New McMail Newsletter!

Mark Tollefson at MarkIdeas.com has put out his first newsletter using our McMail Email Marketing Software.
Mark is a brilliant marketing strategist and immensely creative marketer who has a lot to say about growing your business.
I'm sure you'll enjoy his Strategy, Marketing and Motivation Ideas. 
Just click the link to read it. If you like what you see, the sign up form is on the left side of the page.

The Newsletter Archive page you see is a free extra you get with a McMail Email Blast Newsletter.  While competing email marketing services charge $5 a month extra to create your newsletter archive, at McMail, it's FREE.   To learn more about McMail Email Marketing Software and how easy it is to start a successful email newsletter, call us at McColley Marketing Media - 480-258-4135.

Here's the problem...the names have been changed to protect...

...to protect...to protect... the guilty, I guess.  I found this ad on Craigslist today. 

So, when you fork over 4-5 hundred dollars to buy an ad in this magazine, your ad will likely be created by someone who is getting paid in gift certificates!
I have to explain something that not every small business owner understands:  The most important part of your ad, isn't where it's seen or heard, or even how many people are exposed to it.  The most important part of any ad is what you say and how you say it. 
If your ad doesn't reach out and grab the buyer, you've wasted your money.  Period.
Now take a look at the nearest piece of media.  Go ahead,  I'll wait.
Start on page one and turn until you find an ad where the logo is small and the headline is big.  Then see if the headline says anything other than "Our store is best." 
(Things like "Unbeatable Prices" and "No One Undersells Us" are just another way of saying "Our store is Best").
How many pages did you have to go?
The ads you passed violate the most important rule in effective advertising: "Talk about the buyers needs, not the sellers."
And, unless they were in the magazine above, there's a pretty good chance they were created by ad designers who get paid cash money.  "Professionals."
Imagine the expertise of someone who is getting paid in bowling certificates and movie passes.
Media only deserve to exist if they can do an effective job of (1) getting an audience and (2) converting that audience into buyers for the sponsors.  If the owners of media don't understand those two requirements, they need to join the buggy whip manufacturers in the history books.  Which is what is happening to a lot of ineffective media these days.

Need help making your marketing dollars work harder?  Give us a call.  McColley Marketing Media. 480-258-4135.

How are you doing on your 2010 goals?

It’s almost December, the last month of the year.  How are you doing on your goals for this year?

Chances are some of them are lagging a little behind what you wanted – hopefully not all of them, though.

I’m a great believer in “The Secret” and all that power of attraction stuff.  I also preach about being mentally focused on the things you want and want to accomplish.

But there is a missing element in all that. In fact, in some ways those “power of positive thinking” things can hurt you if you think that’s all you have to do.

You have to do the work. 

I’ve just spent the last 5 weeks with my head down while finishing up a set of six websites.  They’re for a big player in the radio/tv audio field and we launched 3 of them a week ago and 3 more just went up.   Just in time for a major marketing push they have going on for the end of the year.

It was an interesting project.  We started last spring, but as we got started, they realized they need to look a little more holistically at their web strategy.  So they put the project on hold while they got input from some of their partners and consultants.

Then, 6 weeks ago – the first day of my vacation – they solidified their plan.  And they wanted to get the sites all done in 2 weeks – one of which was my vacation.  We got a short reprieve but some trade magazine marketing was set for mid-November with no way to change things.

They are huge sites – while an average business site might be 5 or 10 megabites in size, these sites are each 30 times larger.  They have lots of technical information and graphics that show off details of their high end products.

The only way to get that kind of work done is to put your head down and ignore all distractions.  I have to commend the team on their end for some very long hours in getting this done.

So back to where I started.  What about your goals for the year?

You’ve still got 4 weeks.

Do you need to turn up your effort a bit?

A little change can make a big difference.  Think about hot water.  At 211 degrees it will burn your skin and you can cook an egg – but raise it just one more notch – to 212 degrees and you make steam.

And steam can power a locomotive.

You’ve got a month to go…lets make some steam!

If part of your goal set for 2010 involved getting your web site working harder, we would love to be involved.  We do small business web site design, internet marketing, and email marketing.  Call McColley Marketing Media at 480-258-4135.

Kudos to the team at Wheatstone

Wheatstone is the preeminent maker of audio control boards for the radio and television broadcasting industry.  Their equipment is the best out there.  And they've jumped into the digital world and created some very cool products for using networking and even the internet for getting sound from studios to transmitters and your home, car and office.
I was contacted last spring by an engineer friend who had recently joined the company and was put in charge of refocusing their web presence and getting them heavily into social media as well. 
He wanted Joomla for their site's content management system - something I've been working with since the beginning. 
Long story short.  We've just relaunched six Wheatstone websites with new branding.  And a Wheatstone blog, too.
Kudos to Scott Johnson and Mike Shane at Wheatstone for their mad dash to the finish line, and thanks to Bob Martin at RTM Creative, Wheatstone's agency who is responsible for much of the "look" of the sites.
Take a look at the Wheatstone corporate site, then follow through to any of the brand sites from there.
Wheatstone Radio
Wheatstone Television
Wheatstone Commercial
Vorsis
Audioarts Engineering
I'd love to hear what you think.

If you would like to get more out of your website, let’s talk! We do small business web site design, internet marketing, and email marketing.  Call McColley Marketing Media at 480-258-4135.

Introducing www.coolidgecc.org

May I introduce www.coolidgecc.org!
We just launched the site tonite.  Coolidge Christian Church is a small church in Coolidge Arizona. 
Many church sites today look like they were designed for rock bands.  Grungy graphics, huge splashy slide shows.  Of course, many churches today have rock bands and big multimedia presentations with video and animations and grungy graphics.  They also have full time graphics people and music directors and...who knows what all.  And 10,000 members to pay for it all.
No kidding, there's a help wanted ad for a church in my area that is looking for a full time graphic artist right now. They're saying they have 10,000 members. 
I've lived and worked in towns smaller than that.
Coolidge Christian Church is more than a little bit short of 10,000 members right now...hey, the whole town of Coolidge isn't much bigger than 10,000.  
But Coolidge Christian Church is looking to grow!  The church is small town conservative in style and members are, on average,  a little older than the rock band church's membership. 
Knowing all that, their website is a bit conservative in design, too.  And since they won't have a full time staff working on the site, we designed it to have incredibly low weekly maintenance - yet it has dynamic, fresh content all the time.  And when they do their updates, it's a simple as can be - no special coding or anything needed.
Let me know what you think of it if you get a chance.  And if you're anywhere near Coolidge AZ on a Sunday morning...you know you have a friendly place to drop in on.

How to have a BREAKTHROUGH Holiday Season

No all of us have a retail driven business, but the end of the year is also the end of the budget year for a large number of companies and even in these tight spending times, the use-it-or-lose-it madness of budgeting can still make for a great end of the year.

Have you ever hired or worked with a consultant?

I’ve had the good fortune to be involved with and work for a couple of consultants in a couple of fields over the years.

Most consultants make their living by learning about several different industries and then taking the good ideas from one and transforming it for another. It’s a proven idea; all you do is introduce it to someone who has never seen it.  You become the hero and get hired again and again.

But I had another consultant tell me the secret of being a great consultant.  No cross-industry pollination is needed.

You go into a business and interview all the key players.  As you’re interviewing them you ask, “What do you think needs to be done to get your business rocking?”

In the final report, you list these in some order of precedence and you put a price on getting each of them done.  Then you help them keep on track.

So save yourself $10,000 this week.

Make a list of the Top 10 things your business needs.  Then pick one and do it.  That’s it.  No out-of-town consultant needed.  You already know what your business needs.  Do it.

Your Holiday Season will thank you.

If your needs fall under the banner of Marketing and Advertising, give me a call.  It never hurts to get a fresh pair of eyes on your plans (and I won't charge you $10,000 for a consultation).