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December 2006

RELATIONSHIPS | RESOURCES | RESULTS

MARKETING:Year in Review

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MARKETING:Year in Review



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4 Brilliant Results | December 2006 www.brilliantpublishing.com

ABSOLUT BRANDED LANGUAGE 16Associating words with brands comes at no

extra cost. Find out why 80 percent of the world’s population directly

associates “dreams, “fantasy,” and “magic,” with Disney.

By: Martin Lindstrom

TO GET THE BEST DEAL, UNDERSTANDWHAT SPEAKERS WANT 18

A dynamic or informative speaker generallyis a stellar investment in the success of yourmeeting. But, sometimes your budget is not

enough. Discover a solution.By Ed Rigsbee, CSP

WHEN YOU WANT CUSTOMERS TOBUY, TELL THEM THEY CAN’T 22

Rediscover the selling technique known asthe “takeaway close.”

By Robert W. Bly

ADVANCE BACKWARD 24Work backwards to get ahead. Learn

why “Advance Backward” is a perfect description for executing successful

marketing campaigns. By: Marsha Londe

Contents

8

22

24

columnsCOVER STORY 8

MARKETING: THE YEAR IN REVIEWThis month our cover story presents some of the best ideas we received this year

from our business executive interviews on marketing and the use of promotional & incentive merchandise.

TMbrilliant resultsVol. 3, No. 12

features

departments

EXPERT INTERVIEWING: FIVE MUST-ASKINTERVIEW QUESTIONS 30

You’ve pored over the collection of resumes, cover letters and portfolios on your desk. Now discover the five questions you must

ask for a successful interview.By: The Creative Group

HOT PRODUCTSTHINGS WE LOVE 28

Write with style or just for fun with these exciting pens!

IT’S ALL PERSONAL 32So, how do you spend less while going

after more market-share?“ By: Dave Ribble

WHAT WORKS PRESENTED BY THE PROMOTIONAL

PRODUCTS ASSOCIATIONINTERNATIONAL (PPAI) 34

Successful Case Studies and research foryour next powerful promotion.

IT’S ALL PERSONAL 45(Publication of corrected November column)

“Is setting up your site so that it is amore personal approach worth it?”

By: Dave Ribble

PUBLISHER’S LETTER 6

ADVERTISING INDEX 44Get FREE information from

this month’s advertisers

OFF THE CUFF 46Quotes & Marketing Trivia: Advertising,

Slogans & Brands

THE LAST WORD 48Brilliant Results speaks with Jim

Lenskold about marketing ROI and mar-keting profitability and the award winningmethods presented in his book Marketing

ROI, The Path to Campaign, Customerand Corporate Profitability

Cover Photos(Top to Bottom – Left to Right):

Robert Federer & John L. Jacobs; Robin Freeman; Keith Mercier;

Arthur Rubinfeld; Mark S. Liberman; Steven Hacker; David Capano; Lori J. Littlepage; John Bigay;

Don Hulstrand; Judy Patterson; Lani Hayward; Timothy Kosiek;

Christine A. Plonsky; David Knopp; Nick Ferrara; Chris White; Rodger Stotz;John P. Stockhausen, Sr.; Nancy Serrato.

MARKETING: The Year

In Review

BR1206_Section01.qxl 11/30/06 9:35 PM Page 4

BR1206_Section03 11/29/06 6:43 PM Page 5

9034 Joyce LaneHummelstown, PA 17036

Ph: 717-571-9233 Fax: 717-566-5431

PUBLISHER / ADVERTISINGMaureen Williams-Berman

[email protected]

EDITORIALEditor in Chief

MaryAnne Morrill717-571-9233

Senior EditorsMichelle Donofry, Pierce Roberts

Style EditorCharity Plata

Asst. EditorMildred Landis

Contributing WritersRobert W. Bly, Martin Lindstrom, Marsha Londe, EdRigsbee, CSP, PPAI - What Works Section, Dave

Ribble, The Creative Group

CirculationFor any questions or updates regarding

subscriptions, please email:[email protected]

PRODUCTION / DESIGNArt Director

Percy Zamora

Brilliant Results is published monthly by Brilliant PublishingLLC, 9034 Joyce Lane Hummelstown PA 17036 (717) 608-5869;Fax# (717) 566-5431. Postage paid at Mechanicsburg PA andadditional offices. POSTMASTER please send address changesto Brilliant Results, 9034 Joyce Lane, Hummelstown PA 17036.Volume 3. Number 11. Brilliant Results subscription rates: one-year $120; Canadian $160 USD; one-year foreign $225 USD. Allsubscriptions are non-refundable. Copyright © 2006 BrilliantPublishing LLC. All rights reserved. The publisher reserves theright to accept or reject any advertising or editorial material.Advertisers, and/or their agents, assume the responsibility forany claims against the publisher based on the advertisement.Editorial contributors assume responsibility for their publishedworks and assume responsibility for any claims against the pub-lisher based on published work. No part of this publication canbe reproduced in any form or by electronic or mechanical means,including information storage and retrieval systems, withoutwritten permission from the publisher. All items submitted toBrilliant Results become the sole property of Brilliant PublishingLLC. Editorial content does not reflect the views of the publisher.The imprints, logos, trademarks or trade names (Collectively the“Marks”) displayed on the products featured in Brilliant Resultsare for illustrative purposes only and are not available for sale.The marks do not represent the implied or actual endorsementby the owners of the Marks of the product on which they appear.All of the Marks are the property of the respective owners and isnot the property of either the advertisers using the Marks orBrilliant Results.


Publisher’s Letter TM


brilliant resultsbrilliant results

262467

WOW! I CANNOT BELIEVE IT IS ALREADY DECEMBER!!!

Where did the year go? It always amazes me when you

take into account your year and all that you have

accomplished.

I am truly impressed with all that our editors have

done and the valuable edit that this magazine delivers

each and every month. This past year our editors inter-

viewed business executives in a number of market

segments. In our Marketing: Year in Review we provide some of the inside

information we gleaned from these leaders. I believe their words will inspire

you and set you on the right course for the upcoming year…after reading this

review I think you too will be impressed with all that we delivered.

As the snow falls and the temperature drops another year comes to a close

with much to be thankful for as well as inspired about. To each advertiser

who makes this magazine a reality as well as all of you who read it every

month I want to send a heartfelt “Thank You”. It is hard to believe that this

magazine that was once only a dream is now entering its 4th year of publication!

While we have much to be thankful for, we also believe that to be the best

we can never stop striving...so, keep us on your email lists because we want

to hear the good, the bad, and the ugly. You keep me on my toes. As we strive

to continue to deliver to you the best magazine out there, please know that

we need your help. We want you to remember to mention the magazine each

and every time you think of branding and marketing…. and of course every

time you contact one of our advertisers! With your views, your words of

encouragement and your advice on topics you would like to see covered, etc

we can only get better with time…

There is much in store for you in 2007 so don’t miss a single issue!

Happy Holidays to all! See you in the New Year!

Have a Brilliant Day!

Maureen [email protected] 541-788-5022

Brill492


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ASI l 95280 W l www.warwickpublishing.com Contact your local Promotional Products Distributor

make a date with success!

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OVER THE PAST TWELVE MONTHS BrilliantResults has had the opportunity to interview somefascinating executives and get their perspective onmarketing, branding and the use of promotional andincentive merchandise. As we approach the end ofanother year, we decided that this month we wouldreview the thoughts of these top marketers andpresent a compendium of their ideas.

LAST DECEMBER we spokewith John L. Jacobs, Executive VicePresident and Chief MarketingOfficer The NASDAQ® StockMarket, Inc. and CEO of NASDAQ®Global Funds, who summed up ourthoughts on branding in one sentence, “Brand is thepromise you make to your customer and therefore yourbrand is critically important.”

We also asked John about successful marketingcampaigns and this was his response, “The mostinnovative thing that NASDAQ ever did in the mar-keting world was when I worked for the formerChief Marketing Officer of NASDAQ, L. BrianHolland, who created the first campaign for adver-tising in NASDAQ history – it was the first TV cam-paign that any stock market did. Brian built theawareness of NASDAQ itself. People did not knowwe existed even though, at that time, we were thesecond largest stock market in the United States.That campaign, which ran in 1990-91, answered thequestion “What was NASDAQ®?” It was followedvery quickly by a second phase, which talked aboutthe companies listed on NASDAQ. That campaignanswered the question, “Who was NASDAQ®?”

NASDAQ is Microsoft, Intel and those kinds of com-panies and it was, I think, a brilliant campaign thatdid wonders for our brand.”

When we asked John about the use of promo-tional merchandise, he replied, “If the ExecutiveAssistant sees something that they think is greator really interesting, they will pass it along, ormaybe highlight it, or put it on the top of the pile.We did one where we were trying to demonstratethat NASDAQ was more flexible in our customerservice and how we do things. We sent everyone alittle metal Slinky® to demonstrate our flexibility. Itwas amazing, we’d get calls saying, ‘I walkeddown the stairwell and I saw the CEO and CFOhaving a Slinky® race in the stairwell!’ You could-n’t pay money for that kind of response. So, thegoal of promotion is not to find the most expensiveor the most elaborate, but to find something that iscreative, that really resonates with someone, that’srelevant and that they will remember. You can’t sellwith a direct marketing piece like that; all you aretrying to do is open their mind to the message ofthe sales force.”

At the conclusion of our interview John alsomade another point that is worth remembering,“We try never to forget that we are two things - anaspirational brand, and a working brand – it has towork for every one of our businesses, every one ofour salespeople. And we also know that you canspend millions of dollars in marketing and that canbe slowly undone through poor execution of theother part of your promise. So, we always makesure that there is no disconnect between our brandand our business.”

MARKETIThe Year In


We concluded our December issuewith a Last Word from RobinFreeman, President / CEO, ofCommunity First Bank. When askedabout a successful marketing campaign, Robin discussed a recentpromotion, “Each year, the largest event in ourhometown is a big annual rodeo…This year wedeveloped a campaign designed to bring a uniqueaspect to that event and its attendees, while givingour bank high profile exposure. A volunteergroup…secretly stapled more than 3,000 specialoffer cards underneath every seat in what wouldbe a sold out venue later that night. The cardsoffered every single attendee the opportunity toget a free, limited edition official rodeo T-shirt ifthey opened any kind of new account with thebank… the back of the shirts had our logo on them…One lucky attendee had a card under their seatthat had a special prize - An all expenses paid tripfor two to the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas!Without a doubt, it was the highlight of the 3-dayevent…The end result…we got very unique, highprofile exposure at our headquarter town’s largestannual event.”

IN JANUARY we spoke with KeithMercier, Senior Director, Gap, Inc.Business Direct. When we askedKeith about the use of promotionalmerchandise he said, ”Obviously, inGap Inc Business Direct we are goingto use our own products. We really are using ourown products because we think that is the best

way to market who we are and what we can bringto the table.” Keith went on to say, “I think it isimportant to understand that what you are givingto either your best customers or your best employeesreally says something about you. I wholeheartedlybelieve that giving them a brand that they arefamiliar with…sends a message about how youvalue them…and I think there is a really great haloeffect that does come back to them in appreciationand recognition that they have done that.”

Arthur Rubinfeld, Founder andCEO of AIRVISION, provided theJanuary Last Word. When askedabout his favorite marketing cam-paign, Arthur answered, “I like theconsistency and longevity of theAbsolute Vodka campaign. It served to give them aunique voice. This year Absolute will be focusing 20% of its marketing dollars to Internet advertising…Apple is (also) doing everything well as it’s market-ing is seamlessly tied to it’s product design andstore presentation. It’s marketing is targeted to theinfluential audience of “discoverers” and trendset-ters in every age category.”

FEBRUARY saw us speaking withMark S. Liberman, President andCEO LA INC. The Convention andVisitors Bureau about marketing cam-paigns and he was quick to give us hisfavorite, “The one marketing cam-paign, which has really been associated with us forthe last few years, is the See My LA campaign. One ofthe greatest assets in Los Angeles are the celebrities

TING: Review

Brilliant Results | December 2006 9www.brilliantpublishing.com



that live and work here. These are the people that arerecognized worldwide…almost 50 of them, are thefocus of our campaign and the focus of the campaignis to tell people what LA has to offer. See My LA hasreally branded us.” Mark also had some thoughts onpromotional merchandise, “Promotional merchandiseand materials are very important. The key componentis making sure you get the right item for the rightaudience…You need to have brand identity…I alwaystell people that work in our organization – we mustunderstand our customer and we must understandour product to be successful.”

February’s Last Word found usspeaking with Steven Hacker,President International Associationfor Exhibition Management (IAEM),who spoke to us about marketing tradeshows, “Pre-show promotion is the most effectiveaspect. Even if you don’t get everyone to attend, youare certain to be reaching your target audience with aseries of pre-show messages. Some will respond to themessage even if they ultimately don’t attend the event.Those who do attend the event will be much more like-ly to visit your booth. Failure to engage pre-show pro-motion relegates you to just one of several hundred orseveral thousand exhibits competing for very limitedtime and attention.”

When it came to promotional products, Steven assured us that, “We believe in promotion-al products…if used wisely promotional productsallow us to build excitement and help us cementour members (customers) awareness of us in acrowded marketplace.”

MARCH was all about golf with Mark Marney,CEO, and Steve Tangdall, Corporate SalesDirector of The Golf Warehouse (TGW) answer-ing our questions. When it came to marketingcampaigns, they felt that, ”The golf market is eas-ily definable. In other words the customers arepretty easy to find. You just need the money to doit. TGW has largely depended on advertisementsshown on The Golf Channel to reach its customerbase.” They summed up their thoughts on promo-tional merchandise and its use by saying, “TGWuses items such as logoed golf tees that we giveaway with every purchase. We have given awaylogoed balls in the past. We had a logoed “pocketrules book” that we gave away. Clients appreciateunique, well thought out gifts or incentives thatare useful and have great- perceived value. It isour job to find and deliver such mer-chandise to our customers.”

David Capano, Director ofCorporate Sales for The GregNorman Collection gave use the

Last Word in March when he talked about market-ing campaigns and promotional merchandise. Heindicated that, ”Each product we offer providessomething different, so there is a great deal of valuein educating distributors as well as sales represen-tatives about our product. Naturally, product semi-nars have been one of the most affective marketingstrategies. These events ultimately help deliver ourproduct to the end-user after distributors becomefully educated.” David also thought that it wasimportant that a company “should consider its audi-ence and what works best for those recipients.Furthermore, like any product, purchasing the bestin value within a respective budget will always pro-vide the best return on investment.”

David summed up our thoughts on promotionalproducts when he said that his favorite was “Anyproduct that delivers a clear concise long-lastingmarketing message.”

IN APRIL our cover featured aPPAI Pyramid Award winner, Ice BlueAdvertising’s Lori J. Littlepage,Owner, Chuck Littlepage, BusinessDevelopment Guy and Dr. TeresaCody, their friend and client. When asked about mar-keting strategies, their responses summed up thesecret of their success, “Work with your friends! Icouldn’t have done it. We knew what we wanted to do,but they turned an abstract idea into something con-crete” and…”Promotional products or physical adver-tising as the industry is now touting should be consid-ered a growing part of any strategic marketing plan.There is longevity with promotional products that youjust don’t get with any other kind of advertising.”

The Last Word in April came fromJohn Bigay, Captivate Network VicePresident Marketing & Programming.John described the process his compa-ny goes through in developing thebest merchandise for their marketingcampaigns, ”As a new medium, our primary task inour direct marketing is to continue to educate the mar-ketplace about the power of our medium. This can beparticularly challenging because we are marketing tomarketers, so promotional merchandise is one tacticwe have used to reach this audience and capture theirattention. In terms of messaging, we stay focused onhow we can help our clients’ business by reaching thisexceptional audience during the workday…(on devel-oping the right promotional product) “An integratedeffort between The Boston Group’s creative, strategyand production staff, in collaboration with a partnerfirm, Structural Graphics.”

As for his favorite marketing campaign, Johnselected Orbitz; “I think they have done an



exceptional job of leveraging different mediumsin a creative way to reach their audience. Forexample, their online campaigns feature a gameright now that is interactive and very popularwith consumers. They also run advertising onour network and they have tailored the ads perfectly for the Captivate medium. In today’sfragmented media environment it is important tosee this type of creativity to truly connect withthe target audience.”

IN MAY we went fishing andreeled in Dan Hulstrand, Rapala’sVice President of BusinessDevelopment. When asked abouthow Rapala products are used in pro-motions, Dan answered, “I like this questionbecause I think it is something we spend a lot oftime at around here. As a highly branded company,we consider ourselves a marketing company.Marketing is imagination. One of the great thingsabout fishing is that a lot of the vernacular of fish-ing lends itself so well to sales and marketing.Think of: “lure them in,” “casting for customers”,“bait the hook”, “reel in the big one”. By messagingwith fishing products you are appealing to the vastdemographic interests of the American populationbut you are also tapping into metaphors that areimplicit with attracting more business.”

When it came to successful marketing cam-paigns, Dan gave us an inside look at a couple of hisfavorites. “Years ago there was a woman workingon an Academy Awards Gala who requested abunch of lures from us and she asked us to take thehooks off. She put them in martini glasses becausethe speaker was, I believe Jesse Ventura, and sheassociated fishing with Minnesota. It was a big hit;everyone was fishing these balsam wood lures outof their martini glass. We did put some informationon the side of the lure so it was fun and very cre-ative on her part.”

Dan also mentioned the Valvoline Oil promotionRapala “participated in where we paired a unique-ly designed Rapala lure with a more expensive fueladditive that they were promoting. It was a nation-wide on shelf promotion that yielded an incremen-tal lift of 52% for Valvoline. The results validatedValvoline’s expectation of the brand convergence. Itwas a great lift and in spite of the short-term natureof promotions, we did run this one concurrently fora couple of years and it was very successful forthem and for ourselves. We enjoyed the wonderfulcrossover exposure in a different retail department.We also enjoyed the marketing power of two com-panies working together. It was fun. Actually,Harvard University did a case study on that syner-

gy and used this promotion as an example of twobrands that worked well in crossing over theirdemographics.” As for Dan’s final thoughts on pro-motional product success, “Great brand associa-tion. Partner with great brands. By doing so, itreflects positively on your marketing initiative andraises the level of product association. When youuse something that is not quite as brand worthy,you don’t always get the impact.”

Judy Patterson, Senior VicePresident & Executive DirectorAmerican Gaming Association, hadthe Last Word in May when she toldus about the AGA’s most successfulcampaign using promotional merchandise, “themost successful promotional pieces we’ve ever cre-ated were the responsible gaming awareness wrist-bands we developed last year for our eighth annualResponsible Gaming Education Week. The wrist-band craze was a phenomenon we decided wecould latch onto to spread our message aboutresponsible gaming, and the program was tremen-dously popular. Casino employees throughout thecountry wore them throughout our awarenessweek, and many of our casinos sold them to cus-tomers as well. Even today, they’re still sellingbriskly, and all proceeds are being donated to theNational Center for Responsible Gaming. So far,we’ve raised more than $50,000 through this cam-paign alone.”

JUNE saw us at the bank withLani Hayward, Executive VicePresident, Creative Strategies,Umpqua Holdings Corporation. Wethought a bank with a name asunique as Umpqua would have some interestingmarketing stories and Lani did not disappoint,“Two years ago we dropped almost all of our mass-market advertising and we created what we call“Handshake Marketing.” Essentially what thismeans is taking marketing down to a personallevel…micro marketing.”

Lani went on to tell us about the ice creamtruck, ”(it) is one of these campaigns and it cameout of a merger. It was our first entry into California,people didn’t know who Umpqua was. All theyknew was it was some company out of Oregon tak-ing over their local bank and in some areas thatwasn’t necessarily looked at as a positive. So to puta face on Umpqua, we got an ice cream truck,branded it, put great music on it and drove aroundhanding out free ice cream. It sounds small, but itwas huge. That worked so well in California afterweeks of driving around in different areas, that weare now about to purchase the second one, after




putting about 10,000 miles on the first one in lessthan a year. Basically, it is that handshake, sayinghello to somebody…that brand experience.”

When we asked Lani about adaptive strategy,she suggested, “It goes back to any company hav-ing to say ‘what is our passion?’ What is the passionthat tells our story? If you can align yourself withthat in your core gut and then have your peopleunderstand that passion…that story…then yourmarketing campaign will win in the long run. But ifmanagement is the only one understanding whothey are and what the passion is… it won’t win. Ithink again my biggest statement here is you haveto understand who you are, what you stand for andwhat your passion is, because if you understandthat it is going to come out through any marketingdevice that you use and your people are going tocarry that message through.”

Timothy Kosiek, Vice Chairmanand Chief Financial Officer ofMarshall BankFirst Corp. providedour Last Word in June suggestingthat the “most successful promo-tional products have been targeted toward con-sumers with a specific transaction need (e.g., vehi-cle purchase). In these programs we find the com-bination of an imminent or necessary transactionwith a meaningful and measurable incentiveresults in a high degree of acceptance by the con-sumer. This degree of acceptance provides our cus-tomer with a measurable increase in influencingthe consumer’s choice and increases our opportuni-ty to generate revenue through the issuance of anincentive based card.” Talking about incentive pro-grams, Timothy suggested that a company should”keep the incentive program simple and under-standable. Maintain a commitment to providing ameasurable and practical incentive that will clearlyinfluence the consumer or business to make thedesired choice.”

JULY was all about Universitysports and who better to speak withthan the Rose Bowl winningUniversity of Texas DirectorWomen’s Athletics/Senior Associate DirectorMen/Women’s Athletics External Services,Christine A. Plonsky. Chris introduced us to theworld of successful sports marketing and describedhow a slogan by Coach Mack, “– come early…beloud… stay late…wear orange – became amantra…simple things that every fan and everystudent could do – “ caught fire and became a mar-keting theme. Chris also described many of thetechnical and contractual decisions made by the

university to prepare it to capitalize on the success-es of its athletic teams.

When we asked for her final thoughts andadvice her main point was that every success is ateam effort and that was a great lesson…”with-out all of those engines and pistons firing at thesame time we would not have been able to maxi-mize the way we did when we finally won thatfootball championship. Everything was increscendo mode and we were so capable in everyway of capitalizing.”

The Last Word for this issue came from MartinSalamone, Director of Marketing University ofFlorida Athletic Association, better known as thehome of the Gators – winners of March Madness.We asked Martin about the University’s use of pro-motional merchandise and he told us that they “useseveral promotional items to increase attendance atevents and to promote various messages from ourcorporate partners, as well as the University andthe Athletic Department. During a baseball gameearlier this year, we gave away green t-shirts topromote Green Energy for our sponsor, GRU(Gainesville Regional Utilities). We also promoteevents that the University is celebrating and oursport schedules.”

IN AUGUST we looked at thehealth and medical segment. DavidKnopp, Managing Director ofStrategic Activation for the NCAA,offered insight into how the NCAAdeveloped out of a concern for thehealth and well being of collegiate athletics and dis-cussed his personal favorite corporateinitiative…”among many very good corporate promo-tions from our Corporate Champions and CorporatePartners over the years would include the Coca-ColaCommunity All-American Program (because it cele-brates an often-overlooked characteristic of mostNCAA student-athletes and their athletics programs– tremendous community service initiatives) and TheHartford Playbook for Life (because it addresses aneed – financial literacy among students – withoutbeing a sales pitch).” David also broke down thesteps to a successful promotion or incentive…”a suc-cessful promotion requires the following: an under-standing of each party’s objectives (sponsor andproperty), agreement on the target audience for thepromotion, breakthrough creativity (new, fresh, bigideas), and multi-platform dimensions (TV, radio,Internet, print) working together and anchored bytrue sponsorship elements at the core that reallytouch fans in a meaningful way (so that it goesbeyond ads and logos).”



To give us perspective on themedical side of health our AugustLast Word was from Nick Ferrara,BD&A Medical Sales Manager.When queried about successful mar-keting and promotion strategies,Nick offered the following, “I believe many of us inthis industry are becoming more aware of the chal-lenges facing traditional forms of advertising.Merchandise and product placement are becomingincreasingly important to brands and their advertis-ing. The medical sector is no different and under-standing our customers, their target audience,brand message, and helping to bring their cam-paigns to life is critical. The guidelines regulatingthis sector are under constant scrutiny and ourclients expect us to present merchandise thatmeets their needs and deliver a true ROI. We con-tinually work to develop merchandise that is med-ically relevant, patient focused and unique.”

SEPTEMBER was all about incen-tives and Chris White, Founder &CEO Global Events Partners, provid-ed an inside look at the motivatingeffect of the travel and meeting seg-ment. According to Chris, “’Motivation’ is a conceptthat is practically built into the travel business, espe-cially when it comes to planning creative events infaraway destinations. From the perspective of anemployee in a corporate office in, say, Chicago, theopportunity to earn an all-expense paid trip to some-place like Bora Bora, staying in the finest hotels andgetting an insider’s experience, can be a unique andpowerful motivator.” As for what makes incentiveand promotional products successful, “Make it mem-orable, and Add value. Anyone can get on a planeand travel to New Orleans, but not everyone getsgreeted personally by Chef Paul Proudhomme,enjoys a cocktail reception in one of the oldest homesin the Garden District, and gets to do it all as ashared experience with the best and brightest intheir industry. Provide value and experiences that atraveler cannot get on his own, and you have creat-ed a memory for a lifetime.”

In this same issue we had anopportunity to talk with MaritzIncentives’ Vice-President, RodgerStotz, CCP, CPT, CPIM aboutemployee motivation and incentiveprograms. Among other things weasked him to give us an example of a successful pro-gram…”There have been a number of them, butone that comes to mind is a financial services com-pany...through our research, we realized that onlythe very top performers were being motivated …We

suggested and were finally able to convince themthat they should include a second level award for“middle” performers ? a segment that typically rep-resents 60% of the sales force...They listened to usand we put the program in place. At the end of theprogram about 80% of the company’s incrementalperformance increase came from that middle 60%.”Rodger’s final thought for our readers was,“Incentives are like fire; they can burn you or keepyou warm…Realize that there is an art and a sci-ence to this process.”

September’s Last Word was fromanother travel incentive expert, JohnP. Stockhausen, Sr., CEO The MDCGroup, Inc. When asked about hisfavorite marketing campaign, he felt“the most notable was a programwith a region of a national auto parts retail/whole-sale company... focused on customers that hadbeen good clients, but were buying the bulk of theirparts from other sources. The goal was to capturethe business for a 60-day period using the highvalue of vacation awards. For every $500 of speci-fied (high profit margin) parts ordered, the clientreceived a 3-day/2-night vacation award. It creat-ed a tremendous lift”

As for the most important consideration in makinga promotional/incentive product successful, Johnsays “two points are essential; as universal appeal aspossible considering your target audience…forinstance, I once knew a bank that offered a PDA foropening new accounts. That’s ok if you aren’t tryingto attract seniors. In addition, the higher the per-ceived value the better, remember you are trying tochange behavior, so the higher the target audiencevalues the award, the more likely they are to take theaction you want. In addition, any promotional/incen-tive product does not stand-alone. It may soundredundant, but you have to promote a promotion.Communication is vital…creative and repetitive com-munication to your target audience. And make itfun. With travel awards it is easy to be fun.”

We closed out the year inNOVEMBER when we discussed thered hot gift card sector with NancySerrato, Director of Corporate GiftCard Sales for Blackhawk Network,and current president of the Incentive Gift CardCouncil (IGCC).

When asked for advice on using gift cards Nancyoffered the following thoughts, “Look for cus-tomization; look for personalization coming downthe road. I think that is going to be a prime oppor-tunity for many companies to get their brand infront of others in the form of another merchant’s gift



card. Another area of growth is employee loyalty. Itused to only be that people thought of retention oracquisition in terms of customers. I now see a focusin employee based acquisition and retention pro-grams for rewarding…keep in mind that severalstudies have shown it costs three times as much toreplace someone as it costs to retain them.” Wethink the Blackhawk Network branding statementsays it all when it comes to gift cards…‘Every cardtells a story™’.

Finally, we at Brilliant Results like to end ourinterviews with the following question: Do youremember the last promotional or incentive prod-uct you received and from what company youreceived it?

This year all but one of our intervieweesremembered precisely what that was and thevariety of those memories was telling. Everythingfrom 3D cardboard building replicas…coffeemugs… hats… stuffed King Kong doll in a cage…a ruler… a Bic® Solis pen… a Sweda® pen…atravel toothbrush with toothpaste… Oakley® sun-glasses…a Starbucks® coupon…a greeting cardfrom Saks 5th Avenue that had an RFID gift cardin it that could be worth anywhere from $50 to$1,000…an offer for 90 days of XM radio… a set ofpersonalized pens that wrote in blue ink. Nothing

fancy but the personal touch of the name and ink(which I preferred) was appreciated and memo-rable…a product series of power solutions fromiGO… a trip to Europe… an upscale Cross Pen® Iuse it everyday and it came with a gift card. Oneof our interviewee’s story about the promotionalproduct he received really drove home the powerof promotional and incentive merchandise…” Wehave a new puppy named Mozart . . . As a wel-come, the first week we brought him home, hereceived a direct mailing from a pet companybearing his name – how could we toss it away ornot remember who sent it?” He summed it all upby saying…”there’s a lesson here for anyone inthe sales, marketing or motivation businesses:Know your customers, and know what will createa positive, lasting impressions in their mind. Allthe rest is just execution.”

Brilliant Results also spoke with and received con-tributions from many others in marketing, humanresources, promotional/incentive products, building,sales and travel throughout this year. To all of thosewho were a part of the success Brilliant Resultsenjoyed this year we say, “Thank You And BestWishes for a New Year filled with Relationships •Resources • and Results.”



DISNEY, KELLOGG'S, AND GILLETTE are threecompletely different brands with one commonality.Over the past decade, they've established a brandedlanguage, whether they know it or not. In my latestbook, we found 74 percent of today's consumersassociate the word "crunch" with Kellogg's. Another59 percent consider the word "masculine" andGillette as one and the same. Americans formed thestrongest association of masculinity to Gillette, by anastounding 84 percent.

Disney scored higher in purloined language thanany other brand. This brand welcomes you to itskingdom of fantasy, dreams, promises, and magic. Ifyou've stayed at a Disney resort, taken a Disneycruise, or eaten in a Disney restaurant, it doesn'ttake long to hear "cast members" greeting guestswith, "Have a magical day!"

For over half a century, Disney has consistentlybuilt its brand on a foundation much larger than itslogo. A substantial chunk relies on songs andvoiceovers that almost always include Disney-branded words. Associating words with brandscomes at no extra cost. Disney's manages to "own"six of them: "dreams," "creativity, "fantasy,""smiles," "magic," and "generation."

Our BRAND sense study shows over 80 percentof the world's population directly associates thesegeneric words with Disney.

The keywords are repeated over and over inDisney's advertising copy, song lyrics, and story linesand on Disney Channel. The words cross all mediachannels, from TV to the Internet, with ease and flu-idity. No opportunity is wasted in making strong con-nections between Disney and "magic," Disney and"fantasy," Disney and "dreams," and so on.

What's more, Disney's language survives whatI call the smash test. Pick a word, sentence, or col-umn from any Disney publication, remove eachbrand reference, and… voilà!... the brand's stillrecognizable.

To create a truly smashable brand requires con-sistency and patience. This is difficult, in a corporateworld where the only constant is ever-changingbranding strategies and CMOs. Add to this a fluctu-ating financial market that demands instant results,and the brand message becomes just another bit ofbrand information in an overcrowded field. Withannual reports, TV commercials, and

Web sites often handled by different divisions,you loose any opportunity for language synergy.

BY MARTIN LINDSTROM

ABSOLUTLANGUAGE

Branded



It takes years for words, phrases, and sentencesto be identified and accepted as belonging tospecific brands.

The first step to integrate specific language intoyour brand is to identify the words you want toown. Select them based on those words that bestreflect your brand's personality. Choose words thatare easy to integrate in many different kinds of sen-tences and are the most flexible.

There's no mistaking Absolut Vodka's language.Its "Absolut Home" page lets you jump to "AbsolutReality," "Absolut Pictures," "Absolut Generations,"and other "Absolut" destinations. Should you wishto contact the company, go to "Absolut Contact."Everything on the site is consistent with Absolut'sadvertising campaign, which has been running forover 20 years. The campaign's based on continuityand variety; 1,400 ads have been produced since1980, all related to the original vision that launchedAbsolut Perfection.

The key to forming a smashable language is tointegrate it into every piece of communicationyour company is responsible for, including allinternal communications.

Evaluate your branded language, and deter-mine the words you would like to own. It costsnothing and might lead to free advertising in yournational dictionary. •

Martin Lindstrom is recognized as one of theworld's primary branding gurus and more than fourmillion people read his weekly columns that are syn-dicated across twenty-one countries. MartinLindstrom's books have been translated into twelvelanguages and published in more than thirty coun-tries. He sits on several boards globally, and hisclients include Disney, Mars, Pepsi, AmericanExpress, Mercedes-Benz, Reuters, McDonald's,Kellogg's, Yellow Pages and Microsoft. . In addition,his acute insights have been featured in USAToday,Fast Company, The Times, Fortune, BBC 1, BBCWorld, BBC Radio, The Daily Telegraph, TheObserver, Washington Post, The Australian and TheIndependent. Lindstrom’s latest highly acclaimedbook; BRAND sense, with a forward by Philip Kotleris published by Simon & Schuster, New York. Formore information on Martin Lindstrom please visithis website at www.martinlindstrom.com.



SURE, YOU WANT THE BEST POSSIBLE speaker forwhatever your budget might be. A dynamic orinformative speaker generally is a stellar invest-ment in the success of your meeting. But, some-times your budget is not enough for the speaker youwant. What’s the solution? Hire a less expensivespeaker—squeeze the speaker you want for a bet-ter price—think beyond conventional wisdom?

Thinking beyond conventional wisdom mightlook like, limiting the number of speakers at yourmeeting. It is always less expensive to have a singlespeaker do several sessions than to have severalspeakers present a single session each. Not thatevery speaker is capable of presenting multiple ses-sions, however because of the multiple travel andhotel rooms cost, sometimes it is even cheaper tohire a speaker to deliver multiple programs than tohave several non-paid speakers participate in yourmeeting. Even if these unpaid speakers drive in,thereby eliminating their airline travel expense, theywill still want a free hotel room for the conferenceand free registration. Perhaps they were going tocome anyway? You would have then received theirconference registration dollars. Sometimes the truecost of non-paid speakers is staggeringly hidden.

Let’s explore the difference between a profes-sional speaker presenting the same program multi-ple times vs. presenting multiple programs. The bigdifference for the speaker is preparation time—including: research, handout development andPowerPoint preparation. Unfortunately, few meet-ing planners take this key time issue into consider-ation. Speakers are selling both their knowledgeand their time. The latter is finite, so the more youconsume, the more you should expect to pay. Inpaying for a speaker’s time, you have to considerpresentation time, travel time and preparation time.Unless of course you want a canned speech, thenthe preparation time is not an issue. Before youjump on the cost savings of a canned speech,remember that today, few attendees will tolerate acanned speech.

This idea of a single speaker presenting mul-tiple presentations for a single fee is growing inthe world of professional speakers but is count-er to standard operating procedures for mostspeaker bureaus. If you like this idea, youmight have to abandon the ease in speakerselection that you have enjoyed when workingwith bureaus.

To GetUnderstand WhatSpeakers Want

BY ED RIGSBEE, CSP

the Best Deal,


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THE BUREAU CONUNDRUMSpeaker Bureaus provide a valuable outsource

service for meeting planners that are timesqueezed. A planner can contact a bureau, givetheir budget and the bureau will take it from there.For planners that have to fill a large number of con-ference session slots and do not have sufficientstaff—bureaus can be their solution. Yet, there aremany more speakers that are under or non-repre-sented by speakers’ bureaus, than there are speak-ers that they recommend. Most bureaus only have asmall corral of speakers that they can easily sell andtherefore will generally recommend them first.Many of the underrepresented speakers are quitegood and are a tremendous value.

Another component to consider is that somebureaus serve two masters. What I mean can be illus-trated by a recent conversation I had with a plannerfrom a very large biotechnology manufacturer at ameeting industry trends summit. We were chatting atthe event’s evening cocktail party and the plannerwas bemoaning about a request for a speaker that shesubmitted to a very large East Coast speaker bureau.The planner went on to tell me that the informationsheets for the speakers that this particular bureausent her, had no relationship to her submitted speak-er request. The planner was upset that the bureaudidn’t pay heed to what she requested. I explained tothe planner about that particular bureau specialized inspeaker exclusives—meaning that the bureau was theonly place through which a particular speaker couldbe booked. As such, the bureau would recommendtheir exclusive speakers first, and if none were select-ed, would then recommend other speakers—evenwhen a non-exclusive speaker would have been a bet-ter fit. Unfortunately, this trend is spreading throughthe speaker bureau industry..

For most speakers, speaker bureaus are but one ofthe many channels by which they go to market.Speaker bureaus need to be viewed as one would viewany distributor or sales agency. If two-step distributionserves your needs, and there are a number of reasonsthat it might, then by all means select that method.

The conventional marketing message espousedmy most bureaus is that for speaker X, you’ll paythe same price through us as you would bookingspeaker X direct. That is a nice ideal that frequent-ly may be true. Yet, in a supply chain where a dis-tributor or manufacturer’s representative salesagency receives 25 to 30 percent, the reality is gen-erally not quite the ideal. There was a reasonbehind Sam Walton championing the idea of Wal-Mart working directly with manufacturers, therebyeliminating the distributors. This was a necessarystrategy in order for him to continually deliver lowprices to his Wal-Mart customers.

GO DIRECT? If you should select to work directly with a

speaker, the price you will assuredly pay is time.Time both in your search and selection process aswill as time working with the speaker on meetinglogistics. If this route is best for you, there are anumber of advantages that could make your timeinvestment a profitable one. Some of the benefits toyou could be, no lost communication through anintermediary, better negotiation possibilities (theSam Walton dynamic) and the speaker offering pro-gramming ideas and insight that most likely wouldhave never been transmitted through a third party.

Searching for a speaker directly has never beeneasier. To start, there are a number of Internetsearch engines that will do a magnificent job insearching for a speaker by topic or keyword.Remember to look past the first search pagebecause that is most likely where you are going tofind the speaker bargains. A great source to aidyour search is the Web Site of the National SpeakersAssociation (NSA).

Additional items other than cash thatmay create value for a speaker:• Prepayment of speaker’s fee and travel expenses• Additional travel and accommodation for a spouse• Additional nights at the meeting hotel • Earned airline travel vouchers • National chain hotel vouchers (Ritz, Hyatt, Hilton, Marriott, etc.) • City event tours or attraction tickets for meeting city • Restaurant vouchers (in the meeting city or speaker’s home town) • National chain restaurant gift certificates • National big box retailer gift certificates • Tickets to theater performances or sporting events

(in the meeting city or speakers home town) • Snow ski lift tickets • Scuba trips • Bookstore gift certificates (Borders or Barnes & Noble) • Printing services • An advertisement for the speaker's books and products in your

conference, convention or expo directory. • Yearlong full-page advertising in the organization’s magazine,

newsletter or web site. • Guaranteed promotional editorial about the speaker in related

industry publications • Heavily promoted book signing at meeting • Video shoot of the presentation and providing the speaker

with a digital sub-master • Products manufactured or sold by the organization. • Timed usage (one or two-year) of products (automotive, RV, marine, etc.) • Associations; products manufactured or sold by members or sponsors • Electronic formatted association membership directory • Membership in your organization (CVB’s, associations or

business organizations)• And your ideas...


NATIONAL SPEAKERSASSOCIATION

NSA is an alternative method forfinding speakers. NSA has an openonline search capability that anyone canaccess at www.nsaspeaker.org. It istrue that only members of NSA are list-ed, which does limit your possibilitiesjust a bit, but nonetheless you will findthat the NSA Web Site a valuable sourcein your search for the right speaker. NSAoffers its members a certification calledCertified Speaking Professional (CSP).While the CSP designation does notguarantee a speaker’s success at yourmeeting, the process through which aspeaker goes to receive a CSP designa-tion is not an easy one. The CSP is agood indicator that the speaker is trulya professional.

APPROACHING THESPEAKER

Never approach a speaker, out of thegate, by asking if they negotiate theirfees! What the speaker hears is, “I’mcalling to ask you for a discount andoffer nothing in return.” That’s a turn-off in anybody’s book. Besides, every-thing in life is a negotiation—justassume that they will. A betterapproach is to first talk with the speak-er about what you want—engage themin conversation. After they haveaffirmed that they can deliver what youwant, then move into the “we have abudget issue” phase. Do this by firstsuggesting some of the things yourorganization can do for the speaker tocreate extra value for them. Also askthe speaker what creates value in theirlife. Perhaps you have value to offer aspeaker that you had never realized(see insert box).

KEYNOTE VS. BREAKOUTBelieve it or not, more speakers will

be willing to talk to you about yourbudget challenges when you are talk-ing general session (meaning thatthere is no other session competing atthe same time) vs. breakout or concur-rent sessions. The reason for this isexposure and product selling capabili-ty. If a speaker is going to fly acrossthe country to speak at a meeting,

which do you think is more valuable tothe speaker—speaking to 40 people, or400? Naturally, it is the 400. More peo-ple that could potentially recommendthe speaker for future events and moreproduct will surely be sold to 400 peo-ple than to 40—but, rarely do plannersthink about this.

In making your decision about howto acquire your next speaker, I hope theabove has stimulated your thinkingbeyond conventional wisdom. •

Ed Rigsbee, CSP is the author ofPartnerShift, Developing StrategicAlliances and The Art of Partnering.Rigsbee has over 1,000 published articles tohis credit and is a regular keynote presen-ter at corporate and trade association con-ferences across North America. He can bereached at 800-839-1520, [email protected],or visit www.rigsbee.com. Additionally,for more ideas on how to save money atyour next meeting, please visit www.rigs-bee.com/affordablemeetings.htm.



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A FEW YEARS AGO I CAME ACROSS a brochure for anindependent consultant, Sommers White.

The brochure promoting White’s consulting serviceswas written entirely in question and answer format.But what really caught my eye was the first Q & A inthe lead:

Q: WHY SHOULD I HIRE SOMMERS WHITE?A: PERHAPS YOU SHOULD NOT.

WHY IS THIS OPENING SO EFFECTIVE?FIRST, it is unexpected. The surprise factor gets your

attention.

SECOND, it instantly builds White’s credibility.Obviously, here is a guy who only wants clients he canhelp. He won’t just take any business. He has to believehe can really help you before he will work with you.What an ethical guy!

THIRD, it actually enhances the desire to find outmore about White and possibly hire him. It’s intriguing.Who is this man of mystery? Why is he so sure of him-self that he doesn’t even want your business?

This technique of selling is called “the takeawayclose.” White did not invent it, although his use of it asa lead is unusual.

The basic premise of the takeaway close is: Peoplewant what they can’t have.

Think about it. Your doctor tells you, “No morecandy.” What do you instantly want? Candy!

Sales trainer Paul Karasik recommends you use thetakeaway method when trying to close a sale with areluctant prospect.

If the prospect is hemming and hawing, shut yournotebook or folder, take the contract off the table, andsay, “You know, you’re right. This may not be for you.”

The prospect will immediately want to know whyyou say this, and often, will try to prove you wrong. Inessence, they’ll start selling YOU on changing yourmind and accepting them as a customer. What an idealsituation for you!

Another things that makes the takeaway close soeffective is what I call the power of the contrary: Whenyou do something people don’t expect, it is an instantattention-getter.

A radio commercial for Seaman’s, a furniture store inmy area, begins: “Whatever you do, DON’T buy furni-ture today!”

You don’t expect a furniture store to tell you not tobuy furniture. So you listen. It sounds like you are goingto get helpful consumer advice – maybe tips on shop-ping for furniture.

Turns out, the tip is to wait to Saturday for Seaman’s bigblowout sale. But it works. They got your attention — andnow you want to wait for their sale.

The next time you are having trouble closing a prospector moving a sale forward, try the takeaway close.

One caveat: You have to be willing to lose the sale tomake this work. You must be prepared for and ready toaccept the possibility that the prospect will say, “Yes,you’re right, this is not for me.”

Therefore, the takeaway close should only beused either (a) when you already have more busi-ness than you can handle — and therefore can affordto lose the sale, or (b) when the sale is stalled andyou cannot move the prospect forward using yourother closing techniques. •

Robert W. Bly is a freelance copywriter and theauthor of more than 50 books including The CompleteIdiot’s Guide to Direct Marketing (Alpha). His e-mailaddress is [email protected] and his Web site address iswww.bly.com.

When You WCUSTOMERS T

BY ROBERT W. BLY



Tell ThemTHEYCAN’T

WantTO BUY,



“ADVANCE BACKWARD” is a perfect descriptionfor executing successful marketing campaigns. Toachieve results, know first what your outcomemust be. Then, to advance to that result, planbackwards with established goals, and define thepath to take you there. Otherwise, you may endup with a completed marketing initiative that failsto achieve your objectives.

A GOOD MARKETING PLAN WORKS BACKWARDS.

A national grocery chain with a regional pres-ence in an Olympic city advanced backwardswith a guerrilla marketing campaign. Theirobjective: create a connection between the chainand the Olympic Games to build affinity with thehost city and extend their brand recognition.

The plan? Donate the use of a blimp to flyover the games for security, observation, andreporting. This would deliver value to the

Olympic Games and demonstrate honoraryinvolvement in this international event.However, because the grocery was not an officialsponsor, the blimp could not be branded.

With this challenging goal in mind, it wastime to pull together the “marketing dreamteam” to develop the plan and strategy.Members included marketing, public relations,and the promotional product agency.

A PRODUCT AGENCY? Yes, these hard-working marketing tools are

“promotional” products. When marketingdevelops a relationship with a promotional productconsultant who thinks and acts like an agency, theend result is logo product that creates brandawareness and branded merchandise that supportsmarketing efforts.

The grocery’s blimp program was a huge success.Painted with the chain’s logo and corporate

ADVANCEBACKWARD

By: Marsha Londe

Work backwards to get ahead.




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colors of red, white, and blue, the blimp flewover high-profile local events before theOlympic Games. When it was time to donatethe blimp to the games, the logo was removed.To more closely create the connection in public’smind, all store employees and managementdressed in high quality shirts with a flagdesign and an embroidered image of the blimp.The shirts proved to be so patriotic and popularthat customers asked to purchase them. Thechain brought in shirts and hats to sell to theircustomers and in the process created a bonusrevenue stream.

A talented public relations team made cer-tain pictures and stories received local andnational coverage. Even “People” magazinedid an article featuring employees wearingtheir Olympic blimp shirts.

As the Olympics approached, mediareceived blimp-imprinted umbrellas for protec-tion from afternoon showers and heat. Thedivision president personally handed out thou-sands of blimp shaped key tags.

Knowledgeable and savvy marketing, P.R,and promotional product teams worked togeth-er on a highly successful campaign. Even withthe corporate logo removed from the blimp, theOlympic audience knew who sponsored it. Thegrocery chain successfully extended their brandrecognition through a powerful marketingtool…promotional products.

AN EFFECTIVE MARKETING MEDIUM

Why, exactly, do promotional products work?At a time when the agency world is bemoaningthe demise of the 30-second commercial andbusinesses scramble for innovative means to

capture attention, what makes this $18 billiondollar, 100-year-old marketing medium so effec-tive? It’s because a high-performing promotion-al product, integrated into a campaign from thebeginning, completes the marketing effort by providing value to the end-user. Valuableproducts are kept and used, delivering brandingand an impression long after the campaign is completed.

This is a drastic shift in mind-set for thosewho treat product as a last-minute addition.When that happens, product is chosen byprice alone and cannot seamlessly fit into themarketing plan or resonate with the targetaudience. Forget the negative descriptionsthat belittle logo product. Used correctly andcreatively, this advertising venue is highlyeffective in reaching and staying with an audi-ence. Whether developing a product basedcampaign or integrating it with print andmedia, corporate merchandise contributes toreturn on investment.

Avoid the “stuff” and “trinkets” mentality.Take the time to find a partner who bringsvalue to the relationship. Make those advertis-ing dollars count while communicating yourbrand consistently across all marketing efforts.Professionals create ads, and professionalsmanage branded product campaigns. Pickpartners that make a difference and an impact.

Find the right match with a promotionalproduct company that thinks like an agency.When you searched and reviewed for an adagency or PR firm, how did you go about theprocess? You considered what is important toyour company and invested time and dollars toseek out and meet with appropriate candi-dates. Apply the same approach to find yourbest product partner.

The good news is that there are many finecompanies from which to choose, across thecounty and in your own backyard. As youinterview, confirm their approach to market-ing. Do they comprehend your needs, business,and most importantly, how to influence youraudience? Every agency should focus on the “who/what/when/where/how muchand, most importantly, WHY of any campaignor program.

WORK WITH A PRO.“Passion” is a value-added quality. Work

with a pro, one who is knowledgeable,

L – R Danon Middleton, Marsha Londe, Leigh Canavan



detailed, and energetic and believes that brandedproduct enhances marketing performance.Expertise, experience, and a creative mindsettranslate into successful programs that influenceand affect the recipient.

Sergio Zyman, the branding guru, says market-ing is an investment, not an expense. Too oftenpromotional product is an afterthought whendesigning a marketing campaign. For more effec-tive return on investment, budget for brandingfrom the get-go. The grocery chain built productin when planning the marketing approach. Theirlogo product took on a life of its own, strengthen-ing the overall results. Would their guerrilla mar-keting have been as compelling had product beenan afterthought, relegated to what remained ofbudget dollars?

Work with the marketing experts – all of them.An integrated team representing all the marketingdisciplines creates unified, solid marketingexecution. Magic can happen. The ad agency orpublic relations firm may throw out an idea and thepromotional product partner knows the compellingtie-in for lasting impact. Or your product agencymay have the winning idea!

MEDIA, PRINT, P.R., AND PROMOTIONAL PRODUCT.

The grocery chain determined the desired resultand then brought together category specialists,each a professional agency, to brainstorm and makeit happen. Now that’s Olympic quality “advancebackward” thinking! •

Tango Partners manages the RFP process and cost reduction for companies that purchasesignificant quantities of logo merchandise.Headquartered in Atlanta, GA, Tango was formedby pioneers in the promotional product industryand is led by innovators in the use of brandedproduct. More information is available at the company website, www.tangopartners.net, e-mail [email protected] or at 404-846-1900

In Marsha Londe’s 25-year industry career, shehas earned 23 Pyramid awards for the creative use of product to drive results and was twice namedsalesperson of the year. Three of her clients were recognized by the industry as “Buyer of the Year”, areflection of how the effective use of promotionalproduct helped them achieve program goals.



1. A Gold-Plated Stand with Clock, Cardholder & Pen…

is just one of the elegant products available from AmericanIntercontinental Trade Group, Inc. (AITG), a leading

supplier of promotional products for more than 30 years, ontheir new interactive website. Aitginc.com is a one-stop

customer service website that provides access to the company’s expanded product lines, so get clicking

to browse their entire product line.American Intercontinental Trade Group, Inc.

2. When You Want A Pen That Says Elegant…consider the NEW BIC® Attriant™. Exclusively designed

by BIC®, this plunger-action retractable ballpoint penfeatures customized linear gripping pads. It has a glossylacquer finish with chrome-plated trim and is available in

a black or navy high gloss finish.BIC® Graphic USA

3. Have A Little Pen Fun…with one of these fun and functional pens filled with liquid to

meet any budget. Mold your own 3D miniature to float insidea pen you can even light it up with one of the metal pens!

Hirsch Liquid Ideas

4. Show Your American Spirit…with this silver pen set, glass patriotic flag and luxurious

rosewood piano finished stand, perfect for accenting anyexecutive business or home office. The stand comes with a

silver engraving plate to commemorate that special achievement or honor. R.S. Owens & Company

ThingsWeLove

2

1

3

4



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YOU’VE PORED OVER the collection of resumes,cover letters and portfolios on your desk. You’vecarefully weighed the qualifications of each candi-date and chosen the marketing professionals whodeserve further consideration. Now it’s time todecide which interview questions will yield themost telling information about the applicants. Asyou prepare to meet job candidates, consideradding these five queries to your interview arsenal:

1. What interests you about this job, and whatskills and strengths can you bring to it?

This question is one the candidate will beexpecting and should be asked early in the inter-view. The answer enables you to gauge howinterested the candidate is in the position.Equally important, the answer will illuminatehow well prepared he or she is for the interview.Strong candidates will have researched yourorganization and be able to succinctly link theirexperience and skills to your firm’s needs. Anideal response might be similar to this: “I firmlybelieve my success leading XYZ Corp.’s interna-tional campaigns will enable me to help yourbranding effort as you expand overseas.”

2. What are your strategies for keeping up todate with changes in the marketing field?

As new communication platforms arise (thinkabout the emergence of viral advertising andmarketing videos on YouTube and other web-sites), it’s critical marketers stay current withtrends and technology. A savvy candidate willnote that he or she remains ahead of the curve bytapping a multitude of sources, such as industryassociations, marketing-related conferences,trade publications, websites and blogs. Anexcellent follow-up is, “Do you share this knowl-edge with colleagues? If so, how?”

3. Do enjoy working with other people or alone? Ideally, an applicant will be comfortable with

both scenarios. Marketers often interact withclients, fellow creative professionals and col-leagues from other departments. An intervieweewith good interpersonal skills may use a termsuch as “people person” to describe herself asshe outlines her experience collaborating on suc-cessful marketing initiatives. While being a teamplayer is key, marketers also need to be self-directed and adept at making decisions and gen-

BY: THE CREATIVE GROUP

FIVE Must-Ask InterviewQuestions

ExpertInterviewing:



erating ideas on their own. Be wary of candidates who areuncomfortable working autonomously.

4. Describe the most difficult work environment you’veencountered.

Inquiring about the candidate’s most pleasant work experi-ences might elicit warm-fuzzy feelings, but asking about toughsituations will yield more helpful information. Top performerswill likely tell a story highlighting their problem-solvingabilities, while less-savvy interviewees will ventabout a manager or deadlines. An applicant whocomplains about the “hectic nature” of his work-place, for instance, might raise a red flag if yourenvironment is fast-paced. Your goal with thisquestion is to determine if the individual canadapt well to the position and company or if heor she is better suited for a less-demanding rolewith another firm.

5. What steps do you think yourprevious/current company could make to bemore successful?

With this question, you’re digging to seeif the candidate thinks in terms of big-pic-ture goals. You’re looking for an answerthat shows strategic thinking. An astutemarketer will have identified areas ripe forimprovement and articulate possible solu-tions. Candidates who can’t answer thisquery cogently demonstrate a lack ofdepth, knowledge and interest, whichcould carry over into your organization.

While it’s tempting to vary your inter-view questions with each candidate, stick toroughly the same ones for each meeting. Thiswill allow you a more equal basis on which tomake hiring decisions. Finally, take notes oneach applicant’s responses to your queries andsee how they synch with the information you col-lect from references. The best marketers will havea verifiable track record of success.

The Creative Group is a specialized staffing serviceplacing creative, advertising, marketing and web profes-sionals with a variety of firms on a project basis. For moreinformation, visit www.creativegroup.com.



HOLIDAY PARTIES invariably produce that one question most of us dread.You’re sitting on someone’s couch, trying not to spill your beverage on the whitecarpet, you’re dressed in your Holiday finery and waiting for the sugar cookiesto come around again. Music is playing, lights are twinkling, and small talk isgoing on everywhere. Then, it happens. Someone comes and sits next to youand, as they turn toward you and smile, they ask that question. You know theone: “So…what is your New Year Resolution?”

Ok, I will admit, some Resolutions are good ideas… some are questionable.Losing 25 lbs by January 15th is a bit much. Picking up another couple of per-centage points in the market-share game in 2007 is something else, again, andcertainly worth looking into.

Economic indicators suggest companies will continue to tighten their beltsand pay closer attention than ever to how they spend their advertising and mar-keting dollars. Tom Friedman’s The World Is Flat has taught us to think moreglobally than ever, to pay more attention to emerging nations, new enemies andnew friends. The competition is more intense and I am sure part of your resolvewill include being very aware of everything that affects your company’s per-formance. It is also reasonable that your advertising budgets might be cut orfrozen.

So, how do you spend less while going after more market-share?

More and more companies are turning attention to the ways promotionalproducts can help capture attention and continue to drive home their marketingmessage. One reason? Cost-effectiveness. The old-school methods of massadvertising on billboards, radio and in print are being reviewed because theseare shotgun approaches when pin-point accuracy is necessary. We’re all inun-dated with more advertising messages coming at us daily and, as a result, folksare filtering out what they do not have time for. I call this mass advertising the“cross your fingers and hope they remember us” method. I submit you needsomething more accurate going for you.

Pin-point advertising means your target gets a great reminder of who you areand what you do in the form of a useful promotional item placed squarely onhis/her desk or in the office at a cost-per-impression of just pennies, not thou-sands. It means getting your specific target to attend your tradeshow and to wantto come to your booth, first. It means getting your specific target to order largerquantities by knowing about and then taking advantage of your special offers. Itmight be as simple as guaranteeing your target remains loyal to you and it mightmean doing all of the above by using this medium to its full effectiveness.

Resolve now to bring your promotional products professional in for 2007Planning Meetings.

Is this a personal approach to your company’s continued success? You bet.It’s ALL Personal.

Dave Ribble is President of The Company Image, Inc./Geiger and can bereached at 818-906-9894 or [email protected]

It’s ALL Personal

Dave Ribble

“More and more companies are turning

attention to the ways promotional products can help

capture attention andcontinue to drive home

their marketing message. One reason?

Cost-effectiveness.”



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When is the last time you tasted a magazine ad or

sniffed a radio commercial? Touched any billboards

or transit advertising lately?

Conversely, have you bitten into a chocolate truffle

from the pretty tin sent by your insurance company?

Or perhaps you inhaled the tangy scent of the hand

sanitizer you received at the tradeshow last month?

It may sound silly to compare these media, but

success in marketing today is all about creating

the experience. It’s a tangible element that is largely

responsible for the soaring success of Disney theme

parks and Starbuck’s, for example.

Marketing media that engage more than one of the

senses captivate the most attention and create the

longest-lasting experience for users. Print magazines

and direct mail have tried to create more of an

experience from the flat page with the inclusion of

perfume strips and cosmetic samples, but no other

media comes close to promotional products for

advertising that truly goes home with the recipient.

While traditional media is largely one-dimensional,

promotional products are exclusive in their ability to

engage all five senses of touch, taste, sight, smell

and sound. Think about it—the plush toy, memory

stick, blinking button, candle, CD, denim tote, bag of

cashews, scented pen, gel mousepad, pocket radio or

suede-covered travel cup—all imprinted with your

company name or logo. Once you’ve received such a

product, you maintain an instant sensory recall of it.

And if you are like most people, you also remember

the company that gave it to you.

What do you remember about the ads you saw in

the newspaper you read this morning or the

billboards you saw on the way to work? Chances

are both the coupon and message are long gone.

In contrast, when you use promotional products,

their impact is easily measured, they are easily dis-

tributed and tangible, and their use with campaigns

elicits a higher perceived value among recipients

than any other type of advertising.

Traditional media definitely have a role within the

brand-building process. But your campaign will

be infinitely more effective on all levels when

promotional products are also scheduled as part

of the promotional plan.

On the following pages, Promotional Products

Association International provides examples of

how promotional products can be used to create

award-winning promotions. To find a professional

promotional consultant near you, go to

www.promoideas.org and click on the search tool.

Come To Your Senses With Promotional Products

Presented By:

BR1206-WHATWORKS.qxl 11/29/06 5:44 PM Page 34

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www.brilliantpublishing.com

CHALLENGE:Every year, Regence BlueCross BlueShield of Oregon, a health insurance provider, conducts a seminar forhealthcare administrators. But Pam Barrett, adminis-trative assistant for national accounts, didn’t want tohost the same ordinary event; she wanted to generateexcitement for the seminar. How could she do thisand achieve a 10-percent increase in attendance?

SOLUTION:“Historically, the seminar, while important, has notbeen well attended,” Barrett says. She contactedLynn Ackerman, promotional consultant for Wild N’Wooly Marketing in Vancouver, Washington, for help.

In an effort to appeal to this difficult-to-inspireaudience of 100 administrators, they put a twist on the typical invitation: they used a puzzle. Onemonth before the seminar, they mailed a puzzle in acan to administrators, prompting them to assemblethe puzzle in order to read the invitation.

Two weeks later, a follow-up reminder surfaced intheir mailboxes—only this time it was a puzzle-piece-shaped magnet and reminder card. On the

seminar day, attendees were encouraged to collectsix different puzzle pieces from exhibitor booths to piece together a commemorative coaster.

The puzzle theme continued with puzzle-piecename tags and signs. Of course for lunch, attendeesenjoyed pizza, or as BlueCross BlueShield called it,“piece-a.”

RESULT:Barrett was pleased with the response. She had aninitial goal of topping the previous year’s attendanceby 10 percent, but the program resulted in a 50-percentincrease in attendance.

“We have never in the history of putting on thisseminar received such high praise for the quality andjust plain fun of the puzzle theme,” Barrett says.

Find a promotional consultant at www.promoideas.org

FACT: Promotional products have stayingpower, say 75 percent of recipients who,at least once a week, use a productthey’ve received.

Brilliant Results | December 2006 35

INDUSTRY: Insurance—Regence BlueCross BlueShield of Oregon


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CHALLENGE:Many business owners ask them-selves, “How can I promote mybusiness to build corporate recog-nition, generate leads andincrease sales?” With the answersto this question in mind, promo-tional consultant Larry Cohen,president of Axis Promotions &Events in New York City, set out tomeet the challenge of turning histargeted contacts into clients.Cohen decided on a blues-themed,multi-tiered, dimensional mail-ing promotion to gener-ate interest in hiscompany. Hisgoal was tocreateexcitement todifferentiate hiscompany from the competition.

SOLUTION:Cohen planned a three-part mailing to arrive onthree consecutive days so the blues story,designed to resemble a chapter-by-chapter 1940sdetective novel, remained fresh. The first mailing,scheduled to arrive on a Monday morning, was asmall tube containing logo-imprinted Blues Brothers-style sunglasses and a poster. The copy on the tubeasked, “Looking at the same old promotions makingyou blue?”

Arriving on Tuesday was a package with a logo-imprinted harmonica and the copy, “Tired of hearingthe same old tune from your promotions vendors?”The only reference to the company in these first twomailings was its logo on the side of the sunglassesand on the top of the harmonica.

The third mailing and final chapter was designed togive prospects hope (a cure) for their creative blues

and included a customblues CD with “Promotional

Blues? We’ve got the cure!” inserts plus Axis companyinformation.

RESULT:Cohen reports, “This blues mailing has exceeded allexpectations. We initially sent out 29 units with 28of the prospects (96.4 percent) accepting our calls,19 (68 percent) meeting with us and 11 (39 percent)giving us business, which has resulted in more than$345,000 in new sales.”


INDUSTRY: Advertising/Promotional Products—Axis Promotions & Events

FACT: Using promotional products to create brandawareness is the third-largest type of program at9.7 percent behind tradeshows (12.14 percent)and business gifts (17.84 percent).


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CHALLENGE:Waste Management, Inc., theleading provider of disposal serv-ices in North America, wantedto grow its sales. The companyrecognized the strength of itssales team, but it wanted tocapitalize on another resource:its non-sales employees. Non-salespeople can increaseWM sales by gettingexisting customers toupgrade to a largercontainer or gettingpotential customers toswitch to WM from acompetitor. How couldWM motivate them?

SOLUTION:Michael Watson, director of commercial sales for WM,wanted to use a sports theme to motivate employees.He worked with promotional consultant SharonBiernat, MAS, of Wilmette, Illinois-based PromotionalStrategy Partners to develop a game plan.

With a target audience of 40,000 employees, theydesigned a “You Make The Call” campaign by sendinga promotional package to 300 program administra-tors. Inside the packages, administrators—or “coaches”as they would be called for the campaign—foundlanyards, whistles and program details.

Coaches gathered their team members together towatch a training video, after which they gave a quiz.Employees who answered all questions correctlyreceived a company-imprinted pen and duffle bag.Teams were pumped up and ready to sell.

When employees reported leads on the WM 800 num-ber, fax line or website, their names were entered fora chance to win an insulator bottle, NASCAR cap,sports bag or cooler. But the ultimate incentive wasa leather jacket. Every month, WM drew five names

to win a custom leather jacket embroidered with theemployee’s choice of sports team logo.

RESULT:The program resulted in a flood of 29,000 qualifiedleads, 17 percent of which turned into sales. “Sellingthe program to our employees was a breeze. Theywere excited by the prize pool, which included someexcellent promotional products,” Watson says.“Participation, competition and improved moralefueled this program.”


INDUSTRY: Disposal Services—Waste Management, Inc.

FACT: That pizza magnet on your refrigerator doorworks, says a PPAI study. Customers who receivepromotional products average up to 18 percent moreorders than those receiving coupons and up to 13percent more than those who receive nothing.


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CHALLENGE:The entertainment industry always wants the firstrelease of its movie videos and DVDs to generateexcitement in the marketplace so the title will produce outstanding sales. When Buena Vista HomeEntertainment (BVHE) was ready to release videosand DVDs of the movie Monsters, Inc. into theAustralian marketplace, it wanted to create anticipationand secure maximum sales so the title would be thebest-selling-ever release in Australia.

SOLUTION:Promotional consultant Troy Bradbury of Wompro PtyLtd. in West Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, devel-oped a direct mail campaign that targeted managersof national rental outlets, such as Blockbuster andVideo Ezy, as well as state and regional managers forkey accounts and shopping centers. To launch thecampaign, a custom four-color printed mousemat andcoaster set were mounted to the inside of an eye-catching presentation folder. The second mailingwith a “Do the math” theme included a Monsters,Inc.-imprinted calculator and pen set.

A bubble clock to symbolize the “Time’s runningout” message was placed in branded inflatable cush-ion packaging for the third mailing. “It’s not toolate” was the message in the final mailing, whichincluded a branded metal desk pad. “And we didn’tforget the in-store sales support team when it cameto promotional products,” says Bradbury. “Each onereceived a Monsters, Inc.-branded aluminum clipboard,similar to the one in the movie.”

RESULT: Natalie Moss, BVHE group trade marketing manager,says, “Feedback from recipients was enthusiastic,which ensured the title was top of mind during thecompetitive Christmas period. Year-to-date sales arein line to reach our anticipated goal of one millionunits by the end of the campaign period.”

INDUSTRY: Entertainment—Buena Vista Home Entertainment (Disney)


FACT: Flat direct a mail doesn’t pull responsesnearly as much as a box, tube or envelope containing a promotional product. Studies showthe response rate for “fat mail” at 75 percent.


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CHALLENGE:Lori Maliszewski, channel marketing manager forXerox Corporation, wanted to develop a fun, engagingtraining program for Xerox sales reps. Her main goalwas to create awareness of a new printer productwith superior color quality.

SOLUTION:Maliszewski’s first step was to meet with John Davis,promotional consultant for Portland, Oregon-basedCreative Counsel. Playing off the idea that colorsfound in nature could be recreated using Xeroxprinters, they developed a “Catch the Color Bug”theme. The goal was for sales reps to catch the “bug”and spread the news.

Maliszewski and Davis designed training flash cardsthat related a product feature—such as color, flexi-bility, power or speed—to a bug. This “Field Guide”enabled sales reps to learn printer features in aninteresting way.

To further emphasize the bug theme, sales repsreceived boxes containing fun thematic items such

as a magnifying glass and bug jar filled with plasticbugs. On the training day, sales teams could dressthe part of a bug researcher by carrying butterflynets and wearing hiking boots. They also decoratedtraining rooms with a nature theme.

RESULT:Xerox effectively trained 2,500 sales reps within 45days of the product launch. “We created awarenessand knowledge of our product, which resulted ina quick sales ramp of the new product,” saysMaliszewski. “We were able to effectively rise abovethe noise in the marketplace.”

INDUSTRY: Printing—Xerox Corporation

FACT: The packaging and delivery options of promotional products allow them to complimentother types of advertising including print, directmail, e-mail marketing and more.


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CHALLENGE:As a computer reseller and service provider, Insightregularly introduces new products to its sales personneland their managers. The challenge for the Insightstrategy team was to create excitement for the intro-duction of and training on the IBM x440 and sustainemployee interest until the product launch.

SOLUTION:With the help of promotional consultant NaomiAbrams, vice president of Go Promotions inNorthbrook, Illinois, the Insight strategy teamdeveloped Focus Week events to encourage salespeopleto attend training classes so they could becomefamiliar with the product. On the first day oftraining, a lunchtime activity in the parking lot,complete with a rock-climbing wall and rock candy,invited salespeople to “Scale to new heights withthe IBM x440.”

On day two, using a “Find your fortune with the IBMx440” theme, the team left sacks of gold chocolatecoins on the desks of the targeted audience. On daythree, to carry out a “Heat up your sales with theIBM x440” theme, IBM x440-imprinted blue lavalamps were strategically placed at the team sta-tions. And on the fourth day, to tie in with a“Predict sales will soar with the IBM x440” theme,Chinese carryout boxes with customized fortunesin two fortune cookies were delivered to the desksof the target audience.

RESULT:Abrams says the Insight salespeoplebecame familiar with the IBM x440because of the extensive training andvarious activities during Focus Week. “In the fourth month after the campaign, Insight was IBM’s No. 1 x440reseller in the nation,” she says.

Kerry Joe Davis, IBM business develop-ment manager, Insight, Inc., reportsthe revenue increases for the IBMx440 for the four months after thecampaign measured 615-percent,324-percent, 1,069-percent and 486-percent growth.

INDUSTRY: Computer—Insight, Inc.

TIP: While you may think you are savingmoney buying promotional productsonline, a promotional consultant has theclout to push for the best pricing withoutthe high-quantity demands.



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The variety of products available to businesses and

consumers today is greater than any other time in

history. And with the world wide web just a click

away, buyers are also more informed than ever

before. Business author Bo Bennett said, “In sales,

a referral is the key to the door of resistance.” How

can you get clientele to give your key to others?

Make it easy. How many times have you wanted to

refer a plumber, real estate agent or even a great

Chinese take-out restaurant to a friend but couldn’t

find the contact information? Business cards get

misplaced, and no one has the time to search

through old home maintenance records or a

drawer full of to-go menus to locate that

elusive phone number.

Promotional products, such as calendars, mouse pads

and coffee mugs, live on prominent desktop real

estate. By including a phone number and web

address in addition to the company name, it’s easy

to give a co-worker the 411 on firms you like doing

business with. In fact, people who receive

promotional products are 12 percent more likely

to recommend your business to others than if they

received nothing, according to a PPAI study.*

So if you need the key to unlock the door to more

referrals, talk to your promotional consultant.

Together, you can choose decorated merchandise

that opens the door to new business.

Now that’s the power of promotional products.

PROMOTIONAL PROOF

PROMOTIONAL PRODUCTS ASSOCIATION INTERNATIONAL3125 Skyway Circle NorthIrving, TX 75038888-I-AM-PPAI (426-7724)www.ppa.org

PPAI—the promotional products industry’s only international not-for-profit trade association—offerseducation, mentoring, public relations, publications,technology, tradeshows and legislative support to its7,500 global member companies.

INDUSTRY RESEARCH: The Power Of Promotional Products

2

2.2

2.4

2.6

2.8

3

3.2

Product No Product

Likelihood To Recommend The Business

*Promotional Products’ Impact On Brand/Company Image Study© 2006 Promotional Products Association International

On a scale of 1 to 7, with 1 representing a negativeresponse and 7 representing a positive response.


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FINISH YOUR HOMEWORK! Wish you had a nickel for every time you heardthat from your parents? Homework is what used to separate me fromgirlfriends, driving my car, hanging with my friends, playing pick-up basketballand about everything else I could categorize as more fun than that 8-letter wordfor drudgery. I grew up only to have kids and pass along the same admonition,then watch them squirm and try everything they could to make me think theirassignments were handled.

What happens as we grow up? Could it be that not wanting to do homeworkhas now evolved into being part of our everyday DNA? When I think about howmuch work we don’t do in building our databases and following up with peoplewho are trying to find us from our website, it certainly seems like I might be right.

I had coffee the other day with Jon Cline, president of a company calledEnthusiast*. Jon’s forte is figuring out how to get the very most out of awebsite so it works at peak performance consistently. I asked him to explainwhat he meant by that and, would you believe, Jon referred to Homework as thebest way to answer the question.

“Dave, too many companies out there are spending hundreds of thousands ofdollars to have the snazziest website on the face of the earth, complete with allthe bells and whistles you could ask for. Their graphics are superb; their layersof depth as to what they offer are a virtual smorgasbord of cool stuff. But, if theyhaven’t done their homework, they may very well be missing the boat becausethe right set of people needing to find them cannot.”

Ok, so what would be the right kind of homework for a website?

“At Enthusiast, we first encourage a thorough Key-Word Analysis to find theemotional and psychographic DNA of both the potential buyers they are seekingand the current web saturation of these terms by competitors. Then, we wouldrecommend a three-fold strategy leveraging the website and an e-newsletter:(1) rewrite the website using the targeted key words and phrases, (2) segmentand email relevant summary information to this email list pushing them back tothe website or sending trigger emails with next-step options, and (3) follow theemail campaign by analyzing the response reports and see who clicked what andfollow up on those high-value users individually.”

Cliff’s Notes’ interpretation: Your customers have to FIND you or the rest isunnecessary. If you do your homework there are ways to figure out what yourtarget audience thinks, how they look for things, how they search for and findthings. Know this and you are well on your way to more market-share.

Is setting up your site so that it is a more personal approach worth it?Absolutely. It’s ALL Personal.

Dave Ribble is President of The Company Image/Geiger, [email protected].*Reach Jon Cline at [email protected] or 866.242.4748.

It’s ALL Personal

Dave Ribble

“If you do your homework there are

ways to figure out what your target

audience thinks, howthey look for things,how they search for

and find things. “Editor’s Note: This column was published with errors in our November issue. We regret the errors and are republishing the column in its correct format.


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1. What brand was the advertised product in the first television

commercial?

a. Bulova Watches

b. Ivory Soap

c. Pep Bran Flakes

2. How fast did the actor who sped through the Federal Express

commercial speak?

a. 200+ words a minute

b. 400+ words a minute

c. 600+ words a minute

3. What advertising agency created the famous "Think Small,"

"Lemon," and "Ugly's Only Skin Deep" advertising campaigns

for Volkswagen?

a. Ogilvy Mather

b. Young Rubicam

c. Doyle Dane Bernbach

4. Who was the first Olympic decathlon winner to sponsor

Wheaties?

a. Bruce Jenner

b. Bob Richards

c. Bill Toomey

5. What animal is always trying to steal Trix?

a. A squirrel

b. A bear

c. A rabbit

6. How did Pepsi-Cola get its name?

a. It was once peppermint flavored

b. It gave you “pep”

c. It once claimed to contain pepsin

7. Which American President gave us the Maxwell House slogan?

a. Theodore Roosevelt

b. Woodrow Wilson

c. Grover Cleveland

8. Where did the Chevrolet cross originate?

a. From Chevrolet’s coat of arms

b. From hotel wallpaper

c. From a knight’s shield

9. Where did H.J. Heinz get his 57 varieties slogan?

a. From a shoe ad

b. From the year of his birth

c. From his age at the time

10. What did Anheuser Busch name Budweiser beer for?

a. Clarence Budweiser, Milwaukee mayor

b. A Czech town

c. “Bud” Weiser, a baseball player

BONUS: Who coined the term "conspicuous consumption"?

Quote~

Answers: 1. a; 2. b; 3. c; 4. b; 5. c; 6. c; 7. a; 8. b; 9. a; 10. bBonus: Thorstein Veblen in “The Theory of the Leisure Class.”


Off The CuffMARKETING TRIVIA:

Advert is ing, S logans & Brands

"An image is not simply a trademark, a design, a slogan or an easily remembered picture. It is a studiously craftedpersonality profile of an individual, institution, corporation,product or service."

Daniel J. Boorstin, American Historian & Writer

"If this business were split up, I would give you the land and bricks and mortar, and I would take the brands andtrademarks, and I would fare better than you."

John Stewart, Former CEO, Quaker (circa 1900)

"Price is what you pay. Value is what you get."Warren Buffett, American Investment Guru


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TheLast Word

SINCE MARKETING ROI and marketingprofitability have recently been placedat the top of the agenda for businessexecutives who recognize the need tomanage marketing costs while achievingincreased sales results, the opportunityto speak with Jim Lenskold, founderand President of the Lenskold Groupand an expert in the science of meas-uring marketing ROI, was a perfectmatch for the Last Word in this market-ing focused issue. An internationalspeaker and author of Marketing ROI, The Pathto Campaign, Customer and CorporateProfitability (McGraw Hill, 2003) Jim recentlymoderated a panel of three B2B CMOs on thetopic of “Measuring Marketing ROI in the B2BWorld”. In his book, a Top 5 Finalist in the 2004Berry-AMA Prize for Best Book in Marketing,Jim presents tools, techniques and methodolo-gies for strategically maximizing profits at thecampaign, customer and corporate level.According to Jim, traditional marketing budgetingand measurements are not keeping pace with

the science, technology and expecta-tions of today’s corporations and inMarketing ROI he removes the veil ofmystery around the financial dynamicsof marketing and maps out the path toprofitability.

Through the Lenskold Group, practicalsolutions that establish credibility for themarketing organization are delivered.This group combines financial disciplineand a unique blend of methodologies todeliver performance measurements and

strategic insight and has served a broad range of clients since 1997. A team of accomplishedprofessionals combined with a strong network ofpartners, they provide cohesive and comprehensivesolutions for both short and long-term paths togreater marketing profitability.

With a Mission Statement to “Advance theknowledge, tools, and processes to enable execu-tives and marketers to accurately and effectivelyuse measurement of financial outcomes to guidestrategies and tactical plans,” the Lenskold Grouphas surpassed traditional mind-sets and methods to

Jim Lenskold, founderand President of the

Lenskold Group


TheLast Word

www.brilliantpublishing.com

develop the most comprehensive andinnovative process to plan, measure, andoptimize marketing strategies toward max-imum profitability. Brilliant Results waspleased to have Jim Lenskold share histhoughts and expertise with our readers.

BR: What led you to form theLenskold Group?

JL: I originally formed theLenskold Group to pursue my pas-sion for both entrepreneurial ven-tures and marketing. We delivered strategic mar-keting services to a diverse range of companies,with significant focus on early stage ventures. Fouryears ago, I re-launched my consulting firm aroundmarketing profitability management to address thechallenge large corporations were having in meas-uring the financial impact of their marketing.

BR: What is the single most important service/ben-efit that the Lenskold Group offers its clients?

JL: We bring a unique depth of expertise in pro-viding financial impact analysis and measurementdiscipline to help guide more profitable marketingstrategies and tactical decisions. Clients benefitfrom increased performance and profits as well as asimplified process that allows marketers to managetheir planning process.

BR: How can a CMO apply your marketing ROImeasurement system to determine the success of amarketing strategy?

JL: There are a number of ways to get startedwith the marketing ROI process. CMOs ready to

embrace marketing accountabilityacross the organization will workwith us to first establish a solid ROIframework that helps link marketingimpact to customer behaviors, salesactivity, and then financial outcomes.This helps to define the key profit driversand creates a better defined focal pointfor marketing initiatives. From thispoint, or for CMOs that prefer to starton a smaller scale, we develop an inte-grated measurement plan to isolatethe impact of specific marketing ini-

tiatives through a combination of modeling,market testing, quantitative research,and/or trend analyses. The goal is to equipmarketers with easy-to-use ROI planningtools and quality data that comes fromgood measurements to constantlyimprove the impact on profitability.

BR: What are the principal pointscovered in your book, Marketing ROI?

JL: The book lays out the key prin-ciples of the marketing ROI processand helps marketers establish anaccurate financial analysis of mar-keting impact.

BR: In your opinion what is/arethe key(s) to a successful market-ing campaign?

JL: The most significant driverof profitability almost alwayscomes from targeting – finding the

Brilliant Results | December 2006 49



most profitable customers that are also the mostprobable to convert into sales. Another key to successis integrating marketing (and sales when applicable)to effectively influence prospects through the entirebuying cycle (aka the customer funnel). Leakagepoints in the funnel, where prospects fail to progressto the next stage in their decision process, representlost profit opportunities.

BR: What is your personal favorite (or most suc-cessful) marketing campaign and why?

JL: My favorite marketing decision is tied to howa client effectively applied ROI analysis. It is notuncommon for a company to run an ROI projection

on campaigns that have run for a long time and findthat there is little or no opportunity to make thecampaign profitable. The additional insight comesfrom looking at profits instead of revenue. Just lastyear a client recognized that the portion of theirmarketing budget going to their most valuableclients had an offer structure that was too rich forthis group. They acted on the information by changingthe structure and still recognizing valuable customersfor their business. That was a simple first step thatgave them initial success.

BR: In your opinion how can promotional and/orincentive products be used to enhance the success ofa marketing campaign?

JL: When you look at the customer funnel anddesign your strategies and tactics to effectivelyinfluence prospects through each stage of theirdecision process, there is absolutely a role for incen-tive products. You want to make sure the impact ofthe incentive, such as attracting attention, commu-nicating an aspect of your brand, or creating a dialoguewith a prospect 1) attracts the right customer whohas high potential value and a high probability ofconverting to a sale, 2) plays a specific role in moving prospects to the next stage in the customerfunnel and/or reduces a leakage point in the funnel,and 3) integrates with the marketing or sales initiativesthat precede and follow your touchpoint.

BR: Do you remember the last promotional orincentive merchandise you received? Where, whenand from what organization?

JL: My favorite and longest-lasting promotionalproduct is a pen that has a light around the tip. It’sgreat for making notes late at night on a plane or ina car. The pen was from Google and I’ve had it forover a year. I’m not sure it had much influence on mybuying behaviors but hopefully it put me into aprospect list where other marketing initiatives didtheir job.

Additional information about the Lenskold Groupmay be found by visiting www.lenskold.com or bytelephone at 732-223-8886.

TheLast Word

“When you look at the customer funnel and design your strategies and tacticsto effectively influence prospects through each stage of their decisionprocess, there is absolutely a role for incentive products.”


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