What could a 5-7% Return do for your business

We have been working on this new medium that offers up to a 5-7% return on investment. This marketing offers over 80% penetration in target neihborhoods. For auto dealers this gives them the big responses they are looking for with direct mail but it is tailored to be a slow burn. Never will you be overwhelmed from this medium, but you will see a slow response over a 4-6 month window that gives you an advantage over any other dealer in your market. Your dealership will also sit on the refrigerator all month. This gives your the highest visibility of any advertising that is brought into the home.

Call us for a conceltation to see if this could work for your store today!

Holiday Marketing Ideas

Holiday season is just around the corner and you’re probably busier than ever. But take some time to do some extra-special holiday marketing in anticipation of your customers’ holiday generosity and enthusiasm. Even Scrooge will love these great ideas for sprucing up your small business marketing during the holidays.

1. Scratch Their Backs and They’ll Scratch Yours. Examine your business and see what opportunities you have for allowing your customers to get a reduced rate on your products or services by participating in the process. One mechanic told his customers that he would change their oil at a discount if they would bring in their own oil. What are some ways that you could run with this idea?

2. Fancy Up Your Logo. Google does this for every major holiday and event, so why not follow their lead? It’s fun for you and your customers will definitely enjoy it. If you use Twitter, consider sprucing up your Twitter background at Twitterbacks. Once you’ve created a new background, submit it to the Twitterback gallery. Not only will you have a nice-looking background but you’ll get your name out there as well.

3. Customize and Personalize. Use postage stamps with your picture or your company logo. Don’t stop with using these stamps on your own correspondence but also use them for all communication with customers. Get M&Ms or foil coin chocolates with your logo printed on them for holiday parties. You could even bake cookies for your customers, wrap them in cloth bags, and seal them with stickers featuring your company logo.

4. Build on the “12 Days of Christmas” with “12 Days of Your Service.” Feature a new product or service every day during the holiday season. Think about how successful fruit-of-the-month and wine-of-the-month clubs are. This is just another approach to promotion. If you’re a consultant or trainer, consider providing customers with additional newsletters or webinars.

5. Customize a Holiday Greeting. If you simply must send out holiday cards, commission an artist to create a cartoon other image. Once the image is created, you can easily use online card-marking software to finish the job.

6. Make a Holiday Cookbook. Ask your customers to submit their favorite holiday recipes and include them with recipes submitted by your own friends and family.

7. Create your own Holiday Book. Take some pictures around your office, commission a writer, and create your own book for the holidays to send to your customers and potential customers. Make your story light and humorous, but use it to focus on your company values. You might even consider using a case study. Again, make it light and fun.

8. Send out a Digital Picture Frame. Take pictures of all the teams within the company and send each of your customers a digital picture frame full of pictures of the team with whom they usually work. If you have pictures of the customer at a customer appreciation party or other event, include those pictures as well.

9. Send a Video Card. YouTube is so easy to use that it almost seems criminal not to. Get your team together and sing a holiday song complete with shameless product placement that will make your customers laugh out loud.

10. Send Those Holiday Cards. If you really insist on doing this, find a good holiday greeting card template online, create your holiday card, and send it out on heavy, high-quality paper. Do the same for invitations to holiday parties.

Use the holiday season to your advantage by: choosing low-cost gifts or original creations to reach your customers. Whatever your price range is, you can easily find something to charm them, impress them, and keep them coming back for more. Get the ball rolling now, while there’s still a lot of time left and keep your name in front of your customers as they’re getting ready for the holiday season!

Anything we can do to help here at Kelnic Corp just let us know. We are always looking for ways to help other organizations in moving the needle in their markets.

Our design team can help with any design dilemmas.

#1 Marketing Tool

Marketing today is constantly moving and changing but one thing that doesn't change is your clients. Through this process of opening our new office in Traverse City and offering our services to all industries I have seen a common mistake. How many companies are not taking advantage of gathering information on every client transaction. Your email and mailing list should be updated regularly. Now days witht the internet you have a free medium available to you.

What about the old business card drawings or a small gift for filling out a questionaire. These are simple and easy ways to help collect information that will benifiet you later. Your customer mailing list is the most important market tool you have. For a single point merchant who has a small ad budget to begin with this type of tool could easily help increase your sales by 10% over the year.

If you are not currently gathering this information there is no time like the present. Let us know if we can help in any way. If you are not sure what to do but want to get started give us a call we can help. There is no charge for consultations.

Use buddy marketing to promote your business.

For example, if you send out brochures, you could include a leaflet and/or business card for another business, which has agreed to do the same for you. This gives you the chance to reach a whole new pool of potential customers. If your store is in a strip mall or a group of retail stores try shared direct mail. Our company can create a mail piece that encompasses a group of stores. This lowers your direct mail cost and also gives people more reasons to save your mailing. They may not be looking for a salon today but wanted to save the subway coupons. This gives your direct mail a longer shelf life. I also recommend finding stores that compliment each other and putting together a promotion that all stores would benefit from. For example I have a client in Wisconsin who once a year they do a promotion that five stores participate in. My client is a pet groomer, after I mentioned this to her she went and found four friends who had similar businesses and we put together a four day sale that surrounded all of them. She included a pet bakery, a pet store, a kennel, and a dogie day care. The direct mail campaign was sent to all of their clients and a list was purchased of pet owners in the area. The amazing part is everyone who participated saw an increase in sales and services. Obviously some more than others. When they split the cost five ways the promotion was cost effective. They started a new referral program between all five stores as well. Now they all have a punch card that they participate in that has proven to be a great tool. All this from participating in one promotion. What ever business you are in there are always affiliates. Find yours and make something happen. We are always up for the challenge to help in any way we can.

Dennis Kelderhouse
Direct Marketing Specialist

I have tried that and it didn't work!

How many times have you tried a new advertising or promotion thinking this was going to be the greatest ever and it wasn't. Usually you don't see any response or the product you were trying to move sat on the shelves and everything else sold. The next time you were approached for that advertising or promotion you decided not to do it because of your previous response. This is what I call the "I tried that it doesn't work" complaint. One thing to remember about advertising and marketing is there are a lot of components that make up every situation.

For instance, I have a client in Mississippi (Auto Dealership). They have been closing Memorial Day weekend for the past 15 years. The reason was their last promotion on Memorial Day was a flop. During our conversation I made mention of another client just over an hour from him who does a great memorial day sale. Short story he ended up doing a sale with our help and put an additional $60k on the books in May.

My point is, if a promotion or advertisement doesn't show potential, don't rule it out. Something that didn't work 10 years ago is working today. Marketing is constantly changing in your area. The fact that newspaper is the largest portion of advertising dollars for small businesses is crazy from my stand point. Continue to try new innovative ways to advertise your company. The more dramatic and unbelievable the content of your promotion, the better your results 9 times out of 10.

Thanks
Dennis Kelderhouse
Direct Marketing Specialist

I have tried that and it didn't work!

Jaded Marketing attitudes can be harmful to you and your business

Advertising has become such a large expense to businesses today. With all the different mediums and venues to sponsor and advertise in, making decisions on who and where can be extremely frustrating. This one facet of your business can be overwhelming. During my 10 years of automotive marketing experience I have noticed that dealer principles have become almost numb to advertising decisions. They are custom to trying everything to see what works and what doesn't, and their budgets tend to be some of the largest in town, so they can afford to try all types of mediums and their success rate is higher due to these circumstances.

Just the opposite is true with local single point merchants, they have to be so careful with their budget, that they have become jaded in most circumstances. I see this as a large stumbling block for them. working with independent merchants whose quarterly ad budget might only be $2000 is all new to me. Having the opportunity to come home and work with local families and merchants that I grew up with is the greatest feeling and I love a challenge, and believe in a simple motto: "My success is only from surrounding myself with individuals I have helped become successful themselves," Vincent Lambardi. There is no I in Team.

This Jaded behavior that I mention can be very harmful and I do not recommend it at all. This type of on guard and stand offish behavior is never helpful. Why would any merchant alienate themselves or their business is beyond me. Always remember that anyone who is working in the marketing industry has had a ton more successful campaigns and failures than your business has ever had. What a valuable resource this can be for you. In the past 10 years I have helped dealer principles raise well over 100 Million dollars in gross profit, and I assure you in order to reach these type of numbers there have been my fair share of failures as well. I only bring this up because of some of the negative reactions I have received from local merchants. Hiring an expensive marketing agency is not an option for everyone, so relying on those who call on you in the industry to help promote your business is quite important.

This blog is here to help us as group become more efficient with our ad budgets.

Dennis Kelderhouse
Direct Marketing Specialist