketing and had this to say after attending the Legal Marketing Association’s Conference in Orlando:

“I wanted to tell you how fast we have been noticed by the national legal marketing community. We are easily the most talked about new marketing strategy and creative shop in the business.

All the blogs we followed last year to get started are all now following me for content ideas! They told me this themselves. I

had women stop me and ask to get my picture taken with them because they love The Matte Pad!! No joke. So many people read it and follow it with their RSS reader.

It was great validation for all the hard work we are putting into it. MAX Advertising is a great social media success story. We will get so much work from the conference it’s not even funny.”

Tips for participating in special events using social media:

Include a banner for the event in your blog’s sidebar.
Information about the event in your email newsletter.
Invite one of the event organizers to write a guest post.
Write your own article prior to and/or after the event.
Find out if the event already has a Twitter #hashtag set up. If they don’t suggest one to the event organizers. Use the hashtag for Twitter posts about the event, before, during and after.
Use the time to network
Conduct interviews. Use your iPhone to video and edit podcasts that you can share on your blog.
Act an a reporter for the event with live updates via Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.
Set-up “meet-ups” from your online networks of people

Click on the following link to read Scott’s article, “SXSW Interactive Takeaways: The Future Of Advertising & Self-Promotion.” If you are an event speaker, you might find the “7 Traits Event Organizers Need From Speakers” helpful.

9 Comments | Agency Networks, Best Practices, New Business Tactics, New Business Trends, Social Media, Speaking, Special Events | Tagged: Ad Age, Behance, CEO, curation, events, MAX Advertising, Michael Gass, networking, Scott Belsky, Social Media, Steven Paganelli, Tom Matte, trade shows | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

5 Ways to Recycle Older Content for Ad Agency New Business

March 31, 2011

Continue to generate a great return on your time investment, writing for your agency’s blog, by recycling older content.

As you write your posts, learn to write “ever-green” to give the content a long shelf life. I recently wrote a post, 50 of the Best Insights from Ad Age’s First Ever Small Agency Conference, the first ever small agency conference sponsored by Ad Age. Even though this was a one-day conference, I purposefully wrote the post in a way that would allow the content to be used for a much longer period of time.

My recycled posts continue to generate lots of blog traffic and fresh comments from readers who have just discovered them for the first time. The date of the material shouldn’t matter. What should matter is relevancy. Is the content still of value to your audience?

Here are 5 simple ways to repurpose older content:

Twitter: This isn’t like your email inbox. People are on and off Twitter rather quickly. Often they are scanning for helpful resources to their advertising/marketing challenges. That the majority of your followers would see a post that you published at 11 am on a Thursday is remote. It’s about reach and frequency. SocialOomph is a great program to assist with repurposing content through your Twitter account and allows you to control your publishing schedule knowing what post is being published when.
Email Newsletters: Posts from your archive will find new life by way of your newsletter. You can group older posts around a particular category or theme. Highlight the “best of” your online content. Here are a couple of examples: Fuel Lines, Convince and Convert’s Vault
Facebook and LinkedIn: Another way to repurpose content is through other social media platforms such as Facebook and LinkedIn. Just not with the same frequency of posting as you would with Twitter.
Through other posts: Do the work on behalf of your readers and at the end of your new posts include links to additional content that is relevant. Check out my ‘Additional articles of interest’ at the end of this article. This makes it easier for your readers to find relevant, older content on your blog.
eBooklets and Whitepapers: After you have been writing awhile, you can easily pull together content to create eBooklets or whitepapers to share with your audience. I have also pulled older content together for SlideShare presentations. You can even recycle your blogs content into a book. An example is Bob Hoffman’s The Ad Contrarian.

I would also suggest revisiting older posts that may not have generated very much traffic. With the proper edits and revisions you can breath new life into them as well.

Additional articles that may be of interest:

5 Comments | Agency Blogs, Best Practices, Social Media, Twitter | Tagged: advertising agencies, business development, content, Michael Gass, recycle, The Ad Contrarian | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

Media Survey: TV Retains its Power and is Enhanced by Social Media

March 25, 2011

TV continues to reign as the most influential advertising platform, and online ads are considered influential by less than half of Americans.

TV continues to be king. Deloitte’s fifth edition “State of the Media Democracy” survey reveals that 71 percent of Americans still rate watching TV on any device among their favorite media activities. In addition, 86 percent of Americans stated that TV advertising still has the most impact on their buying decisions.

Phil Asmundson, Vice Chairman Deloitte LLP states that “Consumers are not only watching television, they are talking about it, and those conversations are frequently taking place in real-time online and via IM/texting. By embracing the Internet as a platform that encourages audiences to participate in discussions about their favorite programs, television is maintaining its hold on the American public. People want to be part of the real-time conversation and they are embracing both platforms in a complementary fashion.”

Asmundson adds, “And, because television has embraced the Internet and social media so effectively, the traditional television advertising model is alive and well”

Here are some of the highlights from Deloitte’s Media Survey:

TV Retains its Power

Despite the continued growth of access to television content through other channels, with more than half of U.S. consumers preferring to watch their favorite shows on their home TV system
Nearly three-quarters of consumers prefer to watch their favorite TV shows live — even given a variety of other options, including recording systems or online video services
TV programming continues to be the most discussed content, ahead of social networking sites, music, Websites and movies
Flat-panel TV ownership has increased dramatically, with 59% of households now owning at least one

Print magazines survive the digital tsunami

Since 2007, a consistent 70+% of U.S. consumers continue to enjoy reading printed magazines — even though they know they can find the same content online
Since 2007, 80+% of consumers who read a magazine in the past six months state that reading the printed copy is their favorite method
55% of households report subscribing to printed magazines
55% of U.S. consumers surveyed report that an important feature of printed magazine is the advertising that helps them learn about new things for themselves and their family

Rise of the smartphones

This year, 17% of consumers who owned smartphones rated the smartphone as their most valued device, up from 6% in 2007 and 2008
Smartphone ownership is strongest in the households of trailing millennials (51%), leading millennials (54%) and generation Xers (42%)
30% of smartphone owners have used their device to make a purchase over the past year, and more than half have used their smartphone or other mobile device as a replacement for their laptop’s functionality while away from home

Cloud computing may lead to universal content access

Most U.S. consumers own a device that allows them to connect to the Web easily: 85% of households own a desktop computer, 68% of households own a laptop/ netbook; 44% of households subscribe to broadband cable Internet access, 39% of households subscribe to broadband DSL, and 41% of all mobile phone users access the Internet on their mobile phone
51% of U.S. consumers have experienced a computer or hard drive failure that caused them to lose digital content, and 32% expressed a desire for an online media storage service
43% of respondents would like to move content to any device and platform easily and effectively — indicating that cloud storage could provide consumers with an attractive option for greater access to content and greater portability

TV is complimented by social media

57% of U.S. consumers currently maintain a social networking site
26% of U.S. consumers are socializing online everyday/almost everyday (via social networking sites, chat rooms or message boards)
55% of U.S. consumers believe strongly/somewhat that online consumer reviews and ratings influence their buying decisions more than any type of online advertising
51% of U.S. consumers have purchased a product based on an online recommendation
65% of U.S. consumers frequently/occasionally visit web sites as a result of someone’s online recommendation
24% of U.S. consumers would find it extremely/very desirable to have an online service that recommends a product based on other consumers’ preferences
65% of U.S. consumers frequently/occasionally visit web sites as a result of someone’s online recommendation
55% of Americans believe strongly/somewhat that online consumer reviews and ratings influence their buying decisions more than any type of online advertising

The online survey polled nearly 2,000 consumers between the ages of 14 and 75 years old in the United States. Click on the following link to download a pdf of Deloitte’s State of Media Democracy Survey

2 Comments | New Business Trends, Social Media | Tagged: Advertising, Deloitte LLP, media, Michael Gass, Phil Asmundson, Social Media, State of Media Democracy Survey, television | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

Create a Call to Action for Ad Agency New Business Through Social Media

March 11, 2011

A strong Call-to-Action is needed to convert your blog’s visitors into new business opportunities.

The most important key to converting your agency’s blog visitors into leads is to have a “call-to-action”. A strong call to action is a clear, simple and compelling offer that persuades your readers to take the action you want. Just having a “Contact Us” form on your blog site is not very appealing to your blog’s visitors. It doesn’t count as your call to action.

People want to work with other people that they, know, trust and like. Prospects are visiting your agency’s blog site or website, they’ve had a chance to kick your tires, check out your upholstery and take a look under your hood - they feel like they know you. What next? Don’t leave them clueless. Clearly outline a first-step engagement for them through a specific call-to-action.

I would suggest creating an offer for a particular service, something that is usually a first-step that you normally conduct with every new client, like a brand or marketing audit. Price it in lower than normal, a clear value to the prospect. This will do 3 things:

Render a quicker decision from your prospects. They are not having to make a major financial commitment at this point. They’re just committing to take a small initial step.
Identify the true prospect from those that just want to pick your brain for free and will never pay for your services.
Pay you, at least for a portion of your time, for important face time with your prospective clients.

I consistently hear from agencies, “if we can just get in front of our prospects, we have no trouble closing the deal”. We’ll here’s your chance. By using this approach for a call to action, you meet your primary objective of getting in front of qualified prospects.

Here are a few tips for creating your ‘call-to-action’:

Define your goal. I would suggest that your objective would be for a face-to-face meeting with a qualified prospect.
Keep your offering simple. Remember attention spans is fleeting online. They wont spend a lot of time trying to figure it out.
Make your offering valuable to the prospect. Their takeaway is much greater than their time and monetary investment.
What action. Be clear as to what action you want your readers to take.

1 Comment | Agency Blogs, Best Practices, Social Media | Tagged: ad agency new business, advertising agencies, blogs, business development, call to action, Michael Gass, prospective clients, Social Media | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

Report: Inbound Marketing Channels More Cost-Effective for Ad Agency New Business

March 10, 2011

When it comes to ad agency new business, blogs and social media can deliver inbound leads for less.

I often say, “people want to work with other people that they KNOW, TRUST and LIKE”. Social media is an efficient and affordable way to build new business relationships quickly.

According to research from inbound marketing solutions provider HubSpot, businesses dominated by inbound marketing have a 62% lower cost per lead than firms that do mostly outbound marketing.

Inbound marketing refers to efforts that provide web users with information or tools of value to them, as opposed to outbound or interruptive marketing that pushes messages in front of them.

Traditional outbound marketing techniques for ad agency new business – including direct mail and cold calling – are becoming less effective. Your prospects have the capability to evaluate agency services on their own.

Inbound marketing offers your audience useful information and tools that attract prospective clients to your site, while interacting and developing relationships. Inbound marketing tools include blogging, content publishing, search engine optimization and social media.

Here are the top 10 key takeaways from the “State of Inbound Marketing Report”:

Inbound consistently delivers a dramatically lower cost per lead than outbound. In 2011, the average cost per lead for outbound-dominated businesses was $373, while inbound businesses reported their leads cost on average $143.

The gap between spending on inbound v. outbound continues to widen: In 2009, inbound marketing had a 9% greater share of the lead generation budget; in 2011 inbound’s share was 17% greater.

Blogs and social media channels are generating real customers: 57% of companies using blogs reported that they acquired customers from leads generated directly from their blog.

More and more business are blogging: Businesses are now in the minority if they do not blog. From 2009 to 2011 the percentage of businesses with a blog grew from 48% to 65%.

Three out of four Inbound Channels cost less than any Outbound Channel: In 2011, the average cost per lead for outbound-dominated businesses was $373, while inbound businesses reported their leads cost on average $143.

Businesses are increasingly aware their blog is highly valuable: 85% of businesses rated their company blogs as “Useful”, “Important” or “Critical”; a whopping 27% rated their company blog as “Critical” to their business.

The majority of businesses are increasing their Inbound Marketing budgets:54% of those surveyed are increasing their inbound marketing budgets. Among the 54% of respondents with increased inbound marketing budgets, the most commonly cited reason was ―past success with inbound marketing.

Social Media and Blogs generate real customers:57% of those using company blogs have acquired a customer from a blog-generated lead; this is an increase of 11 percentage points since 2010. Facebook and Twitter users reported customer acquisition rates of 48% and 42%, respectively.

Company blogs are increasingly valued. The blog is the channel most frequently reported as critical or important, both in 2009 and 2011. Higher Education, Professional Services & Consulting, and Software & Biotech found blogging was highly effective. All of those industries had over 50% of respondents indicating customer acquisition through their blog.

Most company blogs publish at least weekly. 71% of respondents indicated they blog at least weekly. Despite the evidence showing that increased blogging correlates with increased customer acquisition, blogging frequency remained relatively steady between 2009 and 2011.

HubSpot’s latest 2011 “State of Inbound Marketing Report” is now available for download. The report is based on data from a recent survey of 644 professionals familiar with their business’ marketing strategy.

Additional articles that may be of interest:

12 Comments | Agency Blogs, New Business Trends, Social Media | Tagged: ad agency new business, blogs, Hubspot, Michael Gass, Social Media, State of Inbound Marketing Report | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

Social Media: The Shoe Firm, the Celebrity and the Ad Agency

March 1, 2011

iCrossing helped SKECHERS use social to become a more connected brand — in this case through a partnership with celebrity Kim Kardashian.

This is a guest post written by David Deal who currently serves as VP,Marketing for iCrossing, a global digital marketing agency. I first met David when he was charged with business development for Razorfish. He was an early adopter of social media and is a skilled and creative digital marketer plus an all around nice guy.

SKECHERS has partnered with the socially savvy celebrity to encourage everyone to break up with our bad habits and get into shape (a campaign launched via a Super Bowl spot in which Kim breaks up with her trainer because she can do a better job with her own SKECHERS Shape-ups).

To continue promoting the idea of keeping in shape with SKECHERS, iCrossing developed a campaign reaching multiple touch points including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and the SKECHERS website. The cross-platform approach helps SKECHERS share valuable content and keep its brand visible in an engaging way with new and current customers.

Using a feature called in-stream apps, friends of the SKECHERS Facebook page can watch the Super Bowl ad and take a poll to vote on a bad habit they would like to break, such as junk food. And you can get immediate results from all other participants in a single post.

All this functionality occurs within your Facebook news feed, where we spend most of our Facebook time, whereas typically the content would live in an engagement ad or a separate tab. (You can also drop bad habits on Twitter by using #BreakingUpWith.)

The SKECHERS page also offers exclusive promotions for Facebook fans to receive discounts from SKECHERS products on its website and a useful Fitness Shoe Finder (that helps you match the right fitness shoe for you), among other features.

SKECHERS has seen a 300% increase in its Facebook fan count since the campaign launched three weeks ago (compared to the prior three weeks leading up to the campaign). And engagement with the in-stream app has doubled compared to the normal volume of posts. The campaign runs through March 6.

Meantime, to get iCrossing employees involved, I’ve blogged about the work on one of the iCrossing company blogs, Tweeted about it, and encouraged employees to do the same. They’re doing their part to support clients by doing some basic actions that employees often overlook unless encouraged. I’m having fun collaborating with our people to tell our story.

Follow David on Twitter: @davidjdeal

Leave a Comment » | Client Campaigns, Social Media | Tagged: Ad Agencies, David Deal, iCrossings, Kim Kardashian, Michael Gass, SKECHERS, Social Media | Permalink
Posted by Michael Gass

The majority of ad agencies have yet to comprehend what huge benefits a blog can make and why it deserves to be “prime time” for new business.

Inbound marketing techniques are rapidly becoming more important for agency new business.

“It’s not the will to succeed, but the will to prepare to succeed that makes the difference.” Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant

The Sunday of Labor Day weekend was a very sad day for the social media community. We lost one of our All-Stars and that raises the question; ” Just how real are online relationships created through social media?”

Original content is by far the most difficult and important tactic to fuel ad agency new business through social media.

Content creation is an important part of social media success for ad agency new business, but it is also difficult to maintain without a little help.

Hopefully my personal experience can provide you with some ideas for you can keep your social media | new business program churning even while on vacation.

WE -habilitating Capitalism – How valuable your agency will Be to ME no longer depends on b2c or b2b but on b2we

Social media allows you to achieve a high level of familiarity and validation before your agency’s next new business pitch.

Information regarding new business and social media continues to be the top interests of advertising agencies.

To create new business opportunities for your agency through social media, content is critical.

If your agency’s social media participation isn’t generating traffic and new business leads, it is important to know why.

Social media can enhance your special event experience and make networking for new business easier.

Continue to generate a great return on your time investment, writing for your agency’s blog, by recycling older content.

TV continues to reign as the most influential advertising platform, and online ads are considered influential by less than half of Americans.

A strong Call-to-Action is needed to convert your blog’s visitors into new business opportunities.

When it comes to ad agency new business, blogs and social media can deliver inbound leads for less.

iCrossing helped SKECHERS use social to become a more connected brand — in this case through a partnership with celebrity Kim Kardashian.

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MICHAEL GASS

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