6 Ways Holiday Cards Can Be Strategic CommunicationsTools

The holiday cards started arriving in the mail today. For the next few weeks they’ll show up in clusters, hitting peak volume about seven to ten days from now. Even though direct mail spend has been trending down, there's evidence to suggest that people are still very responsive to this type of printed advertising. Judging by the increased activity in my mailbox already, it's clear that holiday cards aren't going away anytime soon and are something that most companies will consider this year as part of their direct marketing mix.

As I’ve written before, the simple gesture of sending a card–whether it’s for the holidays, to acknowledge someone’s birthday or just to say thank you–can go a long way in fostering positive relationships between a business and its customers. Cards show the recipient how important they are and reinforce for them why they do business with a company.

The problem with holiday cards, is that even though they’re a necessary marketing expense, it can be difficult to justify the expenditure of time and money it takes to produce them, especially if they aren’t doing a good job of furthering the goal of helping keep the company top of mind when it’s time to make the next purchase decision or donation. In this current economic climate, when many marketers are opting for smaller mailings to select stakeholders, or even sending e-cards, how can they be sure to make this tool work strategically for them?

Set A Goal
As with any advertising, there should always be a specific goal for the piece. Perhaps it’s to update the organization’s mailing list, for example. If that’s the case, it may be worth the extra investment to use the mailing to get notified of any bounces or returned mail, address changes, etc. Or maybe it's to build name recognition with certain customers that haven't been in contact for a while. The card could then serve as an opportunity to put the business' name out there again, along with the website. Whatever the goal, it should be quantifiable and measurable in some way.

Differentiate
If 'everyone' is sending out holiday cards it makes sense to try and approach the project in a different way. Caldecott Properties, a San Francisco bay area real estate brokerage firm, sent me a “Happy Thanksgiving” card over two weeks ago; a full week before the actual holiday. While their card was fairly standard from a design perspective, the fact that they had the foresight to get out ahead of the pack by sending their card earlier than most, (and choosing a different holiday than most businesses do), made their piece of mail jump out from the usual bills and publications in my mailbox much more than it would have had they sent it this week or next. Try to do something different than everyone else: perhaps a "New Years" greeting would be more appropriate?

Don’t sell, acknowledge
Some marketers recommend placing coupons, etc. in holiday cards. As I’ve said before, I don’t think it’s a good idea to put an ‘ask’ for more business in a card, even if it is indirect and disguised as a benefit. The card should be sent purely to acknowledge the relationship with the recipient. One exception to this could be to offer a small, downloadable gift (not to be confused with a discount offer!) as a token of thanks that could be obtained from the company website, thereby creating a way to measure response rate.

Make it memorable
Cards should be designed to visually appeal to the audience so they don’t just become throwaways. People are more likely to hold onto a piece of direct mail (which it goes without saying should have contact information on it for future reference) if it’s beautifully designed or has some functional value. Another idea would be to use the card to make an announcement (new office? New campaign?) Getting useful information that they might need later gives recipients another reason to hold onto the card.

Use it as an opportunity to partner
Purchasing cards from a charitable organization or non-profit is a great way to do some small scale cause marketing by making a donation that’s tax deductible. Customers like to know that their desire to make the world a better place is shared by the organizations they do business with. This will also potentially help customers feel good about partnerships the business has with other organizations. There are plenty of great looking charity cards available, which, depending on how a recipient list is segmented, could also make the card more memorable or worthwhile. If, for budget reasons, an e-card is more cost-effective, it could be purchased from an environmental organization and positioned as a choice to mitigate negative environmental impact.

Measure the ROI
The emotional return on investment – how warm and fuzzy customers feel about the organization – is something that all organizations should measure whenever possible. Since a holiday card is not technically an acquisition tool there aren't many way to measure its impact aside from the idea already stated above. Businesses who manage to get their cards out in the midst of the busy end of year season tend to come across as organized and timely and these positive feelings might help influence purchasing/donation decisions later. One way to measure this would be to include questions about customer's perceptions of the card as part of larger attitudinal surveys.

Finally, what should a holiday card say?

Start with the truth. Customers appreciate authenticity. They don't all celebrate the exact same holidays so a card going out at the end of the year should most likely have a generic greeting in it. Be sure to check the customs of any international clients: as always, a little research can save on embarrassment.

Natalie Zensius is a marketing communications strategist with experience in both the for-profit and non-profit sectors. Learn more about Natalie at http:www.linkedin.com/in/nzensius.

A Quick Review Of Jumo, The New Social Network For Non-Profits

Relationship maps have developed and continue to deepen all over the web: Facebook maps our personal relationships, Yelp maps our relationship with local businesses, Amazon maps our relationships to products. Jumo, a new social media network, which launched in BETA today, maps the relationships between people and non profit organizations. It's an attempt by creator Chris Hughes (who co-founded Facebook) to foster more long-term and sustainable relationships between people and organizations that are working to make a difference.

Steve Mclaughlin provides a very thorough overview of Jumo, so I wont go into too much detail here, suffice to say that the platform is broken up into three main components: Find, Follow and Support. Jumo helps the user find non-profit organizations by learning the types of things that interest them and making suggestions. The site then helps users follow those organizations by receiving a stream of updates about the work they’re doing and how that work is affecting real people. When they're ready, Jumo helps users support the organizations with which they’ve built a relationship.

After setting up an account and playing with it briefly this morning, here's my first impressions, typical buggy issues aside. 

It allows people and organizations to build a more organic connection with one another.
The donate button on many non profit websites can often be intrusive and email calls to action are sometimes insistent and urgent, all of which can be off putting for many potential supporters and make them feel like they are viewed as little more then an ATM machine. Jumo just might help organizations that aren't too savvy about this move to where they now need to be–in an era where relationships must be forged and cultivated first before a financial ask for support is made.  

It integrates nicely with other social media platforms and devices.
Jumo helps the end-user see all of a non profit's social media otposts in one place to get a complete picture of their digital presence. It also streams conveniently to people wherever they are, be that email, Facebook, mobile or elsewhere.

We're all somewhat unnerved by the plethora of options now available to us in the promotional mix and here's another social network for non profit marketers to worry about. So, is it worth jumping on the bandwagon yet?

Hughes has said that he sees this helping out small non profits that don't have a lot of resources to devote to their social media presence. In her Los Angeles Times article yesterday, Jessica Guynn wrote that "the site could potentially benefit smaller charities which don't have in-house social media experts." Unless I'm missing something, I don't see this. Each non profit still has to spend time creating their Jumo profile and must continue adding content to all their other media outposts in order for it to be aggregated on Jumo, so it's not really a time saver for them. The benefit, as I said earlier, is for the end-user who gets to see all the content in one place. The real benefit for small non profits will come when Jumo starts making user segmentation information available to them, assuming they can afford to pay for it.

Ultimately, there's no guarantee that all of this activity will bolster a non profit's social capital sufficiently to lead to donations of time and or money. Money quote from McLaughlin in today's New York Times piece about Jumo:

"It’s still not clear whether or not followers translate to volunteers and donors. But people that are more engaged with nonprofits are most likely to become a donor or support them in another way."

Users who may be suffering from social media fatigue could be reluctant to adopt one more social network but if anyone can pull this off, Hughes may be the man. Aside from his stint at Facebook he was also the former director of online organizing for Barack Obama’s successful 2008 presidential campaign. Whether this network will succeed and take off, where others like Yahoo For Good and GlobalGiving have failed to soar, remains to be seen.

Hughes’ presentation at the Social Good Summit earlier this year below.

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Natalie Zensius is a marketing communications strategist with experience in both the for-profit and non-profit sectors. Learn more about Natalie at http:www.linkedin.com/in/nzensius.

What Marathon Running And Business Have In Common, Ctd

Dean Karnazes talks to Forbes, as part of their Sales Leadership video series, about how to apply lessons learned from running to sales and marketing. Watch the video.

  
Natalie Zensius is a marketing communications strategist with experience in both the for-profit and non-profit sectors. Learn more about Natalie at http:www.linkedin.com/in/nzensius.

Marketing Campaign Case Study: How The President Of The United States Helped Slurpee

The best marketing communications professionals think on their feet, mobilize rapidly and do it in an authentic way that aligns with their brand image and delights their customers. I’m impressed by what the Slurpee team did in the last few weeks with their Unity Tour marketing campaign, which wrapped up a two-week-long cross-country journey from Dallas to Washington D.C. on Thursday.

Here's 6 things they did right with this campaign:

They were nimble enough to seize a great opportunity quickly
The genesis of the tour began during the heated rhetoric of the 2010-midterm elections, when President Obama used an analogy about Republicans sipping on Slurpees while Democrats get the car –aka the nation–out of the ditch. This was manna from heaven for the Slurpee marketing team and they jumped right in to capitalize on it; White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs maintained that 7-Eleven (coyly, I'm sure) "declined to comment specifically that Slurpees were a Republican drink."

They created a campaign that is not only clever but upbeat and positive
The day after the elections, Bloomberg reporter Hans Nichols jokingly asked President Obama if he would have John Boehner and other Republican leaders over for a "Slurpee Summit." The President laughed and then quipped that Slurpees are delicious drinks and that he might very well serve Slurpees during the conversation with leaders from both parties.

Slurpee launched a new grape flavored slush drink to take on a nationwide tour called "purple for the people." The color was chosen based on the idea of mixing red for Republicans and blue for Democrats in hopes the parties would work together in passing legislation on the Hill.

They combined social media and traditional marketing seamlessly
The national tour, documented with video, was replete with special offers, customer interaction, and giveaways, and was complemented beautifully by humorous and authentic social media marketing that represented the latest trends in marketing.

They maintained a strong and consistent brand voice
Throughout the campaign, whether it was on the website, various social media outposts, or in comments they made to the media, Slurpee found exactly the right tone and stuck with it.

They were not afraid to be real
Slurpee gave people an insider look into the tour with some behind the scenes footage.



They made sure the campaign was consistent with the personality of the product
These slightly tongue-in-cheek comments from 7-Eleven Marketing Manager, Daniel May, show how Slurpee doesn’t take itself too seriously. The team knows the product is fun and is willing to take some risks:

"We are hoping there will be a Slurpee summit…The tour has sent formal invitations to everybody and everybody is welcome…We truly hope there is one and if they want Slurpees there, we will make sure to bring them."

All of this obviously caught the attention of the media. Here's video below of some news coverage of the President's comments.







Natalie Zensius is a marketing communications strategist with experience in both the for-profit and non-profit sectors. Learn more about Natalie at http:www.linkedin.com/in/nzensius.

What Marathon Running And Business Have In Common

Barring some life circumstances and various states of injury I've been a devoted runner my whole adult life. Until recently, a half marathon was the longest distance I'd ever run; I'd always had my sights set on a marathon but couldn't commit to the time needed. Once I sent my youngest kid off to college a year ago, I began serious training and completed The Marine Corps Marathon with my friend and running partner, Amy Keller, in October. 

It's often said that the hardest part of running a marathon is training for one. It's also said that the first 20 miles on race day are just a warm-up for the last 6.2. Both of these truisms were definitely the case in my experience. There’s no faking it–you have to pay your dues and put in the time and discipline and run to the training schedule. Ultimately that's the only way to get good enough and strong enough to complete the race. And on race day it takes both smarts and determination to get over the finish line.

There's a lot to be learned when we physically push ourselves in this way. The strength and confidence gleaned from stretching to accomplish extraordinary things carries over into how we live up to the challenges of our professional lives; lessons learned from athletics can just as easily be applied to business. Some days the job is easy, other days extremely painful. Knowing when to conserve energy and when to go for broke is a key skill whether you're participating in endurance events, trying to ship a product or ensure a non-profit's sustainability. In all cases it's important to keep your eye on the future and your longer term goal in mind while preventing burnout in the present moment. In business, just like long distance running, you need people you can trust will be there for you when you're losing steam and you need to be there for people, even when you may want to zoom out ahead–teamwork is important, even for solo endeavors. And once a particular race is over it's not possible to rest on your laurels because you have to get out and run again or risk falling back on what you've gained.

Someone who understands all of this well is ultramarathon runner and businessman Dean Karnazes. Dean has pushed his body and mind to inconceivable limits: he ran 135 miles nonstop across Death Valley, CA in 120°F temperatures, and ran a marathon to the South Pole at −40°F. He completed a feat that is staggering to comprehend for ‘normal’ marathon runners like myself: running 50 marathons, in all 50 U.S. states, in 50 consecutive days, finishing with the New York City Marathon, which he completed in three hours and thirty seconds. Most recently he won the 4 Deserts Race, a series of 7 day ultramarathons across some of the harshest conditions on the planet. 4 Deserts has been called the ultimate test of human endurance. Needless to say, he’s a very inspiring person.

Earlier this week I attended the excellent North Face Speaker Series to hear Dean talk. Here’s a few fun facts that Dean, who Men’s Fitness magazine called “quite possibly the fittest man on the planet” shared with us:

•    Researchers found that he is, quite literally, made to run–his biomechanics are perfect and his body pushes out lactic acid (the bane of any endurance athlete’s existence) the more he runs
•    Unless he’s running or sleeping he stands. He finds sitting “tiring”
•    He can sleep while running if he has to
•    His idea of a good day is to run a marathon distance before he makes breakfast for his kids and takes them to school

The guy is clearly in a league of his own. But, Deans asserts that he’s just an ordinary guy doing extraordinary things.

Not surprisingly, Dean isn’t just good at running; he’s also a successful entrepreuner who holds graduate degrees in Science and Business. He’s worked for Fortune 500 companies and startups and founded a natural foods company of which he remains president to this day. Like many famous athletes, he’s put his celebrity to good use and has founded a non-profit organization. It’s called Karno Kids and raises awareness about childhood fitness and activity. I’m guessing that this philanthropic venture benefits greatly not only from his business acumen, but from his proven ability to excel in a competitive, and often challenging world.

Natalie Zensius is a marketing communications strategist with experience in both the for-profit and non-profit sectors. Learn more about Natalie at http:www.linkedin.com/in/nzensius.