Time Management for Managers: Stop Killing Time and Start Investing Time

"The way we measure productivity is flawed. People checking their BlackBerry over dinner is not the measure of productivity." - Timothy Ferriss

At the end of each day, do you take stock of what you've done and feel as though you were constantly busy, but you can't for the life of you figure out how your time was spent? As days turn into weeks and weeks into months...we often feel exhausted, but with no real accomplishments to show for our efforts.

The problem is, most people see time as an infinite resource.  They approach life like they're driving down the street and miss a Starbucks, but happy in their knowledge that there's another one a mile down the road.  Likewise, we always think "tomorrow is another day" and promise ourselves we'll keep track of our time and use it wisely then.  This mindset is the best way to never accomplish what you want in life.

When we think of money, though, our mindset is a bit different. Our society encourages us to work hard when you're young and invest your money so that when you retire and no longer make money, you'll have that nest egg to spend.  If you invest in your time, though, really spectacular things can happen.

Understand your productivity cycles.

Ernest Hemingway wrote in the morning because that was his most creative time of the day. Former Prime Minister Winston Churchill, on the other hand, reportedly didn't get out of bed before 11:00 am, preferring to work late into the night.  Having a solid understanding and respect for when you are at your most productive will enable you to reserve your most important work for when you're at your mental best.

Make a list of the most important things you want to accomplish.

Making a list of the things you need to accomplish can help us overcome what's called the Zeigarnik Effect. No, it's not a mosquito-borne virus. You've experienced the Zeigarnik Effect on those nights you can't sleep because you're endlessly trying to remember everything you need to do and keep it organized in your mind. This happens during the day as well, when you're trying to concentrate on the task at hand, but your mind is still whirring in the background keeping your list organized. Give your brain a break and write it all down. Take a few minutes to prioritize those items for better efficiency.

Do the most important things first each day.

By doing the most important things first, you can always be assured that something important is done each day.  Night owls, fret not, you can still save the most brain-intensive or creativity-intensive items for those 2:00 am writing sessions, just make sure that if something absolutely needs to be done in the morning, it gets done.

Don't discount small blocks of time.

As a society, we've taken to killing time on our phones during those periods of time when standing in line, or commuting on a bus or train. Time is too valuable to kill! Instead of checking Facebook while waiting for your coffee, identify things on your list that take up small amounts of time and get those done while you're waiting instead.

Finally, schedule in some down time for yourself. Nothing kills productivity more than a burned-out mind. Take a look at how you're spending your time and see how you can better spend it using these easy tips.

To contact Chuck Gherman for more information about how Printing Arts Press helps organizations with their Marketing needs through print communications please visit www.printingartspress.com.


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Anticipation is Your Friend: The Art of Teasing a Product or Service Before a Proper Launch

All of your print marketing materials should be designed to evoke an emotional response. Most of the time when you're marketing a product or service, your goal is to convince people to spend money on what it is that you have to offer AFTER the fact. This is time consuming and isn't always successful, especially in a crowded sea of competitors. But what if there was a way for you to start your print marketing momentum well in advance of the actual product or service's release? What if there was a way to build so much momentum leading up to that day that all of the hard work from a marketing perspective had already been done for you?

Luckily, there is a way to accomplish all of this and more. By spending your marketing dollars pre-emptively and teasing the launch of your product or service well in advance, you can build the type of hype that will continue to pay dividends for a lifetime.

The Most Efficient Marketing Engine 

on the Planet - Disney

Perhaps the most powerful marketing machine in existence belongs to The Walt Disney Company - and this isn't just because they seem to have unlimited financial resources at their disposal. Consider the masterful way that they built anticipation for "Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens." Starting a full year out from the premiere of the movie, a teaser trailer was released to build anticipation. Since that opening salvo, we were bombarded with a steady stream of marketing content, from tie-in comic books to a toy launch event that was treated as a national holiday, and more. Anticipation for a new "Star Wars" film could not have been higher going into its release, but what did all of that marketing really tell us about the film itself?

The answer is "not much." People knew what it was called, knew who was in it, knew it had the words "Star Wars" in the title and very little else. So, why was the hype going into the release of the film so massive if people actually knew next to nothing about it, let alone whether or not it would be good? Because of the power of "anticipation" in action.

Little By Little

When building anticipation for a product or service ahead of its release, the key is to understand just how powerful saying very little can actually be. You don't want a print marketing material to literally say "this is what this does and this is why you want it." Doing so removes the air of mystery from the proceedings, which is one of the key ingredients when building anticipation. You need to focus on core images or small facts that only hint at a much larger whole. You want people to say to themselves "I NEED to know more about what this is," because at that point you've got their attention. Once you have their attention, the actual product or service itself can help make sure that you never let go.

Focus On the Problem, Not the Solution

Say you had a product or service that made it easier for stay-at-home moms to get the kids off to school in the morning. If you wanted to build anticipation in your print marketing materials, you might focus on that particular problem above all else. The different waves of your campaign would be devoted to essentially confirming what they already know - "kids tend to not be cooperative in the morning, if only you had more hours in a day, it's difficult to manage your own schedule and theirs at the same time, etc." Then, you might tease with a bold statement like, "We're about to change all that. Stay tuned for more information," and continue to hit them with additional marketing materials in the run-up to the actual launch.

Not only have you appealed to their sentiments and hinted at how you're about to change their lives in an emotional way, but you've also begun to build anticipation at the same time. The great thing about anticipation is that it tends to snowball - if you can get a customer excited today, your focus can then become on KEEPING them excited, which is significantly easier and less time consuming than getting their attention in the first place.

Anticipation is one of the single best assets that you have in your quest to connect with your target audience in new and meaningful ways. If you can play the "anticipation game" in the right way, you won't have to worry about convincing people to engage with your product or service when it launches. They'll come directly to you - they practically won't be able to help themselves.

To contact Chuck Gherman for more information about how Printing Arts Press helps organizations with their Marketing needs through print communications please visit www.printingartspress.com.


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Pro-Tips For Rocking Your Next Trade Show

If you've ever worked a boring booth at a trade show, you've most likely been the victim of the "avoiders." Those passers-by who liken you to Medusa and refuse to look your way for fear of being turned to stone.  You notice them by the way they engage actively with booth 1145, take a quick glance at your booth with that lonely poster and brochure, and then, hurriedly walk past you with their eyes carefully averted. After enough of these avoiders, you may start to wish you had some of those smiley-faced, squishy stress-balls to throw at them.

This year, with some careful planning and a little creativity, you may be able to grab people's attention and keep them engaged without resorting to assault and battery. Obviously, the lengths that you go to create interest at your booth may be limited by your budget, so it's important to think about what this trade show means to your business and how engaging 10, 50, or even 1000 target individuals may bring more work your way in the coming months. Once you've got your budget ironed out, you can start getting those creative juices flowing.

Get Out Your Lasso

You know from experience that the hardest part of working a trade show booth is getting people to look at you, right? What if your booth looked like they just stepped into the hottest casino in Vegas? Or, they're stepping into a game show hosted by loud and enthusiastic individuals? Being active and/or unconventional is key to attracting attention. The possibilities are only limited by your imagination, and here are some favorites to get your mind flowing:

• Superhero or celebrity photo ops. Invent a superhero to represent your company and have him or her available for photo opportunities with booth guests. It may seem a bit corny, but it works. The same is true for celebrity look-alikes. Be sure to get their card so you can send them the pic after the show.
• Wheel of Fortune. Nothing screams "come here now" than the chance to win fabulous and exciting merchandise (or your services).
• Create a treasure map leading to your booth. This may require some cooperation on the part of the venue, but placing arrows or words on the floor that lead people to your booth can create intrigue and bring people in.

Whatever you decide, make it fun and interactive. Think Disneyland for adults.

Build Excitement in Advance of the Show

Regardless of what genius idea has emerged from your mind, it's important to create a sense of anticipation among your clients and prospects. Sending out formal printed invites or periodic emails revealing a little something more about what's in store for them when they visit will get them chomping at the bit to visit your booth.

Have Quality Informational Products to Hand Out

You get very few chances to make an impression once you get people into your booth. Once they're there, make your efforts count by providing them with unique, high-quality informational products that will not just stay in the bag in the closet when they get home.

Follow-up After the Show with Everyone

Hopefully, your venue will provide a mailing list of all of the participants so you can send out follow-up correspondence to those you saw and those you missed. If no list is provided, be absolutely sure you get business cards from the people you talk to and connect with them ASAP! The more opportunities you have to make an impression, the better.

To contact Chuck Gherman for more information about how Printing Arts Press helps organizations with their Marketing needs through print communications please visit www.printingartspress.com.


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Print Marketing - What Was Once Old is Now New Again

Recently, a prospective client said they wanted to get customers' attention through non-traditional marketing using printed products. Who knew that in 2016, the printed word would be considered "non-traditional?" Non-traditional? We're saying this about a medium that was developed back in the 1400's by Johannes Gutenberg! While Webster's (of dictionary fame) mind might be little blown by this reference, when you think about it, it actually makes a lot of sense.

For the past two decades, digital media has been rapidly replacing many of our formerly traditional ways of doing things, from watching television, reading the newspaper, to yes...print marketing. With the democratization of information that the internet has brought, more and more people are consuming this information digitally. Social media and search engine algorithms target our interests and bombard us with advertisements directed at those interests, to the point that we've become immune to the ancillary advertising "noise" that surrounds the article that we are reading online. Ad-ridden blogs and online media are now considered traditional.

Obtain Thought Leader Status 

With Print Magazines or Newsletters

While many of the more traditional news magazines are transitioning to digital-only formats, the fact of the matter is, 80% of individuals who read newspapers read them in print. People actually trust written content more than they trust online content. This is true of both information and of advertising. So, depending on your industry, it may be a good idea to create a periodical print magazine or newsletter to give your customers or prospects informative and entertaining news and information that they will be excited to get each month, quarter or year.

Getting Attention With 

Quality Print Marketing Materials

A well designed print marketing device can effectively break through the noise and grab your customers' attention.  Print marketing can take on many forms, including:

• Business Cards: Different shapes, sizes, die cuts, and formats grab people's attention and make for some great talking points that help build relationships.
• Invitations: Having a grand opening or special occasion? Send out printed invitations and make people feel they are connected.
• Postcards: Whether for direct mail purposes or periodic sales or coupons, postcards can bring in a surprising amount of business.
• Brochures of Services or Products: Printed on glossy paper with excellent design and copy, these types of marketing products add personality to your business.
• Catalogs: Create loyalty and more business by sending out catalogs while encouraging your customers to spread the word by passing it along. You could also offer a discount to both the existing customer and the new customer they bring in. 

 

Poke Your Customers Periodically 

to Keep Yourself on Their Minds

Marketing doesn't end when the sale is made. Customer retention is a key part of a successful marketing plan. Following up with the customer can increase retention and build loyalty. Sure, you could send them an email, but really, email is where messages come to die. Consider instead a few timed mailings to keep them engaged, such as:

• Direct Mail: Consider seasonal postcards or brochures with loyalty discounts on relevant seasonal items.
• Directories: Advertising in professional directories puts your organization at 'top of mind awareness' since there aren't any 'ad blockers' as is the case online. 
• Thank You Cards: Sending out a card thanking them for their purchase and providing a time-limited discount on their next purchase makes customers feel appreciated and welcome.
• Stickers: Put your logo, tag line or a branded and relevant inspirational quote on a sticker to put on cars, computers, water bottles, and other personal gear.

Regardless of what type of print marketing you use, telling people a good story or giving them useful and entertaining information will make them loyal customers.


To contact Chuck Gherman for more information about how Printing Arts Press helps organizations with their Marketing needs through print communications please visit www.printingartspress.com.


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The Evolution of Sales: How the Landscape Has Changed

Depending on whom you are selling to, and how, the nature of the sales process has changed since the birth and incredible growth of the Internet. However, with all of the changes in how we communicate with digital connectivity, some things have not changed much at all. Sales are still sales. It is the targeting of sales that has changed more than anything else.

A century's worth of knowledge about how to go about selling something has not been made obsolete, but it has experienced some competition. The old guard, presenting the "correct" path for sales taught new recruits the art of manipulation. Jeffrey Gitomer, Zig Zigler, Brian Tracy, Tom Hopkins, and many other authors on the subject have outlined a strategy for increasing sales on the basis of this manipulation. They have shown us a successful, proven model for sales. So, what has changed?

Old School

The mantra for the old school approach was to establish and maintain a sort of control over potential customers by answering questions with questions. Establish some common ground and build a rapport. Spend all the time you can, build value, and only then reveal the price. Once a value has been established, even a higher price will seem more acceptable. It must be said that this approach has achieved much success. And, in fact, there remains a place for it, depending on the medium used for conversation.

What the Internet and digital communication have done, however, is to change the speed of interactions to the point that available time has collapsed. These days, spending a lot of time has become counter-productive if the medium is the Internet, for example. Studies show that most web surfers, even when looking for a specific product, will spend very little time searching before making a decision, one way or the other.

This makes building value more difficult, and when transactions occur online, there is no face-to-face interaction and no rapport building. Digital customers have very little time for elaborate presentations building product value. Typically, they already have a price in mind and are most interested in your price for the sake of comparison.

New School

Today, sales are being made with a rapidity that has never before been matched. For that to occur, some of the old ways have been relegated to other media, as the Internet has expanded to take over some of their space. Online sales are continuing to explode exponentially, so it is quite clear that new approaches are being validated.

To a certain extent, a person's approach is tailored to his or her personality. Some people are built for face-to-face interaction. Some can do without it. All sales become a contract and there is a personal comfort zone that must be attained even in the quickest of transactions. Serious shoppers who demand a greater depth of information do exist on the Internet, but the Internet can easily adapt for these shoppers by offering the information to those who demand it, while streamlining the sales process for those who do not.

There is really nothing inherently wrong with the old school approach to sales. There will always be a time and place for it in certain contexts. What the Internet has introduced to the process is flexibility. While there is no flesh-and-blood person speaking to the buyer, there is a wealth of information available if the buyer really desires it. As a result, website building has become something of an art form, so the needs of customers can be addressed as those needs emerge rather than in a pre-determined sales presentation.

It seems old school and new school can live together, after all.

To contact Chuck Gherman for more information about how Printing Arts Press helps organizations with their Marketing needs through print communications please visit www.printingartspress.com.


#print #directmailmarketing #chooseprint

Endurance Can Make All the Difference

Entrepreneur and author Matthew Paulson has characterized entrepreneurship as an endurance sport. It is true that sometimes if you see you are on the wrong track, the best course of action is to abandon the original plan and start in a new direction. However more times than not, just sticking with it can often make all the difference between success and failure, winning and losing. Famed cinematic genius Walt Disney is quoted as saying, "The difference between winning and losing is most often ...not quitting." In another famous quote referring to the opinions of pessimistic critics and detractors he said, "It's kind of fun to do the impossible."

He should know. Walt Disney achieved some of the most spectacular success anyone has ever reached in cinema, winning 22 Academy Awards and more awards and nominations than anyone else in history. He did so by overcoming rejection of his ideas and doing "the impossible."

Disney's most profound idea, the notion of feature-length animated films when nothing but shorts had ever been done before, was widely criticized as foolish and destined for failure. He persisted, though, and we all know how that turned out. Disney's endurance in the face of blanket rejection made the difference. By comparison, what a sterile and vacuous world we would have had if he would've listened to his detractors and bailed out on his plans.

Long before he was laughed at by Hollywood studios, he learned the value of endurance from other so-called failures that might have derailed an otherwise imaginative career. Early on he was fired from a newspaper for not having any original ideas and for lacking imagination, of all things. His first feature-length animation was Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and it became the most successful film of 1938, earning the equivalent of 134 million in today's dollars. That's not too shabby for someone who lacks imagination. The world is far better off because he had the endurance to see the project through.

Distinguished writer Malcolm Gladwell outlined a theory that it takes 10,000 hours of work on a business to really know what you are doing, to make it a success. That is five years of full-time work--in other words, endurance.

David Weber and Kenny Lao hatched an idea for a food bar built around dumplings as a primary menu item. Their idea actually placed second in a New York University Stern School of Business competition, after which they launched the brick-and-mortar Rickshaw Dumpling. Becoming a bit too ambitious, they launched a second store and stretched their resources far too thin. Nearing bankruptcy, they abandoned the second site and started a mobile food truck, instead. This proved quite successful and saved their business, becoming a well-known icon in New York City. Their endurance--as well as their ingenuity--provided them the vehicle they needed to succeed.

In business and in life, we can allow rejections and other circumstances to rule us, or we can take charge and continue unhindered by those circumstances. An anonymous line states that calm seas do not a skilled sailor make. The rougher the sea, the more practice you get at handling problems. Walt Disney, David Weber, and Kenny Lao stuck it out. The example provided by people like this is an inspiration for us all.

It is said of mountain climbers that they do what they do simply because the mountain is there. But, without endurance there would be no successful climb. In business, the best formula for success involves the endurance of a mountain climber--just because your goals and objectives "are there." Endurance can and frequently does make all the difference.

To contact Chuck Gherman for more information about how Printing Arts Press helps organizations with their Marketing needs through print communications please visit www.printingartspress.com.


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Brand Awareness: Becoming Another Kleenex

In today's world of marketing, if you are not marketing online, you are missing a very big boat. Marketing is now a science with logistics and parameters that were largely unheard of just a few years ago. However, that is not the case with the notion of brand awareness. The auto industry was probably the biggest contributor to the idea that brand loyalty could be utilized to sell more products. That industry is over 120 years old, and brand awareness became a fashionable tool in marketing automobiles by the early 1900s.

Brand awareness, of course, is the extent to which a name, label, logo, catch phrase, jingle, or another identifier that is associated with a brand, a specific product, or a company is easily recognized by customers. Brand awareness may be old news, but the Internet has taken the concept to new heights, becoming far more measurable and quantifiable as part of an overall marketing strategy.

There are many examples of successful brand awareness implementation. It has always been primarily produced by effective advertising. The most dramatically successful advertising campaign is the one where your product becomes synonymous with the product category. For many years now, a facial tissue has been called a Kleenex regardless of what actual brand was used. This is the same result we see when some people refer to any sport-utility vehicle as a Jeep and any cola drink as a Coke.

The objective in advertising or any brand awareness marketing endeavor is not simply to get your product name or image in front of the consumer. It is to get the image into the mind of that consumer, so when the buying customer wants a product, he or she wants your product before that of any competitors. Repetitious advertising creates a memory trace that remains and is reinforced with every additional occurrence. Think of mayonnaise, hot dogs, ketchup, beer, and coffee. The odds are pretty good that in each case you thought of a specific brand. It is no coincidence that the biggest selling brands are also among those most heavily advertised in various media.

While a successful advertising campaign can create solid brand awareness, a limiting or cessation of advertising can erase the gains in a remarkably short time. Forty years ago, a steel wool soap pad was known as a Brillo Pad. Today, SOS brand is the big seller. Brillo sometimes doesn't even get any shelf space, and we must ask when was the last time you saw an ad for Brillo scouring pads? The manufacturer failed to maintain the brand awareness level they had established. A massive advertising campaign by the manufacturers of SOS soap pads was the driving force that changed the landscape.

Advertising remains key to this process, and today the most critical medium for reaching the customer is the Internet. No other medium offers such widespread advantages in both reach and monitoring capacity. With the Internet, you can track how many times your ad has been viewed and how many times it has been clicked on.

Furthermore, social media and blogging have opened up new avenues for tracking your brand's impact. Programs exist that can tell you how many times your brand has been searched for by a search engine. Others can reveal how many times it has been mentioned in a blog anywhere on the World Wide Web. These "mentions" can be even more critical to brand awareness than page views or clicks because each one may represent an impartial testimony to your product. Even negative discussion tends to reinforce brand awareness. The old saying applies: There is no such thing as bad publicity. 

Establish it, reinforce it, and nurture it. Brand awareness can make the difference for you in becoming another brand like Kleenex.

To contact Chuck Gherman for more information about how Printing Arts Press helps organizations with their Marketing needs through print communications please visit www.printingartspress.com.


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