Branding & Design

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Branding & Design, Digital Marketing, Web Design & Development

How To Strategically Plan Your 2018 Marketing Budget

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Marketing budgets vary per company and industry, but what’s true about all businesses, is that having a marketing budget, no matter what size, is necessary.

In this article, we discuss what should be included in your marketing plan, and provide an overview of the below checklist – which covers the action items you’ll need to complete as you head into 2018:

  1. Organize your finances
  2. Identify your needs and goals
  3. Determine your spend
  4. Develop a marketing plan
  5. Decide how to allocate your budget
  6. Action your plan

Organize Your Finances To Identify Your Needs

Before creating your marketing budget for 2018, you need to strategically organize and collect social and financial data that will allow you to:

  • Identify holes or ‘misses’ in past marketing campaigns
  • Identify 2017 gross revenue to predict 2018 gains
  • Reflect upon which areas (social, content, SEO) you are struggling in
  • Identify which areas of your business need attention and larger investment

Identifying Your Needs & Goals

Once your financial plan is in order, you will be in a better position to consider the state of your business and how much focus you will need to give social media, website building, design, SEO, or content marketing in the upcoming year. Having a clear understanding of this data will help you to identify your actionable needs and goals for 2018, such as:

  • Developing a social media campaign around a new fundraiser you’re hosting
  • Increasing SEO to rank higher on search engine results pages (SERPs)
  • Updating out-dated content on your website
  • Designing new marketing material to hand out at a tradeshow you’ll be attending
  • Starting fresh with a new website

What is your biggest priority for 2018?

Determining Your Spend & Plan

Brand New Companies

Companies that are less than a year old are likely limited to a very small marketing budget. They should, therefore, leverage predominantly free social media platforms (Ex. Facebook, Instagram, etc.) and consider attending a comprehensive Social Media Training session to begin generating buzz around their brand. By learning how to strategically publish yourself, you’ll reduce costs.

New Companies

Businesses that have been established for one to five years should consider using a healthy percentage of their gross revenue on print (Ex. brochures at tradeshows) and digital marketing (Ex. website enhancements and blog development). A larger marketing budget will help to launch awareness and boost familiarity amongst new and returning customers.

Established Companies

Companies that have been in business more than five years, and have a secure budget for marketing, should allocate a substantial amount of their gross income to brand marketing (Ex. Email marketing, PPC, and social media/content campaigns). For companies who exist in extremely competitive markets, are in need of brand reputation management, or who are promoting a new service or product, this budget should only continue to increase.

Allocating Your Budget

Branding

Graphic design can transform a boring and stagnant brand into something refreshed, relevant, and captivating. Although branding feeds into SEO, social media, content, and website integration, most branding begins in the design studio – where talented teams research and draft branding materials that reflect the vibe and intent of the company’s messaging.

If your business relies on brochure material, tradeshow booth design, or needs a complete logo and brand overhaul, your marketing budget should be catered towards branded design elements, as well as the integration of those designs – into your social media platforms, web copy, and website.

SEO Management

Companies that find they are in need of more quality leads, improved recognition, and higher visibility within search engines like Google, are in need of quality and consistent SEO management, as well as PPC advertising.

However, SEO relies heavily on quality content to rank and perform ideally. Therefore, if your business is in need of SEO, you’re also in need of new and better content – audited, identified, and strategically improved throughout your website.

61% of marketers say improving SEO and growing their organic presence is their top inbound marketing priority.

Local searches lead 50% of mobile visitors to visit stores within one day. (Google, 2014) 

78% of local-mobile searches result in offline purchases. (Search Engine Land, 2014) 

Content Marketing

Web content articulates your visual brand messaging in text. In other words, content backs the intent and messaging that your branding portrays. Content also goes a step further – to provide context, drive actions, present valuable information, help your company to rank well in search engines, and, in most cases, helps users make an informed consumer decision.

While writing words for a webpage may seem easy, content marketing does more than just list details about a product and tell you why it’s great. Content marketing strategically develops copy that will speak directly to a targeted market, tap into their concerns and interests, support SEO, and drive specific conversion goals. This targeted marketing is also effective for email marketing broadcasts.

53% of marketers say blog content creation is their top inbound marketing priority. (HubSpot, 2017) 

On average, B2B marketers allocate 28% of their total marketing budget to content marketing. (Content Marketing Institute, 2015) 

Social Media Marketing

For businesses looking to improve brand recognition and to interact with their customers and clients, a new marketing budget should shift primarily to social media engagement, management, and development. With SSPC on the rise, companies need to consider investing money in social media advertising – to convert social media engagement into a potential sale of a product or service. By allocating the rest of your budget towards content development and SEO management, your online profile will continue to flourish.

83% of all marketers actively pursue social media marketing initiatives. (Aberdeen, 2016) 

Nearly one-third of the world uses social networks regularly. (eMarketer, 2016) 

Website Design

If your website is out-dated, hard to navigate, and is not serving the purpose it should – it’s time to dig deep and invest in SEO, content, social media, and web design. Working together to achieve the succinct goal of driving brand recognition, leads, and success for your company, each of these marketing sectors can deliver a complete overhaul for your public and online persona.

While a full website build is a major investment, the payoff of refreshing your entire brand at once will ensure the future of your business is on-trend and prosperous.

Investing In End of Year Marketing

Is your online business holiday ready? If your company relies on online sales during the end of year season, your marketing budget should allow for an increase in spend during these months. That means more social media campaigns, a stronger PPC play, content development to drive interest, and graphics to support your initiative.

For more information on re-visiting your end-of-year ecommerce marketing budget, check out our article ‘Now’s The Time To Spruce Up Your Ecommerce’.

81% of shoppers conduct online research before making big purchases.

Actioning Your Plan

With so many options of where to begin, it can be hard to identify which marketing venture your company should be focused on and participating in. That’s where we come in.

Treefrog Inc. – Your Digital Marketing Solutions Specialists

At Treefrog Inc., we understand that the needs of B2B and B2C clients are sometimes different, and our Client Care Advocates are well versed in identifying client needs based on their pain points and industry sector. If you’re not sure where to begin, we can help:

  • Social Media Training
  • Content Development Workshops
  • SEO Training
  • Email Marketing
  • Website Programming
  • Graphic Design
  • Content Marketing
  • Social Media Management
  • SEO

As one of Treefrog’s Marketing Partner’s (MP’s), your business will receive monthly project management, support, strategizing, development, and reporting – across content, SEO, and social media departments (if required).

To learn more about planning your upcoming marketing budget, contact us today or give us a call at 905.836.4442

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Branding & Design, Digital Marketing

8 Tips for Improving Your Photos

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Improve your Photos!

In today’s digital world, everyone’s head seems buried in their devices, scrolling through Facebook and double tapping on Instagram. Naturally, you would then expect that your content would get in front of many eyes and be liked and shared by your followers. Unfortunately, this doesn’t happen often. People end up scrolling right past your content without a second glance. In fact, the average attention span is now only around 8 seconds! So how do you get someone to stop and pay attention to your posts? Eye-catching visual content.

With today’s technology, you can take impressive photos without spending a fortune on fancy equipment. Whether you have a high-end full-frame DSLR, a standard point-and-shoot, or a smartphone, these tips will help you get more creative with your photography and create visual content that speaks to your viewers:

1. Try New Angles/Perspectives

The average person takes a photo by standing directly in front of their subject and by taking the photo from eye-level. Now, there is nothing necessarily wrong with taking a picture this way, but it’s become extremely commonplace – there’s nothing unique or interesting about this angle unless the subject itself is interesting or unique.

The next time you pick up your camera, force yourself to shoot from a different angle. Get low to the ground and aim your camera upwards, or stand above your subject and aim your camera down. Shoot from the side, shoot from below, or find interesting perspectives upside down! Giving your viewers a new perspective will immediately draw some interest.

TIP: When shooting children or animals, get down to their eye-level rather than shooting from above. This can create a sense of intimacy in the picture – making the image feel more personal.

2. Follow the Light

The word ‘photography’ literally means ‘drawing with light’! Lighting makes a huge difference in the quality of your images, especially if you’re shooting with a smartphone. Before you raise your camera, look around you and notice where the light is coming from, as well as what type of light it is. If you’re shooting outdoors, acknowledge the position of the sun and the direction of the shadows that it casts. Shooting against the sun can create amazing sun flares and a warm, soft glow on your subject. Shooting in the direction of sunlight can create a bold look with harsh contrasts. You can position your subject so that the light only hits one side, or you can look for trees and buildings that create interesting shadows. If you’re working with artificial light, try positioning the lights in different places and see what kind of effect it gives you. The possibilities are endless!

3. Colours

Colours are often associated with different emotions: oranges are warm and inviting, while greens and blues tend to be calm. You can play around with different colours to get the mood that you are looking for in your image. You can also add that extra ‘pop’ to your pictures by looking for contrasting colours such as a green leaf against a red brick wall, or a white sail boat on blue waters. You can choose to look for strong, bold colours, subtle, pastel colours, or you can avoid colour all together and shoot monochrome images in black and white or sepia. Each of these options has its own way of bringing out different elements of an image. It’s up to you to decide what you think portrays your picture, and your message, in the best way. If you need some inspiration, take a look at the works of Ernst Haas, a master of colour photography.

4. Leading Lines

A great way to improve your photo composition is with leading lines. Lines create a path for the eye to follow along your picture and can have different effects depending on their orientation and direction. Horizontal lines invoke a sense of restfulness and peace, whereas vertical lines create a sense of power, and diagonal lines suggest movement.

Before you shoot, take a moment to look at the scene in front of you and identify if there are any prominent lines that your eyes are naturally drawn to, such as roads, fences, buildings, rivers, or rows of trees. Once you identify your strongest lines, think about how you can use it to your advantage. You can create depth by positioning a strong line that leads from the foreground to the background, or you can place your subject at a point where several lines converge, giving your subject more importance in the frame and causing the viewer’s eyes to be naturally drawn there.

Leading lines can be used to tell a story, to place emphasis, or to draw a connection between two objects. Use them creatively!

5. Patterns

The world is filled with patterns, but many of them are overlooked in our day-to-day lives. And while patterns may seem boring, capturing them in a picture can create an image with real impact.

Look for repeating patterns or interesting textures when you are composing your next image. Patterns can be found everywhere – in nature and man-made constructions. You can use a pattern as the focal point of your picture, or you can use it as a backdrop. A great way to add interest to a picture is to break a pattern, such as a row of blue flowers with one red flower. This pop of inconsistent colour will immediately draw eyes to the object that doesn’t belong and this method can be quite impactful if used creatively.

6. Rule of Thirds

The Rule of Thirds is a composition technique that helps you to position your subject in the best spot when taking a picture. When you are taking your picture, imagine the frame as being split up into a grid of four lines as shown below.

The points where the lines intersect identify the four important points of your frame. According to the rule of thirds, you will want to position your main subject at one of these points so that the image becomes more balanced and easier for the eye to roll over naturally. Studies have shown that your eyes tend to naturally go towards one of the four points when looking at an image, rather than the centre.

 7. Show Depth

A picture that shows a sense of depth is much more interesting and engages the viewer, inviting them to explore the scene rather than just to observe.

There are a number of different ways that you can add depth to your shots. You can add foreground interest by adding an object closer to the camera and a secondary object farther away. You can also use foreground objects to create a natural frame around your main subject. Photographing with a wider angle also creates a sense of depth by naturally exaggerating the perspective of a scene.

Another great way of showing depth is by layering objects in the frame. By overlapping objects, you help the viewer reconstruct the 3-D view in their mind, allowing them to mentally be ‘in’ the scene, rather than just seeing a photo of it.

8. Negative Space

Negative space is the ‘emptiness’ that surrounds the subject of interest, and making use of this space is a great way to add more emphasis on a subject and to evoke different moods. Negative space can provide context, it can create a sense of lightness or airiness, or it can emphasize the emotions of your subject.

Negative space is also important if you are planning on adding text to your image before posting it. You should always have a general idea of what you want your final post to look like before taking the image. Prepare ahead of time and be sure to leave enough space around your subject for texts and other graphic elements.

Out of focus photo of a tradeshow floor
Branding & Design

Get Tradeshow Ready In 6 Steps

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When executed with professionalism and flair, having a company booth at an industry-related tradeshow can take your brand presence to the next level. Tradeshows are the ideal venue to learn about new trends, scope out the competition, launch a new campaign or product, or to simply throw your name in the mix, as an industry player to watch.

However, no matter your presence, a poorly thought-out or lazy-looking booth will do harm to your brand. How? An uninteresting display makes you invisible in a sea of other more captivating booths, will cause people to go out of their way to avoid engaging with you, and in result, your participation will become a waste of time and money.

To avoid these horrors, we’ve outlined the six steps for tradeshow success:

1. Do Your Research

If your industry is big enough, odds are there’s a tradeshow out there that’s featuring your fellow competitors. Search online to determine which tradeshows are being held in your field, your geographical area, and in other areas you may want to expand your reach. Once you have determined which tradeshows you’re interested in attending, be sure to research which other brands and companies will be present, as well as what types of booths have been successful for your industry the past. Knowledge is power!

2. Determine Your Marketing Budget

Professional and engaging tradeshow booths can cost upwards of $5,000 to construct and design. And with tradeshows being all about drawing people in and putting your best foot forward (to secure a potential lead), you don’t want to cheap out. Be sure to fully understand and even readjust your marketing budget to accommodate your attendance in a tradeshow. It’s also important to research what types of costs you’ll face – by not only purchasing a spot in the show and designing your booth, but also your travel, hotel, and food costs, and more. It all adds up. Know what your marketing budget allows for before you get in too deep.

3. Identify Attendees & Connect Online

Once you’ve registered for the show, crack down on your demographics and determine what type of customers you may interact with while there. By identifying attendees, you’ll be able to begin targeting them online – through social media engagement and by sending e-broadcasts, inviting your email list to find and engage with you at the tradeshow.

4. Consult The Professionals

When in doubt, contacting a professional digital marketing agency is always your best move. The advantage of getting input from experts is that you’ll be able to express your vision, receive unique and creative feedback, and then receive guidance on the execution of a unified brand strategy. In addition to strategy and brand messaging, a digital marketing agency can also develop print materials, banners, posters, and whatever else you may need – all in one place. By outsourcing the design of your booth, you’ll ensure that you have an outsider’s opinion of what works and what doesn’t.

5. Invest Time In Your Pitch, Set-Up, & Demo

Don’t head into a tradeshow having never assembled your booth, pitched your brand to someone, or practiced your demo. The less prepared you are, the more likely something is to go wrong. The last thing you need is to forget adhesive to mount your poster, to fumble with your words while trying to explain what your company does, or to have a glitch while showing your product capabilities.

To bump up your presence, think about:

  • Dressing your team in bright and unified colours.
  • Distributing memorable marketing materials.
  • Putting enthusiastic people out front.
  • Designing a visually appealing video or PowerPoint.
  • Providing free giveaway merchandise (or food).
  • Drawing people in with interactive games and raffle prizes.

Example: Fill out a ballot with your name and email to WIN!
This will get potential clients excited, keep them at your booth longer, and help you to build your email list!

6. Capture & Pursue Leads

It’s not enough to just talk to passers-by and bring awareness to who you are and what you do. As a business, you need to capture and secure leads that can result in a sale. Be sure to offer a sign-up sheet for your newsletter and to provide a direct contact number on takeaway materials for those who are undecided. Once you’ve gained a person’s email address, be sure to follow up within 24 hours. By touching base while your brand is still fresh in someone’s mind, they’re more like to commit to purchasing.

If you need help with your tradeshow booth strategy and design, our content, social, and graphic design departments can help! Contact Treefrog today at 905.836.4442 to learn more.

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Branding & Design

4 Signs You Need A Brand Overhaul

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Great brands resonate with customers through the strategic execution of look and feel, reputation management, and by telling a great story. And while some brands like Pepsi and Instagram can take things to the next level by making small adjustments to their brand, other companies may require a full brand overhaul to revitalize their presence.

How do they do it?

They hire professionals who can help to identify when their brand identity is becoming stagnant and mature their logo, website, packaging, and messaging – seamlessly and according to trends identified in the marketplace.

How do you know when it’s time to contact the professionals?

1. You’re Making Too Many Excuses

Are you at the point where you’re making up excuses for updating your branding? You know, saying things like, “We’ve just been too busy,” “It’s not that bad,” and, “Maybe next year”?

If this sounds like you, it’s time to take the necessary steps towards a brand overhaul. Think about it, if you, (a person who is biased towards your brand) is noticing that you’re falling behind, imagine what your potential customers and clients are thinking.

We know your brand may have sentimental value, but it’s important that over time, it still appeals to your audience. Revitalize your business by contacting a digital marketing agency that can begin to strategize and action your creative and innovative comeback.

2. You’re In Need Of Reputation Management

If your business is looking for ways to overcome a series of bad reviews or some sort of scandal; a brand overhaul and reputation management may be able to save your company from losing momentum. Re-branding is the perfect way to articulate that improvement and change are being made to rectify the concerns of your customers.

Creative re-branding is also helpful in distracting customers from the ‘bad’ and getting people excited about the ‘good’ that’s to come as you turn a new leaf. Take fast food giant McDonald’s for example:

When American filmmaker Morgan Spurlock released his documentary Supersize Me, McDonald’s, unsurprisingly, panicked. While customers knew that McDonald’s wasn’t necessarily healthy, the negative press and shocking results of the documentary turned into a massive scandal for the brand.

To minimize the hit, McDonald’s quickly went to the drawing board to try to change the way people were thinking about their food. Since then, McDonald’s has re-designed their restaurants, ordering experience, and promotes sophisticated McCafe coffee and smoothies, Happy Meal apple slices, salads, snack wraps, Angus burgers, and shows no signs of slowing down – a brand overhaul well done.

3. Your Business Is Growing Rapidly

Start-ups typically launch with one service or product, but as they develop a following and identify consumer interests and needs, they are likely to expand their offerings – potentially changing their target market and brand messaging. Therefore, when growth develops outside of the scope of an original business plan, a brand overhaul may be necessary – to target and appeal to a wider audience.

In the beginning days of a start-up, it’s also not uncommon to try to save money by building your own basic website, designing your own print materials, and crafting your own logo. However, as your business begins to grow, you may want to consider consulting print, web, design, and content professionals who can mature the logo and promotional materials you started with, making them more sophisticated, versatile, and professional.

4. Your Brand Is Losing Interest & Customers

Over time, audience preferences change, and it’s your responsibility to keep up. This is especially true for brands that have been around for decades and must launch new campaigns to remain fresh and relevant with changing trends and target markets. Take men’s deodorant brand Old Spice for example:

Before launching their 2010 campaign featuring athlete Isaiah Mustafa, Old Spice had become stagnant, dated, and boring. However, through their successful commercial campaign, Old Spice rebranded with humour, connected with a younger demographic, and became a key creative player in the marketplace. They even went viral with ‘The Man Your Man Could Smell Like’.

Other successful re-brands include Keds partnership with Taylor Swift, Burberry’s innovative use of technology and personalization, and The Bay’s shift back to their original name, ‘Hudson’s Bay’.

How Treefrog Can Help

Need professional guidance on how to execute your brand overhaul or logo maturation? That’s our specialty. Our Treefrog team of content marketers, social media gurus, kick ass designers, and programmers, can help to deliver a brand refresh that will keep your business moving forward.

Contact us today at 905.836.4442 to learn more.

Colour swatches
Branding & Design

Trade Show Booth: Get Results!

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From concept to print and everything in between

Trade shows are an engaging opportunity to build your brand, meet with new prospects and strengthen your relationships with established clients. Often it is not taken into consideration the amount of time it takes to complete the process of conceptualizing, designing and printing of trade shows booths.

Because most industry trade shows are just that: a gathering of the industry, it is important to consider the competition and how to distinguish your business from them in such close quarters. Trade shows can play an extremely pivotal role in your business’ networking if you are able to make the right connections.

Remember it is imperative to think about your target audience and ask yourself if you are effectively communicating with them.

  • How can you best reach your target market?
  • What is the desired action of your target market?
  • How is your presence at the trade show going to affect your target market?
  • Does your booth coordinate with your branding & other marketing efforts?

A compelling, custom booth is a sure-fire way to stand out on the floor and increase foot traffic at a crowded trade show.

In order to achieve this goal, it all has to start weeks earlier in the planning stage. Better yet, let’s say plan months earlier, or as early as you can. This way you will be able to handle any unexpected hiccups or hurdles that are all too common on projects like this.

It all begins with a deadline. When is the booth needed? From there you begin communication with a printer to determine their requirements. Accordingly your design or marketing team work backwards from this date, if left too late and they only have a week, you are likely to be limited in our options. However if you have planned appropriately, there are a variety of innovative alternatives to explore, and you are able to create the right message and invest wisely.

Put simply; people are attracted to booths that look good. Investing some time and money into an appealing design will serve you well when you arrive at the show. You need to communicate visually to any potential visitors what your brand stands for and the message you are expressing. This result is not created plainly with a slogan printed on a 7-foot piece of vinyl but communicated through engaging colour, composition and typography in tandem with a solid marketing message.

There is a multitude of options and booth alternatives to explore and consider, including:

  • iPad stands
  • Video/TV displays
  • Presentation equipment
  • Furniture

How will visitors interact with you and the space?

This interaction is another important component to consider, as you want to make an impression not only immediately in person, but also when everybody returns home from the trade show and has time to reflect on the many choices they have to digest.

To ensure a lasting impact you may want to examine something tangible to send back with all of your new connections, such as:

  • Takeaway pieces
  • Business cards
  • Brochures
  • Giveaways

Even once you have your artwork finalized, the project is not complete.

It is then time to return to the printer in order to turn these digital files to a functioning exhibit. But this too, is not an overnight process. Just how long does it take to get a booth printed? This information varies from printer to printer, as well as depending on the time of the year. However, you could be looking at anywhere from one week to four weeks depending on the size and complexity of the booth as well as shipping times. Remember if you are looking to get a booth printed, it is likely that many other businesses in your industry are as well. You wouldn’t want to miss out on an effective booth because the printer couldn’t find the time to complete your job!

When time and finances are budgeted appropriately, an appearance at a trade show can often be a momentous networking opportunity, and exhibit a great return on your investment.

Need a hand determining a strategy for success at your upcoming trade show?

Treefrog is in the business of helping your business in situations just like this. Contact us today; we’re here to help!

The word "brand" decoratively drawn in a notebook
Branding & Design

Is your brand compelling others to act?

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A good brand can be the difference between having a product and selling a product.

A great brand can be the difference between selling a product and creating a business.

Your brand is more than your logo. It’s the core of your identity – culture, mission, ethics, competitive advantages – that your customers will identify with when they interact with your organization. When a brand is strategized and executed properly, it will not only increase a company’s popularity and visibility, but it will also compel others to act.

How do you accomplish this? Let’s look at the importance of effective target marketing, staying competitive, and brand development – in regard to both graphic design and content.

Target Audience

A brand is only as effective as the market it targets. In advertising practices, a target is a clear and focused description of the demographic a company would like to reach. While some companies will target many different markets, depending on the product or service they provide, other companies will consistently target the same market.

A successful target audience is one in which a company has been able to narrow their focus, taking the time to study and understand their wants and needs. It is then the mission of a company to attract these people and satisfy these desires through effective and consistent brand advertising.

Market Context

While it is important to understand the target market of your brand, it is also just as important to understand your competition and how you plan to remain competitive against them.

How do you do this? Research and strategic brand execution.

To understand the advantages of your competitors, you must work to understand what their product or service offers, fully. Then, to get ahead, you must look to develop and advertise new features that will make customers chose your brand instead. These features can be as complex as offering an entirely innovative new service, or as simple as integrating more colour variations in a new logo design.

How else can you remain competitive?

Through creatively marketing your uniqueness and strengths:

Unique Benefits

It is critical to identify all the unique benefits your company, service, or product offers to customers. If you can’t identify a clear advantage in your business, get creative and think outside the box.

Is your product essentially the same as that offered by your competitors? You may still have an advantage over them in the quality of your customer service or your warranty. Think about the customers you already have – why do they choose to deal with you rather than your competitor? Leverage those advantages to speak to new prospects with an authenticity they will relate to and want to experience.

Culture

People like to do business with people they know, like, and trust. You may think your culture matters only for internal recruitment and retention, but sharing the philosophy of your company with customers and prospects can help to engage them in your brand.

For example, if your employees regularly go on fun camping weekends together, why not use pictures and content from these excursions as a way to promote your company on social media? You may not see the direct link between camping excursions and insurance brokerage, but this fun and interactive material may be the reason a customer connects with you and wants to hire your company over another.

You may then even be able to integrate this theme into your logo, website design, and beyond! When an organization positions themselves as on-trend, relatable, and fun, customers are more likely to engage with them on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, and to then also remember and hire them in the future.

Reason to Believe

A brand must also convey trust. In a society filled with “fake news”, what will make someone truly believe that your company provides the best service or wants to help the community by participating in charity events? It’s one thing to claim it, but it’s another thing to show it.

Effective brands practice what they preach. If your company claims to support Charity X every year, why not include a page on your website that includes a pictures collage of your team at various Charity X events and content about why your company is passionate about that charity. You can also use infographics to show how much money you’ve raised for them.

Customers need proof that you are who you say you are. So give it to them.

Brand Slogans & Logos

Effective brand slogans typically include “we” language rather than “I” language, evoking a sense of collaboration and inclusivity. Great slogans also put forward a call to action, creating a mission that will actively push for and drive success. These slogans do not ‘beat around the bush’; they are instead direct, powerful, and concise, leaving no room for misunderstandings.

Example: Barrack Obama’s, “Yes we can” instead of “I can do it” or, Nike’s “Just Do It” instead of “Try it”.

Even more effective than a slogan, a brand logo will push a sale. These icons register with people when they are simple and say something about the brand – without saying anything at all. In other words, great logos are distinctive, appropriate, “cool”, and visually appealing.

Have you ever purchased a Coach purse? How about a Nike hat? In some cases, people may even buy a product simply because the product features an attractive and popular brand logo that they want to associate with their own personal brand.

How Treefrog Can Help

Through the effective implementation of content, graphic design, and social media, your brand will attract its target market and compel that group to engage and buy.

Together, we can strategize, create, and execute your brand. We can design your logo, your website, your product packaging, your business cards, and beyond! We can also help to develop your brand messaging, developing content that will reach all the right people, in all the right channels.

We’ll work to make sure your brand is not only effective, appealing, and directed at the right target market, but that it is also consistent across all platforms.

Let’s talk!

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Branding & Design, Digital Marketing

Why Writing Good Content is Important and How to Start

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From your company’s site search engine ranking to the number of quality sales leads you receive, good storytelling and valued content reaps reward

Whether your company’s digital marketing strategy is successful or not depends on one key element: consistently producing and publishing great content.

Online and offline, we are bombarded by an unending stream of corporate messaging and advertising wherever we look or go. Naturally, we ignore content that does not interest us or that we regard as hype.

Entertaining and interesting content that centres on your audience’s interests or needs, meanwhile, spikes engagement levels, builds brand loyalty and trust, strengthens your website’s organic search engine ranking, and lifts your sales figures.

Think about it. You’re a consumer, too. When you’re online, what grabs your attention? Content and messaging rife with corporate jargon, spelling errors, and poor grammar? Or content that clearly and succinctly addresses a challenge you face, is educational, or useful to you in some way?

Can You Tell Your Customers’ Story Effectively?

Fifteen seconds. According to digital content analytics company Chartbeat, that’s about the average length of time visitors to your website spend reading your content.

And don’t be coaxed into thinking if someone socially shares a link to one of your webpages or blogs that they read it first. Some social sharers do, but many don’t. A joint study by researchers at Columbia University and the French National Institute revealed, “though social networks commonly measure a story’s popularity in shares, researchers found that 59% of all links shared in their sample went unclicked, and presumably unread.”

But here’s more promising news: data from the Pew Research Center finds smartphone users will spend an average of one to two minutes reading news articles provided they are well-written and of interest to them. Additionally, having a mobile-friendly website goes a long way toward attracting and retaining mobile-based audiences.

Nevertheless, it still presents you with a formidable challenge. And if you’re still reading this article, consider you need to be able to produce impactful, compelling, and SEO-optimized content that is of interest to your intended audience for a broad range of digital and print properties, including:

In light of the above, there are other important factors to weigh. Can you tell your target customers’ story well? Can you write concisely about how your company and its products and services solve people’s problems? Do you have the time to do it on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis consistently? And do you have the bandwidth and know-how to track the effectiveness of your content marketing efforts?

Admittedly, that last one was a trick question. Determining how strong your content’s performance is (the return-on-investment) at increasing your sales leads and revenues is no simple feat. Why? Because content marketing is a long play, and you need to decide which metrics are important to track.

For example, many companies and publications are taking a different approach to online measurement. By switching from solely tracking the number of pageviews and click-thrus to including time-on-site and other attention-focussed metrics, their goal is to try to infer which content resonates with their audiences most.

Good Storytelling Creates Value

Good storytelling stirs interest and creates meaning, fosters contemplation in its readers, and in turn, becomes valuable to your intended audience. But not everyone is a natural storyteller. And not many business owners or leaders can commit the time to writing engaging content for all of their company’s marketing needs.

You need to be able to weave a compelling tale; to sell without selling. In short, you may need to hire a ghostwriter, aka an anonymous writer, to tell your customers’ story (and subsequently yours) to the world.

Some of the world’s most important literary works were written by anonymous writers. And the practice of hiring a professional writer to write on another’s behalf is as common today for everything from business books to marketing collateral to thought-leadership articles, blogs, and company websites.

But you’re keen to write your company’s content yourself. Okay, what do you need to do? How much time can you commit to writing? And how do you go about writing stories and marketing content that appeals to your existing and prospective customers intellectually or emotionally? Try these tactics:

  • Find the right topics. The notion of brainstorming with others is dead, and besides, there are no guarantees it will work. Does that mean you need to dismiss collaborating with a group of people altogether and go it alone? Not necessarily. Conferring and working with trusted sources to come up with important topics and an editorial calendar, or to discuss how to approach writing about a particular subject can produce great results. Most importantly, think about your customers and the questions they have for your company. Arrange to have an informal discussion with one of your longtime customers to get their thoughts if you’re uncertain. Or tell a story about how you failed at something – reading someone else’s account of how they mucked up badly, but who ultimately learned from the mistake and went on to succeed never gets old. You can also create a list of what are referred to as “evergreen topics”. Evergreen stories are based on broad subjects that have lasting appeal like why content marketing is important.
  • Manage your time efficiently. Just as you would plot the tasks involved in conducting any other aspect of business, build an executable schedule that divides up the work you need to do, and don’t waver from it. As you begin to write, different things will occur to you, so allow for lots of revision and editing time.
  • Research your topic. Once you know what to write about, hop online and find statistics, as well as the supporting or opposing points of views of others and link to them (or cite them accordingly). Depending on what your topic is, and if you can’t find useful sources to cite, you can always get help from a librarian in your community.
  • Write your first draft. Ernest Hemingway is famously quoted for allegedly remarking, “The first draft of anything is shit.” Whether he uttered those words or not, there is truth in the sentiment, and it is this: don’t get emotionally attached to the first draft of anything you write. Let it ferment in your head. Read it aloud. Have others proofread it for errors. Get the feedback of others you trust, and don’t be hurt by their constructive criticisms, mull them over. Then revise your first draft – and second, third, or fourth drafts if necessary.

Any literate person can write, but writing well is hard work, and you need to be damn good to attract and retain an audience, especially online.

It takes a significant amount of time to adequately research, write, edit, and produce good content for different media types and audiences. You need to discover what your brand’s voice is, determine your writing style, and commit to the craft on a daily basis.

In her 1969 autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, American poet, author, and civil rights activist Maya Angelou wrote, “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” I couldn’t agree more. But sometimes, you need a professional writer’s help to tell that tale effectively and generate the reaction you desire.

Are you ready to tell your story to the world? Drop us a line and tell us what your content marketing and storytelling wants and needs are.

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Branding & Design

5 Ways a Professional Designer Can Make Your Printed Materials Sing

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A combination of digital and traditional marketing materials can build brand loyalty and spur sales. But if your printed collateral falls short of expectations, it can bruise your reputation

Get ahead of the rush to prepare for trade show season and be ready to wow conference attendees and increase your sales leads with professionally designed printed marketing materials.

Taking the helter-skelter approach to your professional printing requirements prior to a major trade show or customer presentation is stressful. More importantly, scrambling at the last moment to have new trade booth banners, brochures, and business cards printed, cut, and delivered on time and on spec can be risky. Why? Because you’re leaving yourself no margin for error and no time to fix any imperfections that crop up. Mistakes made at the print shop in the rush to be ready for your next trade show are expensive, irreversible, and completely avoidable. And what if your last-minute delivery doesn’t arrive on time?

The quality and appearance of your company’s printed matter are mission-critical. Anything less than exemplary is unacceptable and potentially harmful to your firm’s reputation. Design and print go hand-in-hand, but they are not one and the same. There is a great deal of strategy and skill required to ensure the translation between your digital design properties and the printing press are accurate and as you envision them.

“The purest and most thoughtful minds are those which love colour the most.”
– JOHN RUSKIN

A Worthwhile Investment

An experienced, professional designer has the knowledge required to set up any size or type of design for a print shop flawlessly. It is a critical point to bear in mind since mistakes can be costly when they’re made by a printer whose expertise does not include the finer points of graphic design.

Through their work, a knowledgeable and seasoned designer who is familiar with the printing lexicon will ensure your printed materials are neither delayed nor rife with rookie errors. Five important things designers focus on for print-related requirements include:

  1. The difference between RGB and CMYK. RGB (red, green, blue) are primary colours of light. CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow, and key or black) are the primary colours of ink used in printing. Your computer monitor uses RGB colours. Print shops use CMYK colours. To print digital designs on a four-colour press, the RGB colours must be converted to CMYK, but in doing so, their appearance can change significantly. Hence, colour conversion is a delicate affair best not left to chance.
  2. What the Tristimulus colourimeter reads. In the fascinating world of colourimetry (the science of describing our perception of colour), a Tristimulus colourimeter is a device that measures the quality, intensity, and hue of colours omitted by a computer monitor. It helps designers to calibrate the colour levels on their monitors to accurately match the levels of the printer.
  3. Being mindful of Pantone colour coverage. With more than 1,000 Pantone spot colours available to commercial printers, it is the industry standard spot colour printing system they rely on when mixing inks to produce colours on printed materials. Pantone colours are listed by number, and how they translate into print also depends on whether or not the paper stock is coated or uncoated.
  4. Understanding how to use bleed effectively. In commercial printing, bleed refers to the elements of a design that touch the edge of a page without leaving a white margin. The bleed area is what is trimmed off of printed materials. For designers, knowing what the bleed is helps them determine how digital artwork files need to be set up before they’re sent to the printer.
  5. Triple checking the spelling and kerning. If words are misspelled or the spacing between letters and words is out of whack, changing them digitally is no big deal. Errors of this nature on printed materials, however, is another matter entirely (and a costly one).

Generating Sales with Slick Printed Materials

Professionally designed and produced printed materials – whether for the trade show circuit, a direct mail campaign, or as handouts in your office’s lobby – can reinforce brand loyalty among your existing customers, and help your sales force generate new leads. In fact, producing printed business materials is an important part of complete content campaign strategy.

Moreover, and according to a study conducted by MarketingProfs, three out of four small businesses prefer using both print and online channels as part of their marketing strategies because it tends to produce the best return-on-investment.

Do you have marketing materials that need to be printed for an upcoming trade show? Talk to us before you randomly pick a printer.

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Branding & Design, Digital Marketing, Web Design & Development

4 Reasons Your Email Unsubscribe Numbers Are on the Rise

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Are you taking a ‘megaphone’ approach to your email marketing campaigns in an effort to reach as many people as possible? The key to keeping your customers engaged comes down to sending targeted messages at precisely the right time

It’s the winter and a weeklong cold spell has you shivering. Snow and ice are everywhere. As an icy wind freezes your face while you stand outside waiting for a bus to arrive, you feel your mobile phone vibrate in your pocket. You peel off one of your gloves to check your messages only to find you’ve received an email about ice cream, frosty milkshakes, and frozen desserts.

You wouldn’t think a company would send such an ill-timed and poorly targeted marketing message, but it happens more often than not, and it typically prompts the recipient to hit the “unsubscribe” link in fine print at the bottom of that email.

Irrelevant messaging is a significant driver of unsubscribe rates, and importantly, it’s an annoyance to your customers. According to IBM Silverpop’s annual global report on email marketing dubbed, “2015 Email Marketing Metrics Benchmark Study”, Canadian brands posted markedly lower email opening rates compared to companies in the U.S., U.K., the Asia-Pacific region, Europe, the Mideast, and Africa. It could be because of many reasons including consumers are quick to delete emails that don’t resonate with them immediately.

In addition to the content of marketing communications, the format of marketing emails may also be a factor. A study by Litmus found nearly half of emails are now opened on either a smartphone or tablet. That’s a dramatic increase from 2011 when only 8% of emails were opened on a mobile device. In light of this finding, marketers would be wise to adopt a mobile-friendly approach to the content and design of their emails, and they should reduce the number of calls-to-action to one or two per email.

When Email Open Rates Slide and Unsubscribes Spike

Though your email open rates data shouldn’t be used as a sole indicator of a marketing campaign’s success or failure, it is a useful metric to measure. Your email subscribers are valuable. Reducing email list churn is dependent upon understanding why existing and prospective customers unsubscribe from your communications.

After spending the effort (and money) to get your customers to opt-in or subscribe to your marketing emails and to keep them engaged, it is disheartening and frustrating to see unsubscribe levels increase. Outside of irrelevant messaging, there are four primary reasons why people are unsubscribing from your email lists:

  • You’re emailing them too often. When was the last time you heard someone complain they don’t receive enough email? Determining what the right frequency is to send your subscribers an email is multifaceted, but it comes down to the size of your list, the quality of your email content, and the unknowable: how receptive your subscribers truly are to reading your emails.
  • Your emails aren’t smartphone-friendly. Email remains the most effective and affordable digital marketing tool at your disposal to reach your customers, but are you crafting and designing your marketing emails for mobile device readers? With an estimated 68% of all emails in 2015 opened on a mobile device (tablets comprise about 16% of that total) versus on a desktop, it’s wise to assume your emails will be read on a smartphone.
  • All you do is try to sell to them. Are you hitting people over the head with an unending stream of “buy this!” type of content? It’s good to make your customers aware of current and upcoming promotions, but if all you’re doing with your email marketing content is pushing your recipients to purchase something, they’ll start to tune you out.
  • Your content is repetitive and uninteresting. If your email content triggers déjà vu in your audience, or it’s merely uninspiring drivel that serves no real purpose, all you’re succeeding at is inviting people to hit the unsubscribe button.

“The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him (or her) and sells itself.”
– PETER DRUCKER

Zeroing in on Targeted Messaging

Not all of your marketing communications will be relevant to all of your customers, so choose smartly, and don’t lose sight of your marketing campaign objectives. Keep these key points in mind before you hit the “send” button:

  • Define your target audience. Knowing who to market to and why will dictate the success of your email campaigns. You need to understand who has a need for your product or service, who is most likely to purchase it, and what’s most appealing about it to them.
  • Be specific. Your brand is at the heart of your messaging, so narrow down what it is you’re trying to tell your audience and clearly state it. Are you trying to get them to purchase something new? Are you attempting to provide advice? Or are you wanting to draw attention to something your company has done for the betterment of the local community? Avoid emailing mixed messages; they only lead to confusion (and the virtual trash bin).
  • Tailor your messages per channel. Don’t clone your marketing messages. In other words, whatever messaging you use in an email, shouldn’t be the same messaging you have on your website, use on your social media channels, or have printed on brochures. Particularly now in the age of mobile computing, you need to strategize how best to reach your targeted audiences via varying avenues or mediums and customize your content accordingly.
  • Timing is everything. Use your customer data to determine the best time of day to send your marketing emails. If you do, in all likelihood you’ll see a high number of emails opened, and the links within it clicked. Moreover, you won’t annoy your recipients by sending them an email in the winter about ice cream.
  • Get permission first. The most important point to remember is to make sure you have every recipient’s permission orally or in writing (electronic consent is acceptable) before you send them any marketing-related email. Moreover, take steps to protect your customers’ privacy. You should also make it simple for anyone to unsubscribe from or opt-out of your emails. Nobody likes to be spammed. And lest we forget, Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation (CASL) expressly forbids companies and marketers from engaging in such shady practices. CASL applies to all forms of commercial electronic messaging, not only email.

One last noteworthy point on the subject of CASL: According to the Canadian Marketing Association, July 1, 2016, marks CASL’s two-year anniversary, and it’s the deadline for two-year implied consent agreements to expire. That means you need to ensure you have permission for all of your electronic messages (emails, texts, etc.) from your list of recipients unless you have an existing business relationship with them. It’s also important to be mindful that as of July 1, 2017, Canadian citizens will have the legal right to sue organizations for CASL violations.

Want to learn how to create more sales leads via email marketing? Let’s talk. We can help you create meaningful content for your subscribers, develop a strategy for cultivating an effective email list, and analyze the performance of your campaigns.

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Branding & Design, Digital Marketing

Tips for Writing Impactful Content

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Your content needs to be thought-provoking, meaningful, and it must resonate with your target audience

The power of online publishing is such that every company is a media company nowadays, but is your company producing engaging and informative content?

According to data from the Nielsen Norman Group, you have less than one minute to entice a visitor to your website to stick around and explore. That’s not a lot of time to inspire rapt attention. If your site’s content doesn’t affect or appeal to its intended audience instantly and in an intellectual or emotional way, they’ll quickly lose interest, and you will lose business.

There are theories as to why and how cringeworthy content resides on so many business websites. It could be because of the oft-repeated “content is king” cliché that’s bandied about with wild abandon by marketing cheerleaders induces people to produce content for content’s sake. (Don’t do this) Or it’s possible business owners and decision-makers don’t want to pay a professional writer to help them. Regardless, if brands want to be successful publishers and use content to create relationships and up sales leads, they need to produce clear but compelling content consistently, and ensure it’s optimized for social media sharing.

Whether you’re writing for a corporate website, a blog, company e-newsletter, an advertisement, or emails to your customers, on the web, and especially in a world that’s increasingly dialled in via a mobile device, you have mere seconds to make that connection with your readers.

In general, there appears to be four content- or writing-related errors many brands make online:

  • Their content is poorly written and full of grammatical or spelling errors
  • The language used is sheer flimflam or gibberish, and it’s not the language their customers use
  • It offers no new perspectives or fails to recommend a solution to readers’ problems
  • It’s a standalone piece of work that’s not part of an overall content marketing strategy

Ergo if you’re scratching your head wondering why your website and marketing efforts aren’t bringing home the bacon, it could be because your content lacks sizzle, or it completely misses the mark.

“Words can be like X-Rays if you use them properly – they’ll go through anything. You read and you’re pierced.”
– ALDOUS HUXLEY

There are many good reasons that you should consider hiring a professional writer to help you and your team consistently produce quality blogs, marketing materials, and website copy. These may include:

  • Writing isn’t your forte. Writing is hard work and writing well doesn’t come naturally or easily to a lot of people. There’s no shame in that. But if you forgo investing in a professional writer to help concisely articulate what it is you do, and the value your company provides to your customers and potential customers, you’re essentially handicapping your business. Nothing scorns the prospect of new business and potentially damages your company’s reputation than a website rife with bad or unnecessary copy.
  • You’re busy running your business. Undoubtedly, managing or running a business swallows up most of your waking hours. As a decision-maker or business leader, do you have the time to write website copy, advertising copy, blogs, social media content, case studies, white papers, and press releases? Chances are you don’t.
  • You lack objectivity. In other words, you’re the DNA your business needs to survive, but you’re so close to the heart of it, and so knowledgeable, you simply can’t write effectively about it to your target audience. Sometimes, we need a friend or colleague to point out to us that which we cannot readily identify. When it comes to writing content about your firm or industry, the same truth applies. It could be that something your company does which might seem trivial or unimportant to you may be what dazzles and delights your customers.
  • Your approach to marketing is flawed. You need to know who your target audience is, what they care about and the issues they need to solve, and how your products and services can help them overcome their challenges and reach their goals. But are all of your marketing efforts in-synch? Are your marketing campaigns tied to achievable goals? Are you speaking the language of your customers and leveraging search engine optimization (SEO) best practices in order to ensure your website ranks high in organic searches? Your marketing messages (in whatever form) need to be as smooth as silk and should feature a takeaway or call-to-action that matters to your audience. In general, it’s critical to understand that writing or producing content is but one important part of a holistic marketing strategy.

The Quality of Your Content Impacts Your Site’s Performance

Professional wordsmiths hang on every word they write. They agonize over every sentence and they analyze and assess how those words read, sound, and flow from one paragraph to the next. They rely on keyword analysis and recommended SEO best practices when choosing words to craft a sentence. It can be time-consuming, but it’s a wholly valuable and worthwhile exercise.

A well-designed website with high-quality images and photos and intuitive navigation is important. But don’t let these things overshadow your site’s readability. Content and messaging that’s clear, simple, and bold will increase the number of visitors to your website. It builds trust, positions you as a thought leader, and in turn, leads to conversions whereby prospective customers will have conversations with you about how your services can help them. To quote Mark Twain, “use the right word, not its second cousin.” Indeed.

But it isn’t solely a matter of choosing the right words. It’s also important to ably express what your business is all about, and what challenges you help your customers overcome. Doing so across all of your digital marketing channels will help your business stand out from others in online search rankings, and swell your social media follower count.

Consider these six do’s and don’ts when thinking about drafting content for your website:

  1. Do use a dictionary, the spellcheck feature in your word processing software, and have one or two people proofread your content before posting it live online to ensure there are no spelling and grammar errors. Read your content aloud to catch errors. If it doesn’t sound right, it probably isn’t.
  2. Do write with authority and write for your audience. No one knows your company and its products and services better than you. Let your knowledge and confidence show.
  3. Do produce fresh content regularly. It works wonders for your website SEO rankings by keeping your brand front and centre, establishing you and your team as industry thought leaders, and it will keep people coming back to your site to read more.
  4. Don’t use fanciful, flowery words to promise everything under the sun and then underperform. It’s the opposite you need to shoot for. Under-promise and then exceed your customers’ expectations.
  5. Don’t use meaningless strings of keyword-stuffed jargon. Use plain language to get your message across sensibly and clearly articulate to your customers the value of your firm’s products and services.
  6. Don’t write excessively long marketing content, especially online. On one hand, it’s important to share your breadth of knowledge and expertise with useful, in-depth information. On the other hand, mobile computing and the Internet is changing how we consume the written word so dispense with unnecessary verbiage. You need to find the right balance between producing quality content efficiently without shortchanging your readers by being too vague.

We hope you’ve found this list of ideas for injecting content marketing into your business helpful.

Not sure where to start? Have writer blocks when it comes to content marketing? Get in touch with us. Our experienced team knows how to make your marketing materials sing.

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