Smart Marketing

Retail Marketing Tricks

Here's a great post called 8 Things Stores Don't Want you to Know by John Nardini that gives all retailers proven marketing tricks to increase their sales. In this post you'll find answers to marketing questions on:

• How to use color to increase sales
• What kind of music to play to make shoppers feel more welcome
• Which scents put a shopper's mind at ease.

Retail marketers, remember that successful marketing is about doing a thousand little things right. Start with these retail marketing tricks and you'll be well on your way to success...

Brands are NOT dead

I just finished reading an article in one of our local business publications Minnesota Business
that had the curious title "Brands are Dead". Written by an author claiming to own a "marketing architecture consultancy" (whatever that is) it quoted a CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi as saying "Brands have run out of juice. They are dead."

This is way off base. Sure, the dynamics of the marketplace are changing to a more opt-in environment, and yes competitive pressures are found most everywhere these days. But brands are NOT dead. In this hyper-competitive environment we face, you are obligated to build a strong brand; rooted in trust and customer confidence. If you don't, your customers will turn elsewhere, in the blink of a mouseclick.

My second book Stand Out from the Crowd: Secrets to Crafting a Winning Company Identity (due out  next year by Dearborn Trade Publishing) will cover all the tools a company needs to distinguish itself from its competitors. But building a company brand, is at the heart of it, and still very much alive.

Do you agree?

The Sounds of Marketing

My daughter and I srolled  into my favorite coffee bar yesterday for a Sunday morning daddy-daughter bonding event. After ordering, we took our seats and it was then that we noticed the music playing. It was a grunge/metal band, heavy on the yelling, that played over the loudspeakers at entirely too loud a level.

Since we were 2 out of just a few people in the joint at the time, I walked up to the counter and asked if there was any chance of listening to a different CD. My request was met by the manager of the place with a steely-eyed look and the words "We don't honor music requests ".

I couldn't help but notice another worker, who was far less severe in her attitude, watching with great interest, but deference just the same.

After getting our orders, my daughter and I proceeded to talk over the music for a couple of minutes. Then, I noticed,  out of the corner of my eye, the other worker turn the music down. The rest of the morning went just fine and my daughter and I had a great time after that.

But the whole incident raised two questions in my mind:
1) Do you think music influences the mood of a retail environment?
2) Is it right for customers to request a change in music? Should the owners comply?