Most people in communications and marketing are already performing simple linked tactics. The idea is to become conscious of these tactics and to try to accelerate performance by adjusting and tweaking the timing of them. For my dermatologist clients, for example, I know if I send an email to patients and follow up about a week later with information on the monitors in the offices, I get a pretty strong result. I also know that although the monitor information is there, I also need signage in the office to appear at about the same time. I’ve examined and tested the timing of email, monitor and posters to understand how I can achieve the best result with the least effort and money.
As I mentioned in the previous post on linked tactics, posting earned placements on social media is something communications people do every day. If you haven’t already, start looking at the timing of your social media posts to determine engagement. Now see if you can add something to boost your results. I’ve begun to get really serious about Pinterest and Reddit when I’ve seen the boost they can give to website traffic. I also know the timing to use - how soon after the initial post, time of day and day - that gives me the best results.
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© Wany0003 | Dreamstime.com[/caption]
Direct marketers have been using landing pages for a long time. QR codes were a great hope, but haven’t really worked much however other promotional codes seem to still work well. I like those that are branded and include a bit of messaging as well. (As a side note, you can include a bit of branding with unique bit.ly shorteners, another micro tactic that works well for me.)
Don’t ever underestimate the power of traditional and online tactics combined. They provide some of the best results I’ve gotten for my clients. Another example of this are combining print ads with online channels. Print ads have become more of a “boost” mechanism for me and less of a direct draw. In fact, we’ve reduced the spend on print ads by half for one of my clients, and still increased our results. That’s because the print ads are now supporting many of the content marketing and digital tactics we’re using. The lesson there is that for this client, traditional tactics have become the "boost." Not the primary vehicle for messaging. (Don't forget, we do a recap of a great IMC campaign every month. This is a great place to find examples of linked tactics.
The BJP Party campaign, for example, linked a lot of bleeding edge stuff with traditional media. )
Finally, we need to measure our objectives at the end of the campaign of course, but there are many ways to measure how your tactics are responding on an iterative basis.
Mark Montini, m2M Strategies[/caption]
"Small businesses can eliminate a lot of frustration by addressing the common marketing mistakes I see on a frequent basis," says Montini. "Those mistakes are usually centered around focus - on the wrong data, the wrong tactics and even the wrong message."
Montini says there are three primary marketing mistakes that can cause failure for any small business right from the start.
1. Focusing on the wrong metrics
