The Digital Agency
“The Digital Agency” is a digital marketing agency which I am founder & director of.
The Digital Agency is a digital marketing agency with offices in London and Istanbul. The Digital Agency has expertise in website production, social media communication, search engine optimization, Facebook & Google advertising through 12 years of experience with 110 brands in 400 projects.
World-class brands that trust The Digital Agency include:
- World’s largest tire manufacturer: Michelin
- World’s leading beauty company selling direct: Oriflame
- World’s largest hotel chain IHG that owns Holiday Inn
- World’s largest hosting company: Equinix
- World’s 3rd largest biscuit producer: Yildiz Holding (owner of McVities, United Biscuits, Godiva)
- World’s largest natural products company: Dabur
- Europe’s largest auto service station chain: Euromaster
- Europe’s largest integrated meat factory: Aytaç
Leadership and Management Skills
Make your team proud
Make your team happy
Rewire your brain to focus on positive
Spend time above the line not below the line (
You can start the day with your intention. What are you going to get from it?
High growth model book – email to instructor
Prove – initial stage of business when you achieve constant ROI
Grow – leadership, team, implementing strategy, coming up with great strategy
High growth cycle – the team brought you to that place might not be the team that might take you to the next level
Valley of death
When you need to reinvent yourself to move to next stage
1m – 10m – 20m revenues – many companies fail to scale
4 people – 24 types of interpersonal relationships
Managing interpersonal relationships
Leadership management
Pareto – 20% of activities make up to 80% of results
1- personal leadership
2- communication
3- leadership and management skills
4- build and grow high performing teams
Tip of the iceberg – being doing
Below the surface – habits goals beliefs values passions
Environment around us
Passions – your purpose, an intense desire or enthusiasm
Values – represent your highest priorities and your deepest driving forces
What’s important to you?
Define your value rules
Put down how you express your values
Eg value: health, rules: anytime Ie exercise,
Beliefs: the lens that you see the world
Write down 5 beliefs about your company
Beliefs about your team
And your leadership skills
Are they empowering or holding you back
The power of written goals –
A class research only 3% had goals written down and they got 98% of wealth after 25 years
Beware the niagara falls syndrome
(Dissatisfaction x vision) + FirstSteps > Resistance
Why you got to change
Write down 3 goals you want to achieve this year
Communication is one of the best
Importance of empathy
3 tools of communication – body language 55%, voice 38%, words 7%
Modalities of communication
40% visual
20% Auditory
40% kinesthetic
Neuro linguistic programming NLP
Match and mirror
Do not stop meeting altogether
They get rid of miscommunication
Make them more effective
Every meeting ever https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7agjXFFQJU
Quarterly one day meeting strategy
Monthly 4 hours – priorities
Weekly 1 hour – big issues
Daily 5-15 mins – tactics
Best time for meetings 11am – 2pm
People are most productive in the morning
Types of meeting
Consensus decisions
Creative decision
Information sharing
3 roles
Moderator
Time keeper
Parking lot – take note of items to discuss in the future
Whoever attends meetings must have a voice
PERSUASION
Push method. I have an idea , proposing ideas, suggestions, recommendations, questions that suggest a proposal
Reasoning facts and logic in support or opposition argument against
Pull , asserting . stating expectations, needs, demands, standards, requirements
Evaluating, positive or negative judgement, reinforcement, criticism, personal and intuitive
Using Incentives and pressures: specifying the ways and means you control that meet others needs
Attracting
Finding common ground, highlighting common values, beliefs, ideas or agreement
Sharing visions
Bridging
Involving soliciting views ideas information from other encouraging participation
Listening summarizing reflecting feelings,
Disclosing admitting mistakes revealing uncertainty asking for help, making oneself vulnerable
LEADERSHIP VS MANAGEMENT
Vision and strategy
Creating value
Influence
Have followers
Behavior dynamics
Mindset – behaviour – results
Mindset – meditation, breathe box method (breathe in 4 seconds, wait 4, breathe out 4, wait 4)
Gratitude, journal
Water, eating healthy, sleep, exercise,
Physiology, posture, breathing, tone of voice
Language: words used to describe experience
- DIMINISHER VS MULTIPLIER
High growth leaders have the right questions not the right answers
- COACHING
10% build rapport
70% listen and ask questions
10% feedback and advice
10% decisions
Coaching – instead of instructing, ask questions. Let them think about solutions and answers.
- DELEGATION
How you can create more time in your life, stop doing something.
Management by Objectives
EMPOWER TEAM TO MAKE DECISIONS
Authority level | Decision areas and specific |
Discuss with manager, make joint decision | |
Bring signature stage, recommendation, manager sign off | |
Act and report through agreed process |
Most valuable thing you have: TIME
Time management = Life management
10 WAYS OF DOUBLING YOUR PRODUCTIVITY
1- Make a list, get ideas out of your head,
2- Consequence: What are the consequences of not doing those?
3- Zero based thinking: If you started the day over, what would you do differently?
4- 20:80 pareto principle, how do you spend your 20% time to get 80% results
5- Time grid:
Not urgent but important – that is where growth happens
6- Focus. Follow one course until successful.
7- Stop procrastination,
Set clear goals
Break goals down to bite sized
Pick 1 task and start immediately
Do the most important thing first thing in the morning
8- Default diary
9- Plan
10- Leverage
BUILD A HIGH PERFORMING TEAM
Focus on culture
Winning cultures are difficult for competitors to copy
Employees seek more from their jobs than pay
Report card on leadership is culture.
How people talk to each other
Put big rocks into the bottle first. What are big rocks?
What are the 3 biggest goals?
- ALIGNMENT
What is your vision?
Does it describe how things will look like?
Lack of clarity will result in people coming back to the leader, asking every step.
- ACCOUNTABILITY
Assign clear expectations +owners agreement + personal reward = self ownership and high accountability
RACI
Responsible
Accountable
Consult
Inform
Find everybody’s roles up front
Well-being Strategy
Creating a robust and effective well-being strategy designed to boost productivity, performance, and profit.
The amygdala (Latin, corpus amygdaloideum) is an almond-shape set of neurons located deep in the brain’s medial temporal lobe. Shown to play a key role in the processsing of emotions, the amygdala forms part of the limbic system.
AUTONOMIC NERVOUS SYSTEM
Sympathetic nervous system
Fight or flight – stress response
Adrenaline, cortisol
The sympathetic nervous system directs the body’s rapid involuntary response to dangerous or stressful situations. A flash flood of hormones boosts the body’s alertness and heart rate, sending extra blood to the muscles
—
Parasympathetic nervous system
Rest and digest, feed and breed
Oxytocin, serotonin
The parasympathetic nervous system is one of three divisions of the autonomic nervous system. Sometimes called the rest and digest system, the parasympathetic system conserves energy as it slows the heart rate, increases intestinal and gland activity, and relaxes sphincter muscles in the gastrointestinal tract.
- These two systems cannot be activated simultaneously.
2 FROGS
The boiling frog is a fable describing a frog being slowly boiled alive. The premise is that if a frog is put suddenly into boiling water, it will jump out, but if the frog is put in tepid water which is then brought to a boil slowly, it will not perceive the danger and will be cooked to death. The story is often used as a metaphor for the inability or unwillingness of people to react to or be aware of sinister threats that arise gradually rather than suddenly.
MANAGING PERSONAL STRESS
- Symptoms
- Cause
- Prevention
STRESS MONITORING
What are you feeling when there is a trigger?
PRACTICAL APPROACH
- Can you eliminate the source
- Can you reduce your exposure?
- Can you change how you deal with it?
SEE HEAR FEEL 54321
https://makingsenseoftrauma.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/5-4-3-2-1-Relaxation-technique.pdf
- Be aware
- Manage notifications
- Manage expectations
- Remove phone / tech from bedroom
CALMING MEDITATION
Meditation is a practice where an individual uses a technique – such as mindfulness, or focusing the mind on a particular object, thought, or activity – to train attention and awareness, and achieve a mentally clear and emotionally calm and stable state.
Mindfulness is the psychological process of purposely bringing one’s attention to experiences occurring in the present moment without judgment, which one can develop through the practice of meditation and through other training.
20 MINUTE RULE
There is an easy trick that you can use in order to forge new goal habits to help you accomplish the goals behind the dreams that make up your ideal life: It’s called the 20 Minute Rule. The 20 Minute Rule is a simple three-step process. … Devote 20 minutes a day to that new goal habit.
- Procrastination
- Reduce exposure to stress
- Manage large projects
- Work ahead of time
SURVEY
JLD resilience and wellbeing survey report 2019
TANGIBLE AND INTANGIBLE COSTS THAT STRESS BRINGS IN TO YOUR BUSINESS
Stress is taking its toll on our society and costing the NHS over 165,000 bed days per year with a cost to the public of £71.1 million. The UK is facing a mental health crisis and it is largely due to our broken economic system.
INTANGIBLES
- Absenteeism
- Poor performance
- Do the bare minimum
- Rpocrastination
- Reduced profitability
- Lost productivity
- Stiffle innovation
- Lose best people
- No job satisfaction
Rosch (2001) also estimated that stress costs the US economy US$300 billion annually, this figure being based on Albrecht’s (1979) conservative estimate of the annual cost of stress-related absence and staff turnover of US$150 billion.
Tangible Costs | Intangible Costs |
Hours lost | Delays / missed deadlines |
Company sick pay /SSP | Lost productivity of others picking up slack |
Temporary Cover | Effect on team wellbeing |
Lost productivity | complaints |
Admin | goodwill |
Return to work | Effect on manager / you |
Litigation | Other |
WELLBEING STRATEGY
- Reduce sick days
- Best performance
- Enthusiasm and engagement
- Increase profitability
- Reduce recruitment costs
Deloitte 2017 UK research says wellbeing strategy ROI 400%
5 STEP FRAMEWORK
- Accept
- Understand
TIPS
- Accept – treat stress like any other business issue
- Provide for it in the same way as other human needs at work (such as water, food etc)
- Understand
- We need data, knowledge
- Well being audit,
- Set goals
- Plan
- Why are you implementing a wellness strategy?
- Who will manage it, HR?
- What is it you are going to focus on
- How are you going to implement it?
- Where, office workers vs warehouse employees?
- When can we implement it?
- Plan
- Tactics
- Empowerment to handle stress
- Hydration 3-4% dehydration reduce work performance by 25-50%
- Management styles and consistency
- Communication
- Expectations
- Training / education
- Support for stress
- Culture / behaviours
- Mission and values
- Email, phone
REALITY CHECK (AVOID)
- One-offs
- Gimmicks
- Activities that only a few will benefit from
- Fashion (unless it adds real value)
- One size fits all
- Double standard
- HR doing wellbeing
- Giant leaps
- Forced imposition
- Increasing targets
Small Business Finance
Money might not equal to success
Yes money is important and we are in business to earn money
What success is not:
- Having large turnover
- Business losing money
- Being in debt
Bigger picture
- 99% of UK businesses is small business
- 40% is 5 year survival rate
Why businesses fail
- Grow too fast: can’t meet the demand
- Run out of cash
- Poor management
- No market demand
- Risk not managed: 2 directors not getting on?
Financial basics
- Have a business model that works,
- profit or at least breakeven (people working are paid)
- Enough cash
- To pay taxes
- Support owners
- Money reserve
- Invoicing, collection, book keeping
- Sales
- Cost of sales
- Gross profit
- Gross profit margin
- Expenses / overhead
- Net profit
- Tax
- Net profit after tax
- VAT does not belong to business
- Business are acting as agents of gov’t to collect VAT
Balance sheet
- Stuff that have value (assets)
- Cash
- Debtors – accounts receivable (outstanding invoices)
- Stock (money tied up)
- Fixed assets (PC, plant, vans)
- Liabilities
- What you owe to others
- Creditors / accounts payable (bills to pay)
- Taxes (VAT, corp tax, PAYE etc)
- Loans (incl. Directors’ loans)
- You can charge interest for personal loan to company
- Owner’s equity / capital
- What is truly yours
- Share capita
- Net profit after tax less dividends OR
- Net profit less drawings (if sole trade / partnership )
BUILD A FINANCIAL STRATEGY
- Getting dividends is more tax efficient instead of wages
- When you take on staff, your profits might decline because directors usually work very well for almost free
- Sales, reach or exceed
- Gross profit percentage, maintain and improve
- overhead , do not exceed
- Break Even point
- How much sales you need to cover your overhead?
TOP TIPS FOR IMPROVING THE PROFIT
- Increase sales – lots of resources
- Increase gross profit % , stop giving stuff away for free, increase price, reduce cost of sales, increase efficiency
- Little things, chip away
- You can not erase all costs, you can not run business with nothing
- Xero is better than Sage
- If you had a very good year, Invest in capital to reduce tax (take advice and be business driven not tax driven)
EXTRACTING MONEY FROM BUSINESS
- Limited companies
- Have some form of mng accounts, keep an eye on how your company is doing, then take dividends
- Leave a bıt of money in the company
- Wages, dividends, set aside money for self assessment tax
ROUTE TO FINANCIAL SUCCESS
- Quality Record keeping
- Raise invoices for the work
- Capture all expenses
- Reconcile your bank at least weekly
- Use a cloud accounting package
- Receipt processing
- App xero, quickbooks etc
CASH MANAGEMENT
- Cash is very different to profit
- VAT is not your money. It was never your money
- Cash mng is different than managing your business, profits etc
- It is a daily job
- Work estimated, work done, invoice issued, invoice chased, inv. Paid
- Shorten this cycle
- Get money in faster
- Consider
- Agreeing price upfront
- Use of retainers
- Invoice by instalment rather than on completion
- Invoice the moment the work is done
- Collect by direct debit
- Automatic chaser emails
- Do not give credit – your are not a bank!
BUFFER CASH
- Build resilience – don’t drain your business
- Aim for retained profit about 5%
- 3-6 months of fixed costs
CASH MANAGEMENT
- Save for tax
- Consider opening a separate account for VAT
- Or even separate account for corporation tax
MANAGEMENT OF INFORMATION
- Forecasts, quarterly, monthly accounts
- Have a financial strategy, budget
- Profit goal, sales goal, marketing plan
- Know your monthly key numbers
- Forecast monthly / quarterly and budget at the start of the year
Digital Marketing and Brexit
DATA
Data protection – if you are gdpr compliant your are almost OK
Make sure you are able to get data from EU
Check your providers if they are EU based eg Ireland
IMPORT EXPORT
Customs declarations
HMRC APPROACH TO NO DEAL
Day one easements
- Transitional simplified procedures
- Intermediatetd liability
- Guarantee relaxations
- Entry summary declarations for imports
DAY ONE RO-RO LOCATIONS
Declerations to be prelogded
EORI
An EORI number – which stands for an Economic Operator Registration and Identification Number – is a unique ID code used to track and register customs information in the EU.
An EORI number is not the same as a VAT number. However, if you’re VAT registered, they are linked. When you apply for an EORI number as a VAT registered business HMRC will link all your imports to your VAT number.
Exit summary declaration
If an export declaration or a transit declaration containing safety and security data has not been submitted for goods exiting the EU, an electronic exit summary declaration (IE615) is to be submitted to Customs for the goods.
The responsibility for submitting an exit summary declaration lies with the transport company, which has drafted the transport agreement and which transports the goods out of the Union.
Safety and security data must be submitted for goods exiting the EU prior to their departure from the Union.
The declaration is submitted when goods physically exit the EU territory by road and by rail.
The declaration is submitted for goods exiting by air or sea when the goods are loaded on board a craft, which transports them outside the EU.
An exit summary declaration is required at a place of exit in Finland when goods are sent from Norway via Finland to a non-EU territory, for example Russia.
https://tulli.fi/en/businesses/arrival-and-exit/exit-summary-declaration
Export Control System
The Export Control System (ECS) is the EU system for the control of indirect exports, such as export consignments declared for export at a location in one member state that then exit the EU via another member state.
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/export-control-system-ecs-supporting-guidance
UK to remain in Common Transit Convention after Brexit
Continued membership of the convention will ensure simplified cross-border trade for UK businesses exporting their goods.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-to-remain-in-common-transit-convention-after-brexit
Customs Special Procedures for the Union Customs Code
Paying VAT on imports, acquisitions and purchases from abroad
If you import, acquire or buy goods or services from abroad you may have to pay VAT or account for it under the reverse charge procedure.
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/vat-imports-acquisitions-and-purchases-from-abroad
KEY ACTIONS
TRANSITIONAL SIMPLIFIED PROCEDURES – TSP
HMRC has today set out an extension of Transitional Simplified Procedures (TSP) which includes:
- an extension of the date when the first supplementary customs declarations must be submitted, and any import duties must be paid, to 4 October 2019, with subsequent declarations submitted monthly.
- making TSP available for any port or airport where goods are being brought in from the EU. HMRC will continue to work with stakeholders on TSP implementation, recognising that circumstances will be different from port to port.
- giving importing businesses until 30 September 2019 to provide a guarantee that is required to cover any customs duties that they wish to defer. This will apply for all importers, not just those who have registered for TSP.
The full news article is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/hmrc-outlines-extension-of-transitional-simplified-procedures
Also published is further guidance on making declarations for TSP: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/making-declarations-using-transitional-simplified-procedures
https://www.bifa.org/news/articles/2019/mar/transitional-simplified-procedures-tsp
TRADE POLICY
Trade Barriers
Temporary tariff regime for no deal Brexit published
Government has published details of the UK’s temporary tariff regime for no deal, designed to minimise costs to business and consumers while protecting vulnerable industries.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/temporary-tariff-regime-for-no-deal-brexit-published
An update on existing trade agreements if the UK leaves the EU without a deal
An update on existing trade agreements if the UK leaves the EU without a deal.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/trade-agreement-continuity
Unilateral free trade simply means that one country reduces its import restrictions without any formal agreement for reciprocation from its trade partners.
The Agreement on Government Procurement is a plurilateral agreement under the auspices of the World Trade Organization which regulates the procurement of goods and services by the public authorities of the parties to the agreement, based on the principles of openness, transparency and non-discrimination.
The UK’s trade remedies investigations process
Trade remedies help protect UK businesses against unfair trading practices and unforeseen surges in imports. These usually take the form of additional duties on those imports.
The Trade Remedies Investigations Directorate (TRID) will investigate if new anti-dumping or anti-subsidy measures are needed to counteract unfair trading practices. TRID will also investigate if safeguard measures are needed to counteract unforeseen surges in imports which risk damaging UK businesses.
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/trade-remedies-investigating-dumped-or-subsidised-goods
Commodity code
https://www.trade-tariff.service.gov.uk/sections
Increase sales by Digital Marketing
Do some marketing every day
SIMPLE AS ABC
Audience – Who are you selling to?
Demographics
Boast – What are you saying to them?
What are their problems
Channel – How are you getting that message across?
THE 3 W’S
Who – are you?
What – do you do?
Why – should I care?
(WIIFM) What’s In It For Me
WIIFM is the stuff that shows how or why what you have to sell or say matters to those who you are trying to sell or say it too. It’s the value proposition, the thing that makes them realize that what you’re offering is worth their money or their time.
HOW ARE YOU USING YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA?
Are you consistent?
Are you useful?
Are your profiles complete?
Are you using hootsuite.com (or similar) ?
B2B is possible but difficult in FB
IN is best fit for B2B but IN is becoming like FB recently
COPY FORMULA
AIDA – Attention, Interest, Desire, Action
Speak to the client – use you
Get testimonials – lots of them
Capture data
Write blogs and case studies
Answer questions
Use social media (especially video)
Reviews
Don’t start with we, start with your audience
Make it easy for people to get in touch
FEATURES TO BENEFITS
Say what? So what?
WIIFM? How can you help me?
Tell me I’m special, please!
Don’t we all over your message!
Everyone buys something for a reason
Usually these reasons are hidden
A lot of people buy things for feelings
When is the last time you got a thank you card for purchasing something?
Go the extra mile
Do something extra, little things…
You just need to be a little better than your competitors.
PRICING
Never compete on price – race to bottom
Review your prices every 6 months
High price strategies
Do you have payment options?
Have you got a guarantee?
Price is not the issue
Value is key
Premium products?
Add instant profits
Upsells, upgrade
Payment options?
MARKETING PILLARS
Affiliate marketing
Affiliates
Articles in other magazines
Asking existing clients for referrals
Auto responders
Awards
Banner retargeting
Blogs
Blogs others
Brochures
Business cards
CRM / Database
Direct mail
Discussion groups
Exhibitions
Facebook organic
Facebook ppc
Four square
Google PPC
Introducers
Leaflet drops
Letter campaigns
Linkedin organic
Linkedin ads
Local magazines
Local papers
Joint ventures
Networking
Newsletters printed
Newsletters email
Papers
Postcards
PR articles
Premium products
Promotional clothing
Promotional other cards, pens etc
Radio
Roller banners
Seminars
Speaking
Sponsorship
Squeeze pages
Strategic partners
Telemarketing
Telephone
Testimonials
Testimonials video
Text
TV
Up-sells
Video
Walk-ins cold!
Webinars
Website
Yellow pages or similar
Youtube
THE MONEY IS IN THE LIST
Are you using a CRM?
And, if not, why not?
How often do you contact client and connections?
When you sell a business, it is the database that is worth the money
REFERRALS MADE SIMPLE
How to get a referral:
ASK FOR IT!
Or, offer an incentive
Give something back
LOOK AFTER YOU
Get good sleep
Eat properly
Exercise regularly
MARKETING ACTION PLAN
Every Day
- Social media, TW, FB etc
- List building or updating your database
Every week
- Email writing, newsletter
- Blog writing
- Gather testimonials, talk to clients, get feedback
Every month
- Planning marketing campaign, working out how to reach and contact your target market
- Referral gathering, asking your clients for introductions into other clients
Every Quarter
- Review success and failure over the last quarter
- Adjust what didn’t work , do more of what did
- Plan the next quarter, what markets, products are you going to target?
Recording short videos for ecommerce
WHY VIDEO?
- Communicates some things better
- Preferred by some people over reading
- Liked by google
- Can be viewed on many devices including TV
- Can be published on your site and many other platforms
- Video is a persuasive medium
VIDEO FOR…?
- Location
- Process – timelapse
- Brand story
- Show the person/people
- Show/demo the product
- Event
- Customer/product support
- Testimonials
- Social proof, reviews
- Easy to buy fake reviews
- How do we know its not fake? Video reviews
- Promotional / advert
TIPS
- Keep your hands close to your body for less shaking
- Don’t jump into the video without thinking about it
- You need to slow down
- Tripod slows you down, frees your hands
SOUND
- Half of the video is sound: microphone
VIDEO TYPES
- Cut away
- You can paste different videos on a main video (eg an interview)
- You can also use photos as well. You can zoom in photos to give it a motion
- You can cut away to photos
LENGTH
- Brand story can be few minutes (someone interested would be viewing it)
- Most other stuff 30-60 seconds
- Most people won’t commit more than this duration
WHAT CAN BE IN VIDEO?
- Camera video
- Archive video (by you or someone else)
- Stills
- Photos, graphics, slides, diagrams, screenshots
- You can do image search and filter it by image rights
- License for reuse
- Animation
- Placeit
- Keynote magic move
- Screen recordings
- Still capture
- Or video capture Loom
- Sound, voiceover, music
HOW TO BE BETTER THAN 99%
- Have a bit of a plan: scripting, composition and storyboarding
- Composition: where things are in a frame
- Choosing location and controlling light
- You don’t want hard shadows
- Worry less about light in video rather than photography
- Keep it steady – tripods and mounts
- Get the sound right – half the battle
EQUIPMENT
- Spaces and windows
- Reflectors including mountboard
- Tripods, including for phones and tablets
- Microphone – Lavalier or “Lav” mike
STORYBOARDING
- Even slight thinking before shooting, makes you better than 99% of videos
EDITING
- Use a clap to sync multiple sound tracks and sync them
- Like a Clapperboard
VIDEO FORMAT
- Size 1920 x 1080 or 1080 square
- File format: MP4 has become the modern standard
- Compression format (or codec) H.264
- Above combination suitable for all of FB, TW and IG
- IG, TW – file size limits are 15 mb
- IG 60 seconds, Google my business 30 sec
- Use Youtube embed on website
- Use rel=0 tag not to show related videos at the end
SERVING VIDEO
- Video is large file size
- Needs a host or content delivery network (CDN)
- Some other website your video lives on
- Eg Youtube, Vimeo, Wistia
MOVING THE CAMERA
- By hand – with image stabilization
- Optical image stabilisation is much superior – in 6S Plus, 7 onwards
- Low cost dollies and gimbals for phones and tablets
- Steadicam
WRAP UP
- Everything takes too long
- Throw almost all of what you shoot away
- Less is more, cut before its gets slow
- Rhythm, try to make your cuts regular
- See music videos
Instructor:
https://www.davidjamesross.co.uk/
Digital Marketing, Branding and more
AGENDA
- Your brand
- Your story
- Your customer persona
- Your key messages
- Your marketing channels
- Your killer content
- Your action plan
START WITH WHY
- Why you are in business
- List 3 things you will work on after the workshop
- Simon Sinek
- https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action?language=en
BRAND
- Voice
- Values
- Identity
- Message
- Integrity
- Recognition
- Positioning
- Logo
- Colours
- Style
- Fonts
- Culture
- Slogans / taglines
B2D
- WHY: Close the literacy gap for all children, enabling them to achieve their true potential.
- HOW: Bulk purchases for lower prices and excellent delivery service
- WHAT: Selling kids books at bargain prices
https://www.accenture.com/gb-en/company-news-release-strategy-gcpr-2018-uk
UK consumers are investing their time, money and attention in brands that have a genuine commitment to important principles that they care about.
HOW TO TELL YOUR STORY
- Who you are
- The business
- People
- Why you exist
- History
- Your why
- What you do
- Products
- Services
- Who you serve
- Customers
- What you can do for them
- Outcomes
- Evidence
- Testimonials
STORY STRUCTURE
Beginning, middle, ending
Backstory, problem, solution, action
STORY THAT WILL RESONATE WITH YOUR CUSTOMERS
WHO IS YOUR CUSTOMER
- Different personas
- What do you know about them?
- What problems do they have?
- How do you solve them?
- Give them a name
What | Who | What channel | When | Priority |
Image of your persona | |
Name | |
Age | |
Job Title | |
Day to day jobs to be done | Taking care of children really is a full-time job; in fact, it’s two and a half, according to research which has found that the time mothers spend on parent-related tasks equates to a 98-hour work week. https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/mother-equivalent-2-jobs-full-time-childcare-98-hours-work-mum-survey-a8258676.html |
Work attitude | |
Family | |
Environment | UK women ages 25 to 54 with children in their households spent most of their time online (59%) via smartphone https://www.emarketer.com/Article/UK-Mothers-Its-All-About-Smartphones-Social-Media/1016039 |
Education | |
Social Status | |
Life Goal | |
Experience |
B2D Persona
Lara, 40 years old, has 2 kids, employed
Does most of the household shopping
Tech-savvy, uses mobile for ecommerce
Value seeker, bargain hunter
Searching for air travel, new house and car so higher end of value seeker
Interested in cooking, travel, celebrity news
Motivated by the needs of her family and looking for ways to add value (find a bargain)
Don’t really have much time, quite busy with all the housework, kids and work.
They want a good deal, trusted seller, frictionless ecommerce experience.
Decision maker or influencer | |
Personality | |
Interests | |
Lifestyle | |
Personal and professional values | |
Concerns | |
Benefits wanted | |
Intent |
DEVELOPING YOUR VALUE PROPOSITION AND KEY MESSAGES
NAME OF BUSINESS | |
HELPS | Target audience |
WHO NEED TO | Value proposition / product / service |
THROUGH | Unique selling proposition |
WHO | |
NOT LIKE |
A unique selling proposition (USP, also seen as unique selling point) is a factor that differentiates a product from its competitors, such as the lowest cost, the highest quality or the first-ever product of its kind. A USP could be thought of as “what you have that competitors don’t.”
- Pros
- Reaches those that don’t use the internet or social media
- Not as common as it used to be so you can stand out
- Gives something tangible
- Cons
- Can be expensive
- Can go out of date quickly
- Not as environmentally friendly as it could be
WEBSITE
- Pros
- Provides information for customers
- Detailed information – offers value
- Can be purchase point (ecommerce)
- Cost-effective – hosting options
- Plenty of people with skills
- Cons
- Many different options
- Standing out requires effort
- Innovation costly
- Requires some tech skills
- Copywriting important
- Search is competitive
- Pros
- Easy to produce
- Low cost / no cost
- Everyone has email
- You own the data
- Cons
- Open rates
- Easy to unsubscribe
- Messages can be vanilla or feel very salesy
- Services
- Mailchimp
- Tend to have HTML heavy emails, can cause spam issues
- Drip
- Hubspot
- Getresponse
- Sendinblue
- Aweber
- Constantcontact
- Convertkit
- Activecampaign
- Mailchimp
When might legitimate interests be appropriate?
Legitimate interests is the most flexible of the six lawful bases. It is not focused on a particular purpose and therefore gives you more scope to potentially rely on it in many different circumstances.
It may be the most appropriate basis when:
the processing is not required by law but is of a clear benefit to you or others;
there’s a limited privacy impact on the individual;
the individual should reasonably expect you to use their data in that way; and
you cannot, or do not want to, give the individual full upfront control (ie consent) or bother them with disruptive consent requests when they are unlikely to object to the processing.
There may also be occasions when you have a compelling justification for the processing which may mean that a more intrusive impact on the individual can be warranted. However in such cases you need to ensure that you can demonstrate that any impact is justified.
The legitimate interests basis is likely to be most useful where there is either a minimal impact on the individual, or else a compelling justification for the processing.
SOCIAL MEDIA
- Facebook
- Older audiences
- Large number of users
- Limited organic reach
- Instagram
- Generation Z
- Aspirational
- Fast growing
- Developing rapidly
- Linkedin
- 79% over 35
- Professional
- B2B
- Big growth this year
- Twitter
- 32% 18-29
- Topical
- Fast moving
- Pinterest
- 80% women
- Craft/fashion/health/decor
- International
- Snapchat
- 76% millennials
- Lifestyle
- Closed network
EVENTS
- Pros
- Great for relationship building (face to face)
- Chance to demonstrate what you do and for people to sample
- Your audience are all in one place
- Cons
- Can be expensive (time and money)
- It’s hard to stand out – what will attract people to you?
- Less people go to events than they used to
Sales calling tips
How do you feel when someone phones you, someone tries to sell to you?
When you are browsing a shop, how do feel when you are approached by a member of the staff, how do you feel if you are being ignored?
How do you feel about using the phone?
Nervous, uncomfortable… but They don’t know you feel like this
Phones: We don’t use it for calling it much. It’s an office, bank… everything.
Email: quick, easy, not involving emotions but can be ineffective. We can’t see the response. The meaning, emphasis gets lots. Its very easy to ignore an email.
Customers are the most important thing in business (they pay our wages) but if we can’t allocate time to them.
What makes it difficult?
- Getting through, gatekeepers
- I wonder if you can help me out
- Google before
- Language barrier
- Time zone
- You don’t know them
- How you or they will respond?
- How we communicate
- Body movements 55%
- Pitch, pace, tone 38%
- Words you are using 7%
PLAN FOR THE CALL
- Research beforehand
- We do not want to be sold to
- We want to build relationships
- Quality and quantity
- Saves time , you should ring the right people
WHAT DOES A PLAN LOOK LIKE
- Your call framework
- Who are we calling
- What do they know about us?
- Do something to raise awareness of you, send a letter maybe?
- Linkedin connection request with personal note. Do not do it from your mobile because you won’t be able to personalize it.
- What do we know about them?
- Linkedin and Google search + web browse
- Why would they be interested in speaking to us?
- We don’t sell products or services
- We sell solutions to problems
- We need to tap into the psyche of the person
- What’s in it for me?
- How will we break the ice?
- How’s the week going?
- Weather?
- Keep it simple, don’t over do it
- What can we do to make it easier?
- How can we stand out from others calling them?
- Authentic
- Keep your word, follow up, do what you said you’d do
- Don’t sell
- Don’t talk industry jargon
- Don’t assume that they know you are talking about
- Don’t over talk
LANGUAGE
- Using the language to get results
- Toxic language
- Does not add value
- Fillers like basically, actually, obviously,
- Ambiguous: probably, possibly, maybe, for sure, might
- Any industry jargon
- Calling everyone “guys”
- Does not add value
- People love their names the most
- Lets focus on positive
- Use open questions
- Questions that can not be answered with a yes or no
- What’s your biggest challenge this week?
- Refer to news on website or linkedin posts?
- What are your top [business/industry] priorities right now?
- Are you having problems with [insert a couple of pain points] like some of our other clients?
- Is your current solution not solving these as well as you would like?
- What would it do for your overall revenue/workflow/pain benefit if you could handle these issues more effectively?
- How does the decision making look for a solution like this?
- What concerns do you have about switching/implementing a new solution?
- At the end of that call will you give us a firm answer?
- Who is the best person to speak to?
- What do you think of the british summer?
- https://www.rainsalestraining.com/blog/21-powerful-open-ended-sales-questions
- 50 sales questions PDF: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ogH8BdU1m_g7wU2AlsRJuL5NThOaOF8g/view?usp=sharing
- What we can do?
- How we’d like to help?
- What would you like to happen next?
- What would you like us to do?
- Listen and reflect
- What would be most helpful to them
- Summarise at the end
- Use open questions
PHASES
- Introduction
- Research about the person
- Keep them talking to you
- Use their names
- You can use a jot form https://www.jotform.com/form-templates/?classic
- Yes
- Qualify them
- When can we sell, today, next week, month, year?
- No
- If it is never going to work, getting a no sooner is better
- Closing
- You can send follow up email
- Keep in touch with them
- When will be the best time for them?
- Agree on next step
- Summarize
- Thank them
- Always check if they are OK with stuff
- M otivation – why
- A bility – budget
- N eeds – want
- U rgency – when
WHEN TO CALL
- Think of your Perfect client
- You might have several segments of clients
- Morning?
- Late afternoon can work, usually people don’t have late meetings
- Part of your plan
SUMMARIZE
- Plan
- Prepare
- Use your framework
- Agree next action
- Confirm it by email
- Diarise
- Do it!
Buying cycle
eCommerce Listing Pages
Product photos with white background
And lifestyle shots – Instagram style
High End fashion products – white background almost finished
Why does this matter?
- We are asking people to buy a physical product but they don’t gave no direct experience of
- More images is better – but not the same type, detailed photos, show the scale
- Checklist of different
- Ecommerce has a problem of tangibility
- The more you show and tell, the more you sell
BURAK Can we update ugly Amazon photos with ours?
People started browsing products by browsing images, not just Instagram but google image search as well.
AGENDA
- Putting together a shot list – types of images you may need
- Deciding on aspect ratios – shape of the image, square or rectangle etc
- Two approaches to controlling light
- General shooting tips
- Optimizing images
- Image manipulation and software
- Styling and lifestyle images
- When to hire a professional
Types of images you may need
- Flat, straight, plain background, product shot
Type | Purpose | Check | Number |
Product | To show the product clearly against a white or plain background. Required by many marketplace platforms | x | 1 |
Product Angle | To show a 3D product form various angles | x | 2 |
Product Detail | To show detail of a product, – pattern, texture, finish, grain | ||
With packaging shot | To show the product with packaging – can include gift packaging – if packaging is part of the experience | ||
Variants | Show variants of the product, color, size, finish, customization | ||
Scale | To show the true size of the product by comparison to a known object | 3 | |
Related Products | To show the product with other related products that complement it and are available | ||
In context | To show the product in the way in will be used or the space it will occupy | 4 | |
Lifestyle / Styled | To show the product as desirable by association with a desired or attractive environment, occasion or collection of artefacts | 5 |
ASPECT RATIOS
Square is the allrounder
Where will you else use them?
dSLR spec might not be OK
LIGHT APPROACHES
- Diffuse natural light plus reflectors (or LEDs or bounce flash fill)
- Light boxes
- Anything small and flat, scan it
- Rembrandt light
- Natural light
- You are seeking strong but diffuse light – a difficult combination
- Natural light – north facing window is ideal
- High cloud cover is good
- Middle of the day is good
- Fill in shadows with reflectors (or lights or flash)
- Get rid of the shadow with reflector
- If you get the lighting right, even iphone camera would be enough (with tripod and timer)
- Light tents
GENERAL SHOOTING TIPS
- Shoot to allow cropping
- Perspective control – distance to shoot from
- If you shoot up very close, closer edge might look bigger
- Pay attention to horizontal and vertical
- Take lots, reject most- bracketing
- In photography, bracketing is the general technique of taking several shots of the same subject using different camera settings.
- Professional photographers scrap 99% of their shots
- Instructor does not prefer flash shots , difficult to work with
EQUIPMENT
- Spaces and windows
- Reflectors including mountboard
- Tripods, including for phones and tablets
STEPS and PURPOSE
- Aspect ratio
- Choose best aspect ratio
- Light source
- Find a suitable diffuse light source
- Fillers
- Choose your tools to fill in the shadows
- Platform
- Support your camera with a stable platform – tripod or similar
- Perspective
- Choose a distance from the product that makes it look in natural proportion – not too close
- Cropping
- Leave enough space around the outside of the frame to allow cropping
- Level
- Use a grid to check your horizontal and vertical
- Timer
- Use your timer to keep your hands free for light control
- Take many
- Bracket by taking lots of little variations. Choose only the best
LEDS ARE THE FUTURE
- Continuous light – see what you do
- Run cool (very little heat)
- Can use a wide range of diffusers
- Can buy daylight, same colour temp as natural light
- Use less energy and long lasting
OPTIMIZING IMAGES
- Image manipulation – any changes to colour, contrast etc first
- Crop to the aspect ratio
- Resize to your largest need
- Compress and optimise file size
- Name your file
LEVELS
- To make slight white background to 100% white – play around with Levels in photoshop
IMAGING SOFTWARE
- Photos (free, apple)
- Pixelmator apple only – pro not necessarily better
- Serif affinity photo
- Gimp
- Adobe photoshop
- Free trials
- Apple aperture – not supported
STYLING IMAGES
- Images can be styled to appeal to the desired lifestyle
- Typically use:
- A complementary colour palette
- Textures
- Desirable backdrops
- Cherished items
- Lifestyle images can use filters or color grading to give a distinct “look”
- This is very much like setting up a stage, eg much in a film
WHEN TO HIRE A PRO
- Critical color management
- Using studio flash
- Hero images
- If your time can be spent more profitability doing other things
- Don’t listen, look for a portfolio in your category
PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS
- People don’t read, they scan for the info
- Use headings
- Lists are easier to read
- Availability
- Copy format for scan reading: headings, lists, tables, symbols/icons, short sentences and paragraphs
- https://readable.com/
CUSTOMER CONCERNS
- Outcomes, what does the customer get?
- Psychological objectives
- People buy my products so they can ….
- Features
- Put them on the product page
- Origins
- Made where?
- By whom?
- Under what conditions?
- Environmental impact
- Variants, options, customizations
- Availability
- Limited?
- How soon?
- Warranty and risk
- What if something goes wrong?
- Longevity
- Uniqueness
- Social proof: Other people and this product
- Customer reviews
- Social media
- Aftercare
PRODUCT DESCRIPTION STYLE GUIDE
- Paragraph length
- Keep paragraphs short – no more than about six lines
- Sentence length
- Keep sentences short to aid readability
- Headings
- Use headings and sub-headings to make text scan-readable
- Lists
- Use unordered (bulleted) and numbered lists
- Tables
- Use tables and diagrams where appropriate eg size charts
- Symbols / icons
- Use symbols and icons where appropriate eg. handmade, made in Britain
- Internal links
- Link to other related products
Multitasking and Productivity
To switch to something new takes time to reinvest your attention
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iM4u-7Z5URk
Air traffic controllers take 15-30 min breaks every 2 hours
Context switching depletes your neuro biological resources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_Weinberg
When programmers are involved in more projects, time to finish increases rapidly.
https://blog.codinghorror.com/the-multi-tasking-myth/
Exercise 1: Draw a line
Start timer
Write multitasking is a thief on top
Write numbers 1 2 3 …. 21 below the line
Stop the timer
Exercise 2 : time again
This time write 1 letter and 1 number like M 1 U 2 … above and below the line.
Effects:
- Time
- Quality
- Stress
Any project longer than 90 days, is subject to procrastination
You need business objective for 3-5 years and link it to something tangible.
Toyota uses 4-5 different approach for 10-20 years and employs the most suitable one according to market needs.
hoshin kanri objective matrix
Fortune Magazine found that 80% of Fortune 500 companies use some sort of balanced performance metric approach to their strategy. But it also found that when a company fails, 70% of the time it wasn’t because of bad strategy—it was due to bad execution.
Hoshin planning can help mitigate that risk.
https://www.clearpointstrategy.com/hoshin-kanri-matrix-template/
Customer Avatar
Value proposition
Scrum element
Gaining clarity and focus
Each task has specific attributes:
Time
Money
People
Skills
Your key asset is your customer database
Especially for B2B
Meetings = big company disease
Time blocking for projects and priority task
Does Multitasking Kill Productivity | Why Multitasking Fails and How to Stop Doing It
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOmsRSwQ9rk