Blogs |

HC Miller’s MindFireInc Client Success Story

Posted on June 6, 2011 by tommytrc

Back in October of last year, I was asked to be interviewed by Mindfire and tell of our start up experience with their tool, Look Who’s Clicking. Mindfire’s people, tools and approach were the right combination for HC Miller. When looking to invest in tools to help with your multi-channel campaigns, Mindfire has yet to let us down.

Posted in 1:1 Personalization, Social Media | Tagged hc miller, hcmimpact, look who's clocking, mindfire, mindfirellc, personalization, PURL, software, training | Leave a comment

How to be a Killer Social Media Advocate

Posted on May 2, 2011 by tommytrc

I had the opportunity to join Jess Dennis from Red Shoes PR in speaking at Leaderfest for one of the breakout sessions. The topic for their discussion is how to be a killer social media advocate for your business.

5 Business Reasons for Social Media

Listening & Research to your customers to find out their wants, wishes and pain points. We live in a Web 2.0 world, if you re not a part of it you re missing out on a lot of information.
Communicating with your customers and prospects, not just about your products and services.
SEO: Social media is more than just communications and connections, it is a powerful business tool.
News & Information: Consumer habits have changed, people rely on their social networks and other Web 2.0 sources for news and information.
It is in line with the business objectives.

Leaderfest is a Regional Young Professional event on April 20th hosted by Pulse, the Young Professionals Network of the Fox Cities Chamber. Below is a video of one of the sessions as well as the presentation itself… Enjoy and comments are always welcome!

How to be a Killer Social Media Advicate and Sell it to Your Boss

Posted in Social Media | Tagged @jessdennis, @tommytrc, appleton, Business, communication, fox cites chamber of commerce, leaderfest, red shoes pr, Search engine optimization, Services, Social media, Social network, twitter, Web 2.0, wi, YouTube | 1 Comment

Marketing Heaven, in 2011

Posted on March 4, 2011 by Tim Mcadow

How we market, position and promote our business continues to evolve. Whether your target audience is an investor, existing customer or a potential client, using multiple channels to connect with them has to be a key strategy for your organization in 2011. This does not mean that traditional press release, direct mail or trade show marketing is going away, but all of these channels are changing and more importantly merging with new methods of information delivery and sharing.

Here are five elements your organization should be including in your marketing and PR strategy in 2011:

1. Integrate your traditional public relations with the social media channels that you have developed. Making your communications seamless across multiple channels will give your organization better efficiency and help insure a consistent “theme” is shared with your audience.

2. Increase options and methods to facilitate conversations with your target audience. A “contact us” fillable form isn’t enough these days. Look for other ways to engage your audience. Twitter, Linkedin, chat and other tools can help you reach new levels of contact and responsiveness to your audience.

3. Review your content – people want participation, not propaganda. Make sure that you offer the audience information that they can use and respond to – this should motivate action (hopefully in your direction!).

4. “Video Killed the Radio Radio Star” and it will do some damage to traditional communication channels –actually, it already has! Back in 1979 when The Buggles released that single, video was new. Radio is still alive today but radio stars are no more – they have embraced multiple channels to share their talent and as communicators we have to do the same. Video, from professional to low budget podcasting will have its place in an organizations strategy. Where does video fit for you?

5. Metrics, metrics, metrics. As integration of the channels continues, more opportunity for measuring technology enabled communication will help demonstrate return on investment for marketing and PR activities. Make sure your organization can measure the impact of your communications and marketing programs.

These are just a few key thoughts, one thing is for certain, change is constant so hang on for the ride or get behind the wheel!

Posted in General, Social Media | Leave a comment

The 4 P’s of a Successful Direct Marketing Campaign

Posted on January 4, 2011 by tommytrc

When you think of a successful direct marketing campaign, many important elements come to mind- from landing pages, to survey questions, to thank you emails. Certainly there are too many components to keep straight to make your campaign as successful as possible.

We just finished our “Fall into Folders” campaign and reflecting on the hits and misses is part of every campaign I do. I want to take a few steps back and talk about the “4 P’s” of campaign success and how they can make any campaign a victory.

The first P of campaign success is Precision. Targeting your marketing efforts and tailoring your database to the proper audience is key. There’s little reason to send out a direct mail campaign to a nursing home if you are targeting people who enjoy using playground equipment. A bit extreme, but you get the idea.

The second P is Presentation. The design and message in your postcard and subsequent landing pages is very important. Remember you only have a short moment in time to capture the attention of your audience, less then 3 seconds to be exact. The use of personalized images is one great way to capture attention and distinguish yourself from your competition.

The third P is PURL. I’m talking about personalized URL’s here. PURL’s are a great way to add teeth to your message. Turn a cold lead into an instant warm lead. Your call to action and offer was engaging enough to get them to visit the landing page and complete the survey. Now put your sales hat on, make that phone call and seal the deal. Without a PURL, you will never know who is interested and who is not.

The final P and most important key to campaign success is Performance. When you run a multi-channel, multi-touch campaign, the worst thing you can do it not track results. We live in a numbers oriented society and results count. Things like landing page hit rate, email open rates and how many people finished the survey provide vital feedback to a successful campaign. In my mind, running a campaign without the proper metrics in place is a sin and can be almost as bad as not doing the campaign at all. Having the proper return on marketing investment numbers will get you the support you need to run successful campaigns in the future.

Posted in 1:1 Personalization | Tagged Advertising and Marketing, direct mail, email marketing, Marketing, targeting | Leave a comment

My Speaking Engagement at Kimberly High School

Posted on November 24, 2010 by tommytrc

Yesterday I was asked to speak in front of the Kimberly High School, Kimberly, WI marketing classes. I spoke in front of 7 marketing classes in 3- 90 min session on the topic of social media and the power of social media.

It was just over-the-top awesome!!!

Great Kids!

Great Questions!

I got these 2 amazing tweets from @HiSchoolLife

Does it get any better then that? I love speaking!!! Seeing the light go on in the eyes of these students was magic.

Here is a copy of my presentation…for those who are interested.

Social media 101 kimberly high

View more presentations from thomas clifford.

What a great day!

Posted in Social Media | Tagged deca, Facebook, KHS, Kimberly High School, Marketing, Marketing and Advertising, Social media, twitter | Leave a comment

Is that what I meant?

Posted on November 2, 2010 by tommytrc

I saw this graphic on Natalie’s blog the other day and it hit so close to home here at HC Miller. Communication or lack thereof is a pain point we all feel. Project managers deal with this all the time. A person says one thing, you design and deliver another. I have fallen into that trap myself and I feel I’m not alone.

Please leave some comments if you agree or disagree and what tools do you use to keep from falling into this communications trap.

Posted in General | Tagged communication, hc miller, misscommunication, project manager | 2 Comments

My Point of View – Thank You Cards

Posted on October 28, 2010 by tommytrc

I had the pleasure of hearing PR expert Peter Shankman speak as part of the PRSA‘s 10th anniversary event in Green Bay. One of his key take-a-ways was to be “top of mind” with your network and used the president of Paramount Studios as a great example.

My take on being “top of mind” is sending thank you cards. Personalized, hand written thank you cards are so under used in my opinion. What an impact it sends when you go to your mail box and get a personal thank you card or note. Who uses snail mail anymore? Thats the point, why get your thank you’s lost in the clutter of email, twitter DM or facebook message…make an impact with a hand written thank you!

I put together a PDF file of all the tweets that took place during the PRSA event. Transcript for #prsanew

Posted in My Point of View, Social Media | Tagged HARO, hc miller, Peter Shankman, PR, PRSA, PRSANEW, public relations, Snail mail, thank you, top of mind | 1 Comment