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Violate Them at Your Own Risk!

Ries & Trout’s 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing

One of my favorite little books on marketing is definitely The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing: Violate Them at Your Own Risk! by Al Ries & Jack Trout. Back in grad school, it was one of the first books assigned to me by my professor, and it’s one that sits nearby all the time. While I don’t necessarily read through each section whenever I need to refresh my memory, I do read through each ‘law.’

If you haven’t ever read through their book, you should. I’m presenting their laws below, because I think they’re a good set of marketing musts. Their simple, easy to understand, and I more than recommend them if you’re doing any sort of marketing whatsoever.

While you may not be able to figure each and every one out here at first glance, do go pick the book up somewhere. It’s a quick read, and the information in there will definitely set you on the right path–or at least give you some guidelines to follow.

1. The law of leadership
2. The law of category
3. The law of the mind
4. The law of perception
5. The law of focus
6. The law of exclusivity
7. The law of the ladder
8. The law of duality
9. The law of the opposite
10. The law of division
11. The law of perspective
12. The law of line extension
13. The law of sacrifice
14. The law of attributes
15. The law of candor
16. The law of singularity
17. The law of unpredictability
18. The law of success
19. The law of failure
20. The law of Hype
21. The law of acceleration
22. The law of resources

Clearly this is just a list for you to peruse, a list to get you started on improving your marketing activities, so don’t read the list of laws and think you’re done. But it’s a great place to start–and these two guys are marketers who know their stuff.

Writing a Good Case Study

If you’re in B2B marketing, you know all about case studies–why they’re important as leave-behinds, how they help your sales team continue the conversation, and how they advertise not only what you do well but who trusts you to do what you do (which means a lot, especially if the companies that do so are fortune 1000 companies). But writing them and formatting them are just a few of the steps you need to follow religiously if you’re going to write good, compelling, strong case studies to back up your products or services.

Here are some tips to writing good case studies.

1. Make sure you’re writing about something your customers and prospects care about. Sure, sounds easy, but it’s definitely something you don’t want to mess up. Keep up on your industry’s latest trends and technology, and see what everyone’s talking about. If you’re selling something everyone wants, or providing a service and doing it better, make sure you’re ahead of your competition in terms of being the thought leader in your case studies as well as in the rest of your business activities.

2. Write a good story. Your audience is obviously key here, because a good story is relative to the audience. If you’re case study is targeting business decision makers in the technology space, a very precise and accurate, technical case study (which to a lot of other audiences may seem like block text) will likely be more effective than a fluffy, sales-oriented case study. Write for your audience.

3. Structure is important. Make sure your case studies all follow a relatively similar formate. You’ll likely want to use (or have your version of) a ‘Challenge,’ a ‘Solution’ (which will likely be your product or service and company) that describes how the challenge was overcome, and a ‘Result’ (which should obviously be a positive one).

4. Be specific. If you want your case studies to be effective, be very, very specific as to all three items listed above. Using percentages is a great way to overcome lack of numbers if you’re short on examples. Dollar amounts are great as well.

5. Quotes. Customer quotes are a great way to get some validity and ‘proof’ behind the claims you’re making in your case studies. If your customers have had a good experience, they’ll normally be willing to sign off on a quote (or provide you one if you ask for it).

6. Get permission. Don’t quote anyone or use customer names without them giving you permission to use their name or their company name.

The last thing you want to do is lose a good customer because you didn’t want to shoot them an email or make a quick phone call.

In general, case studies can be quick and easy to write up, and they’re a great way to generate interest in what you do. A good case study will be passed along to other business decision makers within a company looking for your product or service–so make sure you’re putting out quality. Good luck.

Level2wo has experience case study writers, so feel free to send an email if you have any questions.

Brand Makeover, Copy?

After 40 years of following the same path, Xerox is getting a makeover to try and get away from the perception that they are nothing more than a giant copy company. The makeover will be far-reaching, including a new corporate logo, and will touch Xerox’s product naming, design, building signs, and any other Xerox brand marketing materials. While Xerox, like google, has become a verb in many countries, Xerox the company wants to separate itself somewhat from what they have become dominant in–i.e., copying.

After some research, and to Xerox’s dismay, the Xerox brand had become not only inconsistent with what Xerox did, but also no longer stood out in the consumer’s mind–rather than sticking out, Xerox blended more into the background. The Xerox wordmark was designed over 40 years ago by branding firm Chermayeff & Geismar, has lost some of its pizzazz in the Internet age. The new logo will be softer, with lower-case letters, and in terms of presence, will be a contrast to the block capital-letters that were used during an age of company’s imposing their superiority and dominance. This is a different age, and Xerox is a different company than when they started out, and it seems that the company understands the need to modernize themselves according to the times, but also to the reality of what their company does.

Interbrand, the company that will be tracking the ROI of the branding updates that will be made, hopes the changes will communicate ‘innovation, forward thinking, flexibility, and enterprise.’ While Xerox as a company missed out on using its technology during the computer boom in the 1970s, companies like Apple and Microsoft did not. Ever since then, Xerox has been trying to play catchup. The company has done well in the copier and printer business, but it’s a cloud that never has gone away. One of the big things that may arise from this is Xerox moving up in the global eye; while we know Xerox here like we know Coca-Cola, that’s just not the case around the globe for them. The new brand is something they’re hoping will change that.

Marketing and Technology

Marketing and technology go hand in hand for a number of reasons, and for marketers, technology has allowed for a great many expediencies, as well as scalability, reach, and a good deal improvement in terms of measuring ROI. Below are some general, not-so-random thoughts on using technology for your marketing activities, including tactics to use for your overall marketing strategy.

In certain places I will simply list a tactic and why you may benefit from it, but I won’t go into the ‘technical’ aspect as much as simply state the benefits. Feel free to pop an email if you want specific questions answered. So what are some ways to use technology to market your product or service (or even yourself)?

Website
Seems basic, but a lot of companies do not have websites because they either don’t understand the value, think they already have enough business delivered through their current channels, or because they ‘haven’t gotten around to it’. All three of these reasons may hold some truth, but these days technology and marketing go hand in hand. A website is crucial to at least having a presence online, where most research is done these days. You want to break down all of the hurdles that prevent your customers and prospects from finding you, and chances are that they will do a little research online about your company before initiating any contact.

Websites tend to be of two types–the business card online, and then the interactive type, which includes websites where consumers and business can make purchases, gather information, participate in web communities and social media sites, or do a host of things that add value to a user’s life in some form or fashion.

Websites are a great marketing tool because they allow prospects and customers to approach your business at their own speed, research and browse your offering(s), and take the steps necessary to initiate contact–all pull marketing activities that require little work on your end (at least after the site is already up and running).

Email Marketing
Email marketing campaigns are a great way to market to a great many people quickly and at a very reasonable cost. The beauty of email marketing (besides reach and cost) is that measuring the ROI is much easier than it would be if you had sent out DM (direct mail) pieces and waited for the phone to ring as a result. Email marketing campaigns allow you to reach broader audiences sooner, and they allow you to make edits and changes in almost real time (try doing that after your DM piece has been printed).

Blogs
Blogs are a great way to communicate on a more frequent basis with your prospects and customers. Blogging allows you to provide resources and valuable information to your prospects and customers directly over the internet, and with the great many blogging tools currently in existence, it’s also a relatively painless process on your end. You just have to make the time to write, and have the ability to offer your audience something worth reading.

Online Advertising
Everyone has heard of google and Yahoo! (search engine marketing) and many of the other search marketing tools you can use to drum up business using keywords and search, but online advertising is much more than throwing some money on a google adwords campaign. Banner ads are a great way to build your brand as well as generate leads. Of course, you have to make sure your banner ad is a ‘good’ banner ad, and you have to make sure you’re advertising on the ‘right’ sites where your target market hangs out, but banner ads allow you the opportunity to compete with the big boys in your industry that have budgets much larger than yours.

Webinars
Webinars are another great way to draw attention as well as educate your audience while building yourself as a thought leader in your industry. These days it’s pretty simple to create a webinar, and vendors in the webinar business make it pretty easy to execute.

Hope the above has given you some things to think about. If you have any specific questions about how any of the above may be able to help kickstart your marketing program, give Level2wo a call, or shoot us an email. We’re glad to help.