icre8t results

Lead Generation Part Two

Mon, 29 Oct 2012 15:52:09 +0000

Welcome to part two of our four part education series about lead generation!

Part two reminds us to focus on our data. What’s keeping your segments up at night? Do you know? We have put our thoughts and hands-on experience together for you to help you generate leads more effectively in our education series. Below you will find a link to download our assessment on your own internal lead generation efforts.

Often we scramble just to pull a big enough list together to try to get enough of a response when we should be focusing on smaller, potent segments. Gorgeous creative and an awesome subject line only work when they resonate with the person who received it. Segmentation needs to be a focus the marketing team owns and becomes experts on. There are all kinds of ways to go about this, we recommend starting with your own zip code. Nielson has a cool tool through Claritas that shows you what segments live in your own zip code – it’s eye opening if you haven’t seen this type of marketing data before. Click here to look up your own PRIZM code.

Take a look at the fourth question in the assessment:

4. You have created at least 3 segments in your database and you know what is keeping each of these segments up at night (so-to-speak).

We have over twelve questions in our lead generation assessment for you. These questions focus on getting organized internally so you can succeed, as well as focusing on your data as much as your creative. Obviously you can create a marketing campaign, it will just work so much better if your data has a plan behind it.

Want to keep learning?

Download the part one of the assessment here

Click here to subscribe to our newsletter

Are marketers really ready to generate leads?

Diane — Wed, 29 Aug 2012 22:06:55 +0000

We are launching a four part education series about lead generation that includes an easy to understand assessment quiz followed by three steps to launch an effective lead generation effort. This is perfect for marketers looking to implement or improve their lead generation strategy.

By following us on this series you will learn what steps to take to make sure you are generating and cultivating the right kinds of leads. We see many marketers responding to the demands of a sales force by whipping together a campaign that doesn’t result in any closed deals. A lot of time and effort is wasted on both the marketing and sales teams following up on leads that simply wanted the free t-shirt you were offering.

Here’s the first question in the assessment:

Have you installed web analytics software on all of your digital properties, and, you have access to this software?

You would be surprised how many marketers do not have access to their own analytics data. This makes it very hard for them to learn, revise and gather the right insights about their audiences. Digital properties can be a website, a landing page, a mobile app, etc. Google Analytics is free and very robust in it’s offering allowing a marketing team to see what’s going well on a website and what needs improvement.

Want to keep learning?

Download the part one of the assessment here

Click here to subscribe to our newsletter

Our social attempt to win money from Chase & Living Social

Tue, 19 Jun 2012 21:47:19 +0000

Yesterday we officially submitted our entry into the Mission Small Business campaign, and have begun asking and begging for votes so we can qualify for a chance to win a $250,000 grant. In one day we scored 52 votes, so we are off to a great start. Travis, our copywriter and social campaign guru has generously offered to draw horrible renderings of each voters profile picture on Facebook and accentuate their worst flaws. You can view his art work here.

We are curious what happens once we hit our 250 required votes, but we are currently held in suspense. Often we give advice to small businesses on how to generate awareness and increase clicks – so with this campaign we are going to take our own advice and dig out ideas that our clients didn’t use and try them out.

Please go ahead and vote for us here

Our entry consisted of an essay asking why we are great, what challenges we face and what we would do with the money.

iCre8t Results Wins Best Print Campaign at the 2012 AMA Atlanta AMY Awards

Diane — Sat, 21 Apr 2012 03:04:06 +0000

What an exciting night for the team, and on our two year anniversary too! iCre8t won best print campaign for our proclamation based campaign called “I Will” for Circulatory Centers. We truly believe in the message we are trying to convey to women, and are excited to be recognized for our strategy and creativity. We were also a finalist in the broadcast category for our radio spots, but Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta won that one.

Thanks to Leah & Mark for the photo, click here to see their entire stream….

7 tips for screening social media experts

Diane — Sat, 21 Apr 2012 02:39:32 +0000

Nowadays it seems everyone thinks of themselves as social media experts. Unfortunately,there is no litmus test in existence to fully know for sure. There are a few certifications you can earn, yet how do you truly know you are hiring someone who can actually make things happen in social media? We personally believe most in the industry who call themselves”experts” simply aren’t. Here are 7 sure fire ways to screen out the wannabes from the real deal.

#1. Are they currently getting paid by a client to do social media?
#2. Have they actually hit the ”update status” button on behalf of a client?
#3. Have they written a social media plan for a brand and been paid for it?
#4. Have they managed a client through a crisis on social media?
#5. Have they achieved real, measurable results for a client that made a difference?
#6. Can they provide references?
#7. Do they use tools they are willing to show you?

Remember: just because you can doesn’t mean you should.

Imitation is the highest form of flattery

Diane — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 21:27:40 +0000

Right out of the gate in 2012 we discovered our client’s largest competitor had stolen their exact ad campaign. This can be a bit unnerving for some, and frustrating. However, this same competitor does not have an effective search marketing strategy in place. This presents a unique and exciting opportunity for OUR client! This means all of their ads, that look like ours, will now generate more interest online. Most people go and “google” what they can remember from a TV spot, or radio spot. This is why you see HAMSTERS driving cars. That’s where a smart search strategy kicks into gear. We have our client very well positioned in search, so when their competitor runs and ad on TV we reap the benefit of it.

The headline in our ad, that ran last summer read “I refuse to wear jeans all summer!”. The competitor’s new ad, airing this past week says “We’re not going to wear long pants in July”. As you can see, it’s not verbatim copywriting, but it IS the exact same tone and approach.

To get a good idea of what your competition is doing with their search marketing, use a free site like www.semrush.com and go see what keywords they are going after. Make sure you also type your own company URL in and see what comes up for you. In a matter of ten minutes you can make smarter decisions for your marketing budgets.

iCre8t Capabilities

Diane — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 14:33:29 +0000

You can learn more about us by downloading this brief overview of our services. Click here to get started…

Thank you!

Upcoming Speaking Event: Taming the Social Media Beast

Thu, 06 Oct 2011 14:23:30 +0000

Date: October 11th, 2011
Time: 5:15pm
Where: Keller Williams Offices, 315 West Ponce de Leon Ave., Suite 100

Join us as we present at the Decatur Business Association’s October event and cover tips and tools to use in social media to start seeing immediate results. We will make this fun and interesting as we are very much “anti social media guru” speak. If you can’t make it, let us know and we can go over it with you and your team when you have some free time.

Click here to learn more or register.

How to build a brand that actually means something

Tue, 13 Sep 2011 19:20:36 +0000

Most of the brands we all love have spent millions of dollars to create that exact reaction. Apple, Coke and Porsche actively plan “brand campaigns” every year that are solely focused on a core set of measurable goals. They know just as much about what they don’t want to do as they know what they will do to earn market share. Building a brand platform can be one of the best things you do for your company. This doesn’t have to be painful and can yield an influx of excitement and passion throughout your employees.

The most important features of a brand platform are based on a formal process of thinking.

We offer this 8 week process to our clients that includes:

Two working sessions of 2-3 hours each

Brand Brief

Competitive Analysis

Marketing Ideas

Mood Boards

Copywriting & Tonality

Final Presentation

Printed book of all deliverables

We love to do this kind of work with our clients. It’s truly why we get up every day and work in the field of marketing.

5 Tips for Getting The Most Out of Your Traditional Media

Thu, 01 Sep 2011 18:58:20 +0000

Thinking about running a tv spot or a print ad? Read these tips first to make sure you get the most for your money.

1. Let the sales people help you!

Media reps have very hard jobs and most often they get pounded on by agencies, brokers and their clients. These guys have great ideas though and are very grateful when someone offers to listen to them. Think about it, they know the medium better than most, they know your competitors pretty well too and they have a lot of tools they can use to help you succeed. Now, there’s always an exception, but for the most part these reps have their finger on the pulse and know what works.

2. Clearly state your goals

If you are negotiating your media yourself get your ducks in a row. Have a creative brief pulled together that clearly states what you are measuring your media dollars against. Calls? Leads? Contracting Clients? Make sure you explain what kind of style you like including tone and what’s off limits.

3. Negotiate well

TV stations, radio stations and magazines all run websites that have content updated daily. Think about how those digital properties could help you as you plan out your campaign with them. Perhaps you could reach more of your target audience by including a digital buy as well? It certainly can’t hurt to ask.

4. Know what you are buying

Media buying in it’s basic form yields two things: frequency or reach. You are buying the ability to reach a lot of people at once (think American Idol) or you buy the ability to reach a more targeted group (fans of Say Yes to The Dress) but you place your message in front of that group several times. When your media dollars are slim you should start with choosing one of these first.

5. Ask for details

As overwhelming as it seems it becomes very important to make sure you have reports that show you what your bought, what time it airs or when it aired, etc. Don’t miss out on the opportunity to discuss with your rep what you could do better and have them go over the reports with you.