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Archive for the ‘Learn from Mistakes’ Category:
Why waste time with bad pitches?
It amazes me how many people are using the “shoot and pray” method when pitching their products, services or clients. Why not use better and more effective techniques?
But sometimes, just sometimes… I answer to people sending me bad pitches, and today was one of those days.
Dear Website Owner,
65% of people searching the Internet will never find your web site unless you’re ranked on first page of Google, MSN, or Yahoo. If I help you obtain as much as 4 times more WEB traffic to your online business by promoting you to the first page of the search engines would you be interested?
Our company is on the first page when you search on Google for our primary search term “SEO Company.” We would like to do the same for your web site so you can come up for your main keywords as well? All of our processes use the most ethical “white hat” Search Engine Optimization techniques that will not get your website banned or penalized.
This special SEO program includes:
No upfront fees
A month-to-month program
More traffic guaranteedPlease reply to my email and I would be happy to send you a proposal.
______________________________________________________________________
Sincerely,
Josh HF
Dear Josh HF,
65% of people hiring anyone via Internet will never hire you unless you state your company name, use a company email-address and use your full name when pitching companies offering your SEO services. I can not verify that your company is on the top 10 Google search results for “SEO Company” because you don’t actually state your company’s name.
If I can help you to obtain as much as 4 times more paying customers by giving you a few tips how to market your company, interact with people and above all create an effective pitch email, would you be interested?
Please reply to my email and I would be happy to send you a proposal.
Sincerely,
Katja Presnal
Great Photos Equal Great PR
Case study:
Amanda is a mompreneur, who couldn’t find a product she was looking for when she had her first baby 8 years ago, so she decided to create it herself. Her unique baby product got her friends asking for one for their babies too and soon she was making the products so often for friends and their friends, that she decided to start her own company and start selling her products for other parents as well. Her revolutionary baby product was hitting the retailers and she also started her own online store in 2004. Her website was getting decent amount of traffic and sales, and all the customers who bought the product absolutely loved it, and Amanda started visioning for more. She wanted to have her baby product featured in magazines, written about in blogs and used by celebrity babies. She pitched her product, and was rejected again and again. All this at the same time while getting a lot of positive feedback on the product itself.
In 2006 another mompreneur Hannah saw Amanda’s product and also loved it, but was hoping for getting it in a different color options that what Amanda was offering. Hannah was trying to find the same product from other companies to get it in a color she liked, but couldn’t find a similar product in the market. Hannah had an idea - she wanted to start a company making the baby product like Amanda’s was, and offer it in new color schemes. In early 2007 Hannah’s website launched with inviting graphics and high quality product photos of the baby product in use. In now time Hannah’s baby product was in the baby magazines, featured on TV shows and blogged in mommy blogs.
Amanda’s original product was actually better made, and their price points were around the same, the products are very much alike, but it was Hannah who was getting all the good PR. There are several reasons of course, but one really big reason is pictures and the visual branding. Better pictures, better PR, and ultimately, more sales.
3 Reasons Why You Need Great Product Photos for Great PR:
1. Everyone wants their website or magazine to look good, if your product makes them look good, they are more likely to feature it.
2. The easier you make it for people, the more willing they are to help you. While most magazines take their own photos, websites and blogs don’t. If you offer them great photos they can use to feature you, they are more likely to feature your product.
3. You want your photos to represent you and your product correctly, and it doesn’t matter how great your product is if your photos say “poor quality” - that will automatically be the first impression of your product as well.
The bottom line is.. Better photos means more PR and ultimately better sales numbers.
Babywearing International’s Response to Motrin
The Motrin ad campaign couldn’t have come out at a worse time for
Babywearing International, a non-profit group dedicated to babywearing advocacy and education. It is The International Babywearing Week, and their organization has been focusing on celebrating, promoting and advocating the many benefits of babywearing during this time. Part of this has been a media outreach and educating people about the facts of babywearing.
Babywearing International sent the following response concerning the Motrin mom-alogue campaign to McNeil Consumer Healthcare on November 17, 2008:
Kathy Widmer
VP of Marketing - Pain, Pediatrics, GI, Specialty
McNeil Consumer Healthcare
Dear Ms. Widmer:I am Susie Spence, president of Babywearing International, Inc., a nonprofit organization whose mission is to promote babywearing, with benefits for both child and caregiver, through education and support. I write to you on behalf of the Babywearing International Board of Directors concerning the mom-alogue advertising campaign for Motrin, which purports to be from the point of view of a babywearing mother.
We are deeply troubled by this campaign for the following reasons:
- It disparages babywearing mothers by portraying them as victims of a painful fashion trend;
- It falsely states that baby carriers “put a ton of strain” on the wearer’s back, neck, and shoulders;
- It falsely implies that mothers who wear their babies “cry more” than those who don’t;
- It portrays the research-proven benefits of babywearing as rumor or speculation subject to doubt;
- It disparagingly implies that babywearing mothers look “tired and crazy;” and
- It was timed to run during International Babywearing Week, November 12-18, 2008, when nonprofit babywearing groups all over the world are celebrating babywearing, and thousands of volunteers are working to publicize the benefits of babywearing and to encourage the practice of babywearing.
Just as we are working to create community support for this beneficial practice so that no parent will ever again be harassed or ridiculed for babywearing, McNeil is perpetuating an image of babywearing parents as silly people who make irrational choices to be in fashion. Your “mom-alogue” could hardly be more ill-timed, off-base, or damaging to babywearing parents or to parents who have yet to reap the benefits of babywearing.
While we do sincerely appreciate that McNeil Consumer Healthcare is not so crass a corporate citizen as to continue showing the mom-alogue on the Motrin website in the face of the uproar it created on social networking sites and through email, merely discontiuing the campaign is no step toward repairing the damage it has caused and continues to cause.
Babywearing International, Inc., calls upon McNeil Consumer Healthcare to counter the effects of this offensive ad campaign in the following ways:
- Completely discontinue the campaign by not allowing any further publication of it in any media;
- Undertake an equally prominent campaign that portrays babywearing mothers as the savvy parents and consumers they actually are;
- Undertake an equally prominent campaign that explains the proven benefits of babywearing and directly counters the portrayal of babywearing as painful or as a practice that makes babywearing mothers cry;
- Undertake a campaign to educate healthcare providers as well as patients about the research-proven benefits of babywearing. In fact, babywearing makes mothers more confident and results in fewer tears for both mothers and children.
Recognizing that Motrin is a brand that has heretofore been mother-friendly as well as child-friendly, Babywearing International would consider assisting Motrin in partially repairing the recent damage to its image by having Motrin’s collaboration in our Medical Outreach Campaign, through which we provide research-based information to medical doctors, counselors, and parents concerning the health benefits of babywearing.
Most sincerely yours,
Susie Spence
President
Babywearing International, Inc.
www.babywearinginternational.org
Looking forward seeing what happens next.
Links:
More about Babywearing at Adventures in Babywearing
Motrin Heard the News *UPDATED*
It has been interesting to see how this has been unfolding today.
My YouTube video has gotten over 2500 views, my blog posts mentioned at Peter Shankman’s blog, and at Mashable, written by Sarah Evans. Laura Fitton of Pistachio Consulting posted my video, so did 5 Minutes for Mom. And over 60 blogs blogged about it today and linked to Skimbaco Lifestyle.
A lot of upset moms.
Bad PR.
And silence from Motrin - until just an hour ago, when Motrin.com was taken down - for little upkeep called taking the ad down.
I also just received an email from Kathy Widmer, Vice President of Marketing for McNeil Consumer Healthcare.
Dear Katja -
I am the Vice President of Marketing for McNeil Consumer Healthcare. I have responsibility for the Motrin Brand, and am responding to concerns about recent advertising on our website. I am, myself, a mom of 3 daughters.
We certainly did not mean to offend moms through our advertising. Instead, we had intended to demonstrate genuine sympathy and appreciation for all that parents do for their babies. We believe deeply that moms know best and we sincerely apologize for disappointing you. Please know that we take your feedback seriously and will take swift action with regard to this ad. We are in process of removing it from our website. It will take longer, unfortunately, for it to be removed from magazine print as it is currently on newstands and in distribution.
-Kathy
Kathy Widmer
VP of Marketing - Pain, Pediatrics, GI, Specialty
McNeil Consumer Healthcare
Great - looks like the clean up of the mess has started, and so far done right. Looking forward seeing what happens next.
Motrin’s website was down for good 15 hours, and now this message has replaced the ad:
This is a great start, and hopefully a wake up call, not just for companies involved but for the rest of corporate America. Companies need to be on social media, and communicate with their target market.
Even if people don’t agree that the ad was/wasn’t offensive (which by the way is a personal opinion, and same way that we can’t say someone is wrong because they don’t like tuna fish, you can’t say that moms who found this ad offensive are wrong), the fact reminds that it took 24 hours from Motrin to response anything to those who were offended. Many in social media think 24 hours is a long time to response, we are used to instant gratification, but for a company who isn’t involved in social media, it was some what impressive to get any type of response within 24 hours and on a Sunday evening.
Motrin Makes Moms Mad
Dear Motrin Marketing Team,
I am hoping you will feel our pain, and you have enough Motrin to survive the Motrin babywearing campaign headache you will be feeling in the next couple of days, maybe even weeks. I am truly sorry if someone looses a job over this, but frankly, this would have been easily avoided - by asking a few babywearing moms, what they thought of your babywearing = pain ad.
Me and several other moms in the online communities were offended by your ad targeting moms, which said:
Wearing your baby seems to be in fashion.
I mean in theory it’s a great idea.
…
And who knows what else they’ve come up with. Wear your baby on your side, your front, go hands free.
Supposedly, it’s a real bonding experience.
They say that babies carried close to the bod tend to cry less than others.
But what about me? Do moms that wear their babies cry more than those who don’t?
I sure do!
These things put a ton of strain on your back, your neck, your shoulders. Did I mention your back?!
I mean, I’ll put up with the pain because it’s a good kind of pain; it’s for my kid.
Plus, it totally makes me look like an official mom.
And so if I look tired and crazy, people will understand why.
The advertising video started a discussion on Twitter.com, and in the mommy blogging community. Jessica Gottlieb recommended using a #motrinmoms hashtag for the discussion and “a few hours and two thousand tweets later #MotrinMoms is the #1 search on Twitter, eclipsing SNL for the first time since Obama was elected” .
I asked my followers on Twitter what they thought of the the ad:
And the responses were flooding… I wanted to collect the message for Motrin, but unfortunately YouTube lets you make only a 10 minute video - and I couldn’t fit every comment for the ten minutes!
Here is only a short list of blog posts covering the Motrin ad fiasco:
Motrin’s New Ad Attacking Babywearing
Motrin Ad Bashes Baby Wearing
Motrin the Anti-Mom
Twitter Moms Uproar Over Motrin Video
Twitter Crouwd Isn’t Inviting Motrin Moms to Their Playdate
Motrin Moms React
And since it is 4 o’clock on Sunday morning when I’m writing this (it sucks that bad PR happens when the marketing team has a day off, doesn’t it?) , I’m keeping my marketing advice simple:
1. Always know your target market.
2. If you don’t know your target market - hire someone who does. For example, when marketing to moms - ask moms!
3. Don’t underestimate the power of the synergy of blogging communities like mommy bloggers.
4. You have to be using social media so you can monitor and take control when something like this happens. Monday morning is not fast enough. Everyone will know your story told by someone else but you by noon on Sunday.
The good news is, that any company marketing to moms can achieve amazing results by the help of the moms & the mommy blogging community. The ways companies can do this:
1. Hire a Chief Mom Officer, who knows the target market & marketing. Or hire Mom Experts to answer your questions how you can reach moms. (Motrin: hire a Chief Mom Officer, soon launching MomForce will be a great source)
2. Ask what you can do to moms, not what moms can do for you.
3. Show that you genuinely care, start a conversation and listen the answers your target market is giving you.
Written by Katja Presnal
Mommy Blogger
PR / Social Media Marketing Consultant
Mother of Three
katja dot presnal at skimbaco dot com
