Marketing Matters Blog

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Tag Archives: PR

Marketing Matters Receives Two Awards this November

Marketing Matters is proud to receive two separate awards in the month of November.

Business Leader’s 2011 Women Extraordinaire Award
Company president Coleen Sterns Leith has been awarded a Business Leader’s 2011 Women Extraordinaire Award. This award is presented to women that are influential leaders within their business or organization, with an extraordinary impact on its economic success and forward-thinking strategies; are actively involved in the professional organizations and associations related to their industry; are active in their community and are a recognized mentor and example to other women in her industry.

2011 Platinum MarCom Award
Marketing Matters was also awarded a 2011 Platinum MarCom Award in the Brochure/Catalog category for the 2011 Leisure Creations Catalog. Drawing thousands of entries annually, the MarCom Awards program is a prestigious international competition recognizing the outstanding achievements of marketing and communications professionals. This succeeds our work with the Leisure Creations 2010 catalog, which earned two design awards.  You can check out more of our award-winning work here.

We’re thankful for the recognition, and the wonderful clients that allow us to serve them. Have a fantastic Thanksgiving.

Job Opportunity: Marketing and Public Relations Manager

Marketing Matters, established in 1997, is a full service integrated marketing and public relations agency that works with clients in a variety of industries including consumer electronics and installed technologies. Our work is both B2B and B2C focused.

 

We are seeking a creative, detailed, self-starting team member experienced in both public relations and marketing. Applicants must possess excellent writing and communication skills, be able to create and manage marketing programs, understand and implement marketing techniques (SEO, keywords, email marketing campaigns, social media, etc.), and be knowledgeable about media relations strategies and techniques.

 

The ideal candidate will be smart, entrepreneurial, trustworthy and fun to work with.

 

NOTE: We are seeking to fill this as a contractor position initially to help us with our current work. This position could lead to a full-time permanent position or end in September. The outcome will depend upon economic conditions.

 

Responsibilities:

In this role the candidate will be required to develop, implement and/or manage digital and traditional marketing and media campaigns:

  • B-to-B marketing campaigns (direct mail, email, webinars, advertising, events, etc.)
  • B-to-C promotional and media campaigns
  • Corporate communications (email, website, advertising, etc.)
  • Special events (trade shows, press events, etc.)

 

The ideal candidate will have proven experience in:

  • Conceptualizing, copywriting and working with a team to develop creative marketing programs that ensure the success of clients.
  • Providing strategic input on new business efforts, assist in preparing written proposals, writing creative briefs and reviewing budget estimates.
  • Working as a team player, innovation, resourcefulness, being able to manage numerous projects, being dedicated to the company’s success and possess strong communication skills.
  • Candidate should have good organizational and consensus building skills.
  • Successful candidates should also have proven skills in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Acrobat. Knowledge of Adobe Creative Suite programs (PhotoShop, InDesign, Dreamweaver, Illustrator, etc.) are a major plus.

 

Essential duties and responsibilities include the following:

  • Develop, provide creative direction and draft copy for both online and offline communication vehicles, including web, email, print advertising, jump/splash pages, websites, collateral, media kits and promotional materials.
  • Ensure that all materials are within the current campaign and/or graphic standards, that all corporate and brand identity standards are followed, and that client approval is obtained at all phases of the project.
  • Managing the project process from proposal to strategic planning to creative development and production for client projects, including managing the budget and deadlines.
  • Ability to adhere to our company values of teamwork, transparency, communication, credibility, accountability and flexibility.
  • Stay abreast of industry changes and news.

 

Education and Experience:

Qualified candidates will possess at minimum:

  • Two years experience in corporate position or with an advertising, marketing and/or public relations agency
  • Bachelor’s degree with Marketing, Advertising or Communications emphasis preferred
  • Ability to conceptualize and assist in developing sophisticated marketing collateral using multiple resources
  • Knowledge of marketing administration, media relations and brand management at a level normally acquired through a minimum of a combined six years of relevant experience and education
  • Excellent creative, written and verbal communications skills
  • Team oriented with interpersonal and presentation skills
  • An ability to multi-task and determine priorities on a real-time basis
  • Strong (nearly obsessive) attention to detail
  • An abundance of common sense
  • Intrinsic drive to develop quality programs (appearance, perception, execution and results)

 

IMPORTANT: This is initially a contract position that could lead to a full-time permanent position with benefits and the opportunity for growth. If you feel this position is a good fit for you and us, please submit a cover letter with salary requirements, your resume and two writing samples in a single PDF file of reasonable size to coleen@marketingmatters.net. No phone calls, faxes or agencies, please.

 

More information about us can be found at www.marketingmatters.net.

Sifting Through the Mess: Using Social Networks the Right Way

By: Kyle E. Glass

Marketing no longer can be perceived as a “one-way street”—it’s crucial that you have a “voice” and actively participate in the conversations taking place about your company and its industry. By taking part in the conversation you will build a greater sense of trust and expertise among your target markets.

Social media marketing allows you to connect with your customers virtually anywhere. There are countless mobile applications for social media networks that provide an opportunity to deliver your message more effectively.

Social media also provides an opportunity to generate new online content from and related to you—content that can be directed to your website and dramatically increase rankings for search engines such as Google, Yahoo! and Bing.

There are beginners’ guides, webinars and other articles—and even a class being taught at CEDIA Expo 2011—if you are interested in learning best practices in using social media platforms. What I will focus on is how you can use these sites for business and what to expect on these sites. The list of social media applications and services is long and growing, so I’ll stick with the most relevant to keep it short. 

LinkedIn
Far and away, LinkedIn should be a must for businesses and professionals. Not only will it keep you in contact with your current business partners, including customers, it can also lead to further contacts as you begin to network.

There are some basic limitations with LinkedIn, which could be a positive or negative. Because it’s geared toward businesses, it’s quite structured which means it’s easier to follow. You have the flexibility to only add the individuals you want to add, and my absolute favorite is being able to join “groups,” basically topics you’re interested in following and contributing to, which could go a long way in adding to your and your company’s credibility.

Let’s take, for example, CEDIA Professional Services Group (http://www.linkedin.com/groups?home=&gid=3089525&trk=anet_ug_hm). This group discusses many topics regarding consumer electronics and custom installation. Adding to these types of discussions will not only genuinely help someone in need of information, but likely provide you as the credible expert. 

Facebook
Although less business focused, the Facebook audience is simply massive. At the end of April 2011, Facebook users counted as many as 139 million people, which is larger than LinkedIn and Twitter added together. As far as companies are concerned, generally companies would set up a “Fan Page”, as opposed to the personal pages we are most familiar with.

The users of Facebook are predominately made up of the youngins, which if anyone is familiar with GenY’s traits, means these folks are much harder to overtly sell to. I believe you’ll find that overtly selling your brand/product via social media will prove unsuccessful, no matter the medium. In this case, you just need to be smart about how you handle your Facebook account and/or company Fan Page.

One of the ways that we’ve successfully used Facebook is by creating Facebook contests. One award winning contest in particular focused on gathering outdoor installations featuring our client’s product. The contest drew a 50% increase in followers and was very well received by our target audience.

Coupons are also making a comeback thanks to social media. Offer exclusive coupons periodically through Facebook and you’ll have a reason people will want to “like” you. 

Twitter
We live in a “140 character” society, or at least that’s what the folks who invented Twitter think. As far as business use, it can be beneficial. As with all of the social media, the goal is to entertain, engage or enlighten. There is real business value every time a customer or fan shares their purchase behaviors with their friends, thus you want to get people talking about you as much as possible. One way to do this is by creating a special offer to anyone that Tweets about you.

Twitter is great for market research. By keeping an eye on the trends, your followers, competitors, and brand advocates and naysayers, you can have a wealth of information at your fingertips.

Twitter, along with Facebook, provides great venues for performing customer service. The point of customer service is to make it easy for your customers to reach you, why not go to where they are?

Obviously the end game with business is the bottom line – it has to be. But using these social media tools correctly can give you a leg up on your competition. Your audience will only respect your social media presence if you demonstrate that your ultimate goal is to serve their needs (and not your own).

Kyle E. Glass is the Public Relations and Marketing Manager at Marketing Matters (http://www.marketingmatters.net), a communications and design firm specializing in technology, consumer and custom electronics, audio-video and related industries.