churchill, union jack flags,

The new Covid – a battle not the whole war

The announcement of a renewed Covid lockdown to Level 3 in Auckland – which affects me and many of my clients seems to be a mixture of ‘here we go round the mulberry bush’ and ‘once more into the breach, dear Friends.’

I can’t decide if it’s Shakespeare or a child’s nursery tale.

Be obedient and diligent

I was reminded this week by Trish Love that Churchill didn’t know how many battles it would take to win a war.  And neither do we.

She wrote

In 1939 nobody knew how long the war was going to last.  But, they did know there would be more than one major battle to finish it.  At every stage, Churchill and others had to navigate with the then current set of circumstances.  They did so with courage and steel resolve.  Our Covid-19 situation is not dissimilar.  It will only be with hindsight that we find its’ full impact and duration.  

If from the future looking back, you were to know that we are currently entering the very early stages of a second major “battle”, what would you do differently if you had that benefit of hindsight?  Consciously consider this now, because we have been told that further lock-downs are a case of when, not if.  Plan for your business needs from the perspective of many potential major economic battles occurring in this war.  Work with us to do so, it is crucial to have external help on your team.  Nobody can do this alone.

And what if, this were to be only the second major economic battle of many, over the next few years?  What if we had 7-8 further lock-downs heading their way towards us?  You might need to change what you do, by further investing in some areas of your business, but ration other areas.  The rationing may need to be on your discretionary spending, subject to your business needs.  

Covid is our modern day battleground.

Our goal is survival, thrive if possible, and adapt and renew.

All big ‘asks’ for a business community under pressure.

What we learned already

From the last lockdown we all learned fast. Take a look back at the recession marketing video articles I wrote if you need a refresher.

  • Use what we learned already
  • Look out for each other – help, offer, support
  • Don’t be ashamed to ask for help
  • And consider Scenario Planning as a tool for your future outlook

Please NOT another covid email

I just sent this message to my clients.

There’s an overload of businesses sending unnecessary emails about the New Zealand Covid-19 alert level change.

May I suggest we simply put something on the website home page?

And telephone anyone who’s coming in for a meeting.

And maybe the team add a note to their email signatures….

Covid Alert Email – is it necessary?

The customer is SMART

Interrupting with email is not respectful of people’s time… they will probably guess what you’ll be doing because, let’s face it, compliance has been exemplary through lockdown.

Virtue signalling emails are self-serving and easy to see through. Do you really need to send that message?

Our clients and customers aren’t stupid.

The Exception

One of my clients sells PPE gear – for them this email is useful – because they can communicate product stock levels and ordering information to bulk-buying customers who are probably already working on stocking up.

Be sensible, just think it through from the recipient’s point of view.

One thing to DO NOW

Update your Google Business Listing status.  There’s already a Covid notification “post” option. Google my business Covid

Good.  Sorted in 10 minutes work.

calling bullshit data book

Data – you need to understand it

Data – love it or loathe it, we get it served up everywhere we look. But do you know enough to judge and make up your mind? What is factual, what is relevant, where are devious presenters hiding the truth?

The answers to all these questions requires modern marketers to educate themselves.

calling bullshit data book

Calling Bullshit: The Art of Scepticism in a Data-Driven World. By Carl Bergstrom and Jevin T West

The The Economist called this book “Dodgy Data – the sum of all fears” and opened its article with an expose of the State of Georgia’s Covid19 count – which I tweeted on 18 July.  See if you can spot the deliberate mis-information as presented in their map illustration below.

State of georgia, covid 19 cases, dodgy data

July 2 on left July 18 on right. Covid 19 cases growth.

I think this book will be as influential as Ben Goldacre’s Bad Science was in 2010 – exposing what is and is not a scientific process and a robust outcome.

I’m buying this book (pre publication) if you’d like a copy pm me and I’ll add it to my order. If you’re in Auckland – I’ll hand deliver….. saving you the postage.

Oh, I’ve also reached out to one of the authors….. we will see what happens.

Hex codes, colour codes, logo colours

Hacking brand colours

My logo has a beautiful gradient of colours in the design.

This gives me a huge number of subsidiary colour elements which I can add into customer communications and marketing.

I did an analysis of the key colours and the “colour palette” of associated shades. You can do this by uploading your logo or using a digital colour selector tool.

Creative Agency Secrets logo colour palette

Creative Agency Secrets colour palette tool

Then I made a ton of work for myself

This was a mistake – certainly.

I wrote down each colour hash on a post-it note and had it above my desk. Every time I was writing or designing, I manually wrote out the colour hash. My copying skills are all right – but the potential for a single digit error was high – particularly when I was in a rush.

And so I decided that a change was needed. Electronic copying rather than visual copy-typing was needed.

But again, having a document I had to find and open and copy and paste was a bore. You get the idea. Time consuming eh?

My big insight

I realised that my emailing programme was the place where I used these colour hashes most frequently.

And so I edited the newsletter template to include a segment where each and every colour and its associated hash is listed.

Hex codes, colour codes, logo colours

Creative Agency Secrets logo hex colours

The time saving design outcome

Now whenever I need to get the colour shade I want, I can copy it from the template block into the area where it’s needed. Remove the hash text and bingo!

The only thing to remember is to remove the block from the final email design before sending.

 

 

describe your superpowers

Your marketing superpowers

Selling consultancy is hard.  And selling a professional service is doubly hard.

Niche selling is the best way to be – create a tight brief of detailed information what you do and for whom.  Stay focused and don’t deviate.

All easy to say and hard to do.

When a contact asked me “What are your superpowers?”

I’d like to get an idea of your superpowers, your ok powers, and what you don’t do as well. This will help me work out who best to refer you too, and whether you could be a supplier to me too.

I was challenged to write a decent answer.

describe your superpowers

From a Slack channel introduction automation.

 

Rebecca’s Superpowers

Clearly a lovely Americanism – but hey, who doesn’t want to believe that wearing a cape will “enable the user to fly”?
  • Business to business marketing – does what it says on the tin.  From strategy to tactics. For your Board, for your internal team, for your agency suppliers and subcontractors.

Subsidiary superpowers

Supporting the big one….

  • Marketing strategy – what is the big picture of what you need to achieve and the (likely) tactics which will get you there?
  • Customer relationship management – the strategy to build long term relationships with people who buy from your business.
  • Building a team who understands what is needed and collaborates effectively to get work done.
  • Briefing – ensuring instructions are clear and understood, delivered within brief and on budget.
  • Copywriting – explaining complex things in suitable language for the audience.
  • Teaching marketing – helping others understand the big picture and where each detail fits into the overall plan.  PLUS how to do marketing.
  • Knowing about new tools, techniques and services. I scan the outside world and am frequently an early user / adopter of new things e.g. Blogging since 2006; Twitter since 2007, Podcasting since 2013.

OK Powers

These are competencies.
  • Website management – using different CMS interfaces
  • Search Engine Optimisation – the words that get you found and the software that ensures your site is indexed regularly.
  • Customer journey mapping – how do customers find you, where and when and how to engage with them.
  • Sales – finding the right prospects, engaging with them and starting the sales conversation.
  • Pitching – when you need to present the best face of your business for a very important deal or contract.
And lastly, what I don’t do.
Do PR or organise parties.

 

 

facebook groups, facebook marketing,

FB Group tips – invite a friend

facebook groups, facebook marketing,

Invited by option for group memberships

I am a Facebook for Business group administrator and I’m delighted that they just added back an old feature.

When FB introduced the new interface for Group Admins about 9 months ago, the “Invited by….” feature was missing.

I sent my feedback that this is really useful and I wanted it…. Today it reappeared.

Why is this helpful? We have screening questions for the group and if you don’t answer them, we don’t let you in. BUT if introduced by an existing group member, that allows the applicant to bypass this step and still get accepted. Without knowing if they’d been invited or not, I couldn’t work out who to refuse or accept.

Now I wish they’d allow me to filter group applicants by “have they been invited”.

Rebecca Caroe copywriting, fountain pen copywrite

My copywriting process explained

I write copy for a living.

I write a lot.  Words, words, words. Each project is designed to fit into a particular desired outcome within a marketing strategy and tactical framework. I say that so you understand context.

Context in writing is both important and valuable – but more about that later.

Rebecca Caroe copywriting, fountain pen copywrite

My actual pen and notes for B2B copywriting

How I write marketing copy

Getting a message across using printed words (as opposed to audio, images or video) is a giant challenge. Knowing how long humans have been writing, you’d think that everything that could have been written has been. And yet…. we know that’s not true.  The imagination and skill of mankind to innovate is immense.

My writing is usually business to business copywriting for marketing purposes. That’s my area of expertise. And so the steps I take begin with the outcome. What do I want to happen as a result of a prospect or client reading what I’ve written?

  • End goal is to click through to website
  • End goal is to understand how to write B2B copy
  • End goal is to reply with a  question

These examples are all valid outcomes and each requires very different copy treatments.

The first version is always factual

What are the true, inalienable facts that support the end goal? I list these in a brain dump document. Frequently these are the result of conversations with the client, the internal team and existing customers.

Then I supplement this with some desk research. Reading ‘around the subject’ can come from many sources – newsletters, online magazines, blogs, books. Interestingly, I rarely search social media for this information. My choice – it may suit your needs. The amazing Knowledge Hunter, Geoff McDowell, taught me so much about this subject.

Happy client.

Adding more copy material

From the wider reading I copy/paste and add in more themes, concepts, nuance, examples, phrases and keywords. I also look out for no-nos. These are things I want to avoid.

Sometimes images, colours, layouts and other visual elements present themselves from this research too. That can be very helpful as my brain often leaps forward towards the end result WAY earlier than it’s supposed to. To avoid distraction, I save and note these ideas back in the research document. By noting them, I have preserved the idea; but I’m not focusing on them at this stage. It means I don’t lose the inspiration – I can revive that thought later just by re-reading my notes.

This all contributes to a second draft. This is when I decide the overall frame for the project and HOW does this translate into the copywriting. This could be storytelling, it could be demonstration, case study, questioning, educating. There is a lot more information added, there are more concepts and overall I just write freely incorporating the research information and framing arguments, emotions and logic into one long piece of writing.

This is the place where context comes to the fore. How will the message be delivered, what will the recipient be doing or not doing? Where in the customer journey will they be? What is the outcome or next step goal in this campaign?

Editing and refining copy

This is the part I love.

Precise and concise are watchwords which I hope any client applies to a testimonial about my business copywriting.

Taking what I wrote and simplifying, cutting, removing extraneous information and honing it down into a tight, precise and well-organised message is a repetitive task and it gives me so much pleasure. Sometimes I use a technique of adding in sub-headings (as in this blog) because it helps me to organise and find the big messages in the very long copy.

Often I leave the first opening paragraph until last because it’s so hard. Sometimes I switch the first and last paragraphs – try it!

Headlines and calls to action are a separate challenge and I may do a couple of different versions or give options and let the client choose. This is because they are mostly better-informed about their product or service than I am. Teamwork helps work out what will resonate and achieve the goal.

And then I sleep on it

Yes this is really the final step before showing it to the client, adding it to a mock-up or an EDM. This is important and is one reason why planning at the first step needs to include deadlines and allowances for sleep time.

7 things I’ve appreciated after sleeping on my work

  1. My brain is fresher in the morning
  2. I process ideas while resting
  3. Better re-writes are (nearly always) possible
  4. I can check that I haven’t missed anything out [done this MANY times – but rescued the situation before the client read it]
  5. Reflect on alternative approaches which I earlier discarded
  6. Opportunity to print it onto paper and read out loud
  7. Check grammar, punctuation, capitalisations and links all working and correctly placed

And that’s it. The whole creative writing process for B2B copy.

About the picture illustrating this article.

That’s really my pen and my notebook, photographed this morning as I got a tiny bit of inspiration for a client as a result of doing some research for a different client. It’s odd the way my brain works. And I have learned to respect my brain process and to always seize the moment and make the notes when they jump into my mind. I don’t have to use them – but I’m sure I will lose them if they aren’t captured.

I do not have the neatest handwriting, yet using blue-black ink in an old-fashioned fountain pen gives me both pleasure and the chance to read my words again without guessing what I meant to write. Someday I’ll photograph some of my notes which turn out to be illegible even to me. Generally when I rush to write, legibility suffers.

The unknown part of writing inspiration

The pen also lives in a leather case. My ritual of opening the case flap and flicking back the long cover, unsheathing the pen and unscrewing its lid before writing still gives me a frisson. I never know exactly what will come out of the inky nib onto that pristine sheet of paper, onto the next empty line, or inserted between the paragraphs of print.

And the pen – a birthday gift chosen with care while on holiday. I got the nib re-surfaced by this amazing pen expert who recommended not using ink cartridges. He also explained a lot about the issues of ink/paper and my unique hand/pressure and what a converter is, not a bladder. There is a distinction between them.

So now you know my B2B writing process. What will you do with this knowledge?

 

Brief Rebecca on your copywriting project

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writer, person writing, cop

Key parts in a professional email

I got a question about what the four elements that comprise a “professional email”.  I don’t know why the questioner thought that there were four parts.  My best practice has three parts:

  1. Tell them what you’re going to tell them
  2. Tell them
  3. Remind them what you already said

Easy!writer, person writing, cop

Good email message structure

Slightly less flippantly, the structure of a good message is based around short sentences, simple sentence structure, short words and a clear indication about what you want the reader to do next.

If you can achieve all those things, that’s a great start.

More sophisticated messaging can come through with brand tone of voice, longer messaging plans over months / weeks and a mix of brand, educational and product/service messages. [Ask me how to plan your email marketing.]

Drafting and editing email messages

My personal method when creating EDMs is to work through these steps

  • What is the key message?
  • What is one thing I want the reader to do?
  • Then I start writing…. beginning with the LAST paragraph
  • Add in any context that explains the message (in case they are new to my list)
  • Remind them of benefits
  • Ask for the money / action
  • Add a PS.

Then I sleep on it overnight.  Always.

Because most of my messages can be improved and that only happens after time passes.  I think my brain matures the message and having a bit of time after having written it means I can move into editing mode.  That is a very different brain space and a different skillset.

Now I’m not a visual specialist so I get someone who is good at images to contribute here when I can.

Practice, practice

And then you just need to do it many times to improve your skill.

For examples of best practice copywriting for B2B marketing read on.

How to prototype marketing solutions

Making a big investment into solving a marketing problem is a giant challenge.  The risks are huge, the investment uncertain and the outcomes are unproven.

One way to overcome these risks is to do rapid prototyping.

Rapid Prototyping needs new adherents

Today I interview Joanne Jacobs, an expert in how to use this technique.

Talking work, hacking solutions and online engagement.

Joanne is an expert in rapid prototyping as a way for solving enterprise problems / challenges. She works for Disruptors Co.

Timestamps

01:00 Learning and showing by discussion 09:00 using Jitsi.org and Crowdcast.io and Remo

11:00 Hacking for rapid prototyping – creating solutions to problems.

16:00 What is a problem worth solving? Preferably something you’ve tried and failed before. It must have a financial impact and have knock-on change benefits

17:300 ihackonline.com

20:00 How to set up contests – allow private conversations, collaboration around a screen or whiteboard. Overcome networking challenges.