Abercrombie and Fitch Got It Right

Okay, so Abercrombie and Fitch has been in the news lately because of things their CEO has said about the kind of customers they want.  Their CEO, Mike Jeffries stated, “We go after the cool kids.  A lot of people don’t belong and they can’t belong.  Are we exclusionary?  Absolutely.”  By the way, did you know that he originally said this in a 2006 interview?  Only now has it gone viral.  Now, in response to the viral words of A&F’s CEO, a man by the name of Greg Karber wants to re-brand A&F by giving away their clothes to the homeless. 

Maybe I’m going to come off sounding like the bad guy here, but I think A&F has it right.  Here’s why. 

1.       First of all, they very clearly know who their target market is.  A&F has always been an elite brand.  They had decided a long time ago that their target market is the “cool kids” and that doesn’t include anyone over a size ten.  As a successful business, you can’t be everything to everybody.  A&F knows EXACTLY who their customers are and they should keep it that way.

2.       We often complain that companies are being shady or aren’t being transparent.  A&F is being completely transparent and we’re giving them crap for it!  They aren’t hiding anything and are unapologetic in their stance.  I say, good for them for being honest and true to their beliefs.  They’re not afraid to tell it like it is and they’re not just a voice hiding behind a logo.  If you want companies to be more open, don’t bash them when they do. 

3.       They insist on hiring only attractive people.  I hate to say it, but attractive people have better employment rates to begin with.  You would think that in this day and age, everyone would have equal opportunity to have a job they are qualified for.  That is not always the reality though.  Check out these articles from Workopolis that point to some of the ways more attractive people get ahead in their careers.

http://www.workopolis.com/content/advice/article/353-can-you-be-too-attractive-to-get-hired

http://www.workopolis.com/content/advice/article/2098-five-unfair-ways-that-people-make-more-money

What I’m saying here is that A&F is not the only company to hire more attractive people.  And really, when you think about it, every company uses models in their advertising.  If A&F only hires attractive people, they’ve got built in models right inside the company.

4.       All of the PR that A&F has received has probably done more for their brand awareness than any paid campaign they’ve ever done.  All of a sudden everyone knows who A&F is.  You may not agree with their ideas or you may not ever buy any of their stuff, but you certainly know who they are.

 

5.       So, going back to this initiative to donate the A&F clothes to the homeless.  I like the idea of donating clothing to people in need, but frankly do you really think a homeless guy is going to care about the brand name on the shirt that he just received?  No way.  He’s just happy that he has something clean to wear.  And I really don’t think other people pay much attention to what homeless people are wearing either.  If you walked by a homeless person on the street, would you notice if his shirt is from A&F?  Not likely.  So, trying to re-brand A&F by giving the clothing to the homeless is not really going to do much good.  Please, go ahead and donate your clothing to the less fortunate, whether it’s A&F or not.

 

I’m not saying that Mr. Jeffries is a great guy.  Heck, I’ve never met him and likely never will.  What I’m saying is that he might have chosen his words a little more carefully and frankly he does come across as offensive.  However, don’t bash the guy for something he said 7 years ago, especially when the company is just doing what it does best… effective target marketing.  You don’t have to agree with the company’s decisions and you don’t need to buy any of their products.  Just understand that from a marketing stand point, they got it right…  a defined target audience and free PR.  Exactly what every business should be doing.

 

 

5 Ways To Create Effective Advertising

Advertising is an important part of any marketing plan. But with so much focus on social media these days, you'd think that advertising isn't worth the cost. However, done right advertising can be a really important part of your marketing strategy, especially with a good mix of online and traditional advertising. If you've ever attended one of my workshops or even read some of blog posts you'll know that I am all about consistent, integrated marketing. That means that all of your marketing activities need to work together in a systematic approach to achieving your business goals. And advertising is one of those activities.

The biggest advantage that advertising has over other marketing activities is the sense of control. With proper target marketing you can control (to a point) who sees or hears your ad and you can control when your ad is run. The key to effective advertising is knowing what your objectives are and how you want to approach your campaign. 

Below are 5 elements that you should consider in order to make any form of advertising effective.

1. Advertising should have one of 3 objectives... to inform, remind or persuade your audience. Know what your goals are before you even think about writing the ad. The desired outcome will ultimately determine the look, feel, sound, and distribution of the ad. The goal of most advertising should be to start a relationship, not sell a product or service.

2. Be realistic about what an ad can do. If you are running a small online ad chances are it will be pretty unrealistic to expect a multi-thousand dollar sales achievement from 15 words and a link. When setting your advertising goals, set a realistic goal and set a ‘stretch’ goal to strive for. Also, know that advertising alone cannot be the only metric to measure your success by. There are a lot of factors that go into the buying decisions of consumers.

3. Advertising, both online and offline can be and should be targeted at a narrowly defined viewer. If a radio station that tells you that 75% of its listeners are 18-55 that isn't narrow enough. Know your ideal customer really well, what they want and how they want to communicate with you before implementing any advertising.

There are lots of resources out there to help you learn more about your ideal customer but Google AdWords is a great tool to find out what your customers are looking for. Group your Google AdWords into very tightly crafted keyword groups to target people looking for very specific things. You can also find geo targeted mailing lists and then cross them with lists of people that buy a similar product.

4. Measure everything

The most successful business owners, managers and marketers can tell you exactly how every element of their marketing is performing and why. It takes a great deal of work to get serious about things like analytics and tracking, but you won’t really succeed until you do. By taking the time to create a process that allows you to measure every aspect of your advertising you can see what's working and what isn't, allowing you to make necessary changes and further improve on what is working all the while staying tuned in to what your market wants more of.

5. Test, test, and test again

This last element goes hand in hand with measurement, but takes it a step further. Once you have a baseline you can start to work on improving your results by simply tweaking things like headlines, calls to action, visual elements, keywords, content, publications and lists. Once you know what’s working in one place you can expand on it to test it in other places. Google AdWords is an inexpensive way to test thing out before broadcasting more widely. As for online advertising, particularly in social networks, you also might want to test out new social networks and their advertising structure to get a feel for what works and what doesn’t, providing it reaches your target audience.

So, even with the advent of social media, advertising still has its place in your marketing strategy. Advertising has changed its distribution channels over the years and that will continue for many more years to come. But no matter what distribution channel you use, whether it’s online or off ine advertising, using these tips will allow you to create advertising that resonates with your customers.

Create a Marketing Strategy in 3 Easy Steps

I just came to the realization that all of my blog posts just dance around the topic I am the most passionate about.  And that’s strategy.  I’ve written about integrating your marketing, 3 easy steps to creating a marketing budget and I’ve talked a lot about building a brand.  So, today I decided that I’m just going to lay it all out there, straight forward, step by step on how to develop a strategy before you even attempt to spend $1 on any of your marketing.

Developing a strategy is by far the most important step when marketing your business.  The biggest mistake small business owners make is that they know they need to market their business, but they don’t know where to start.  So, what happens is that they get roped into these “deals” from ad executives from the local newspapers, and radio and TV stations.  They wind up spending hundreds or thousands of dollars on advertising but don’t really know whether it worked or not.  Well, let me walk you through a 3-part process to help you develop a strategy so you don’t spend any more money on advertising that doesn’t work.

Part 1 – Brainstorm:

This is where you throw out every possible thought that comes to mind.  Sometimes the crazier the better.  I have found that sometimes a member of the team will throw out some weird and wild idea that ultimately we end up using some or all of that idea.  But this is also the time to define some really key things such as your intended target market, your goals and your budget.

One of the most important keys to developing a strong marketing communications plan is to determine your target market or target markets and know what they want and how they want to communicate with you.  The trick is to discover what that ideal customer looks like in the most specific way possible and then go about building an entire marketing strategy around attracting more of these ideal customers. 

Part 2 – Budget:

This is where most of my clients get the most stressed out because they haven’t allocated any specific amounts to their business activities.  They are really just “winging it.  If you don’t have a plan this is where you can get into trouble with your spending and then it really will be too expensive. 

1.       To create a marketing budget for the year, set your budget between 5 – 10% of your gross annual sales.  When you think about it, $100,000 is sales with a marketing budget of 5% only gives you $5000 to work with for the year.  This is where the creativity comes in, knowing where to best allocate those dollars.

2.       From that budget, develop marketing campaigns for the year.  Then develop a budget for each campaign based on the yearly budget you have just set for the company.

Remember that advertising doesn’t have to cost you a fortune.  Leave the big marketing budgets for the big corporations who have the money to spend on it. 

Part 3 – Metrics

Now, you need to set metrics for tracking the direct impact of each campaign on its ability to help you reach your marketing goals.  If you have nothing to measure your marketing efforts with you won’t know whether or not your marketing is actually working.  Some common metrics include number of click-throughs on an online ad, number of new sales, number of new leads or percent increase in traffic to the store.  In order to be useful, metrics need to be measurable and quantifiable.  So, make sure you define them specifically with numbers and then break them apart into tiny segments that you can work towards achieving.  Review last year's sales records so you have something to which to compare this year's sales. Here is where good record keeping is essential. 

An increase in leads or sales over last year's numbers might indicate that your current marketing campaigns are actually working but don’t make the mistake of putting all of your eggs in one basket.  One marketing activity cannot be held accountable for your total business success.  So be sure to have a variety of metrics to track.

So, now you have an idea of how to create a strategy before you actually go about spending any money on your marketing.  For more in-depth information, download the video below.  This video is from a webinar I presented a few months ago and gives you a much more detailed step by step process to creating a strategy that works.

Strategy Before Tactics

I always love hearing from small business owners to find out how you do things.  I’d love to hear your input on creating a marketing strategy.  Tell me how you created your strategic marketing plan.