Actions 1–5 | Actions 6–10 | Actions 11–15 | more actions...

These snippets of information are designed to make you stop, think and take action – even if it seems obvious. We get so involved with our businesses we fail to see what's under our noses, so a gentle reminder or push in another direction could make a little difference and result in big implications.

And if you have any suggestions or anything you would like to share, please ask Alice!

If you subscribe to Alice's newsletter Clear to Go to find out more about combining design with marketing to achieve success, you will automatically receive the next edition of Alice's Actions!

See below for past issues:

Alice’s Action #1 – Clear Signage.

This is vital, especially for directions, corporate identity and general awareness.

Take time to consider how clear your company really is. How does the outside world see your business? Are you recognisable? How simple is it to contact you? Are these details clearly visible? Can you be easily found? Are you approachable and/or welcoming?

Alice's Action #2 – Keep your Images Relevant.

My daughter Josie commented recently on some leaflets: "Shouldn't the picture be relevant to whoever picks it up, so to grab their attention?"

She's right - aim the visual aspects of your advertising towards your target market.  Don't reflect your personal favourites and be careful about your business's image.  The customer is king (or queen) and everything should be geared towards them and their preferences.

Take a good look at the pictures in your marketing material, and get feedback from your friends or past customers, to see if they work or not.

Alice's Action #3 – Facing up to Business.

Consider where you can publish a portrait of yourself so that your customers, both existing and prospective, know what you look like. 

How about your business card? The recipient would be able to remember you with the card, help to recognise you at a 1-2-1, or could use it to facilitate that initial contact (email or telephone) when necessary.

And make your friendly, smiley face accessible on your website and blog, it's far more welcoming! You are, after all, selling yourself as well as your product/service.

Alice's Action #4 – Don't Hide.

Get yourself noticed! Don't hide behind a tiny logo, remember big is beautiful! Broadcast your company's imagery by putting it into centre-stage, explode with colour, turn on the florescent lights, bring on the dancing girls and cue the music - how else are your customers going to be aware of you otherwise?

Alice's Action #5 – Headline News

Get yourself noticed! It's no good if the first line of your publicity is your company's name. The public is more interested in the subject or whatever you're offering! Create a catchy headline that's easy to remember, think of some clever use of words or alliteration, pose a question that answers as 'yes', and remember - think BIG! If it doesn't attract immediate attention, you've lost the game.

Alice's Action #6 – Less is More

Get yourself noticed! Increase the impact of your message by decreasing the amount of words. Make it easier to read by concentrating the facts in a bullet point list. This will enable your readers to focus more effectively on your information.

Alice's Action #7 – Soothe that Pain

Get yourself noticed! Following on from Action #6, remember your bullet points should consist of your company's benefits, and not your features. Customers don't care a fig about your company's details, they only want to know about what they can get from you. Consider their pain (what they need) and offer them the solution (in the form of your benefits) in a clear and coherent format, easily digestible and enticingly available!

Alice's Action #8 – Customer Reaction

Get yourself noticed! If you've followed my Actions, you should now have some good publicity. But it's all very well having eye-catching headlines and clear and concise bullet points spelling out your benefits if you don't have a call to action. Customers need to persuaded to remember you and respond. Create special offers or rewards if they contact you by a certain time. And don't forget your action needs to be BIG, prominent and eye-catching for them to notice it in the first place!

Alice's Action #9 – Visual Contact

Get yourself noticed! Following on from Action #8, if your customers are suitably impressed they will want to call or email you. Display your details clearly and legibly - and again make them BIG! Do it more than once, and test different places and positions! In fact, try putting them everywhere! Don't forget to publicise your website too, if you have one, and create a special relevant landing page. If your customers have to search for the right information, you've more likely to have lost them. Don't lose out on a sale just because they can't find how to contact you...

Alice's Action #10 – Keep Reminding!

Get yourself noticed! Following on from Action #8, set up a process for regular reminders, not only for your publicity but also for your call to action. Customers are forever busy, and even though they may appreciate the sense of urgency you have created, they can easily forget due to their own hectic lives. Clever and non-repetitive reminding of your call to action, presenting it each time with a different slant or another perspective, or even further incentive, will eventually enable that response you so desire.

Alice's Actions #11 – First Impressions Count

Take a look at your front cover of your leaflet or brochure.  What is the first thing your customers see?  A descriptive picture or photograph? A catchy headline? If your customer walked past it, would it grab their attention and make them go back to look at it again? Are you successful in getting your message across? Do they have to 'think' to understand it? Would they want to look inside? Is there anything specifically they have to do? Are all your contact details obvious?

Alice's Actions #12 – What White Space?

Either examine your own printed material or any other publications to explore white space. Can you recognise it? Where do you think is it used? How many different kinds can you find?

Have you ever considered the unprinted areas of a design before? Do you think they are important? Can you imagine a design without white space? How about too much? What effect would it have? And what else would it affect?

Alice's Actions #13 – Is your networking up to scratch?

Take a look at your networking material, whether it's your business card, leaflets, brochures or whatever, and consider these few pointers:

• What kind of material (card, paper, plastic) is it made of? Does it look cheap or expensive? Does it reflect the quality you want to portray?

• What colours have you used? Are they appropriate to your product/service? Don't use your favourite colours if they are not suitable to your business. Also, be aware of how legible they are, eg red or yellow on a white background (does it disappear?), pale text on a dark background (may be trendy, but how easy is it to read?), combination of opposite colours (jumpy or what?).

• How unique is your card? If you got it off the internet, do you run the risk of meeting someone else at a networking event with the same design? Alternatively, if you designed it yourself, is it instantly recognisable as being produced by a home printer? Is it bland, ordinary, uninteresting, boring? Could it catch a prospective customer's eye?

• Does it say what's in the tin? How many times have you taken a business card home and you can't fathom or remember what the company is about? If your business name doesn't reflect the nature of your product/service, do you have a strapline or description to help the recipient? Does your logo also help in recognition?

Alice's Actions #14 –– Do you have just one kind of customer?

Take a look at washing powder. There are lots of different brands in the shops, all containing identical white washing powder. How do you know if any are different from the rest? Is it because what is said on the packet? This brand helps troubled skin, this brand protects your colours, this brand works really well on stains, etc. Are there really any differences, in spite of the specific criteria stated on the boxes? Sure, some may contain additional elements to justify their claims, but underneath it all it’s still just washing powder.

Now look at your service or product. How can you market it for specific groups of people? Could it be adapted to meet the criteria of different target markets? Packaging is the key if you want to make it more attractive to a wider audience, but at the end of the day it’s still the same product or service, just rewritten with a separate process and marketed differently.

Now for the action: differentiate the target markets you wish to focus on, restructure your product or service to suit, and go ask Alice how to publicise it!

Alice's Actions #15 – Corporate Consistency

At a recent networking event I was struck by one woman’s exceptionally beautiful business cards. The colours, logo design and type of card just smacked professionalism. But the bubble was burst when she handed me her literature. OK, the logo and colours were the same, but the design layout, font and quality of stock (paper or card) was increasingly inferior, and looked like it had just been collected from her personal office ink-jet printer.

The moral is: take a bit more care with the consistency of your stationery. If you want to portray a certain kind of impression, don’t blow it with cheap promotional material. Keep with the flow and get your marketing products professionally produced to maintain that all-important presentation – otherwise your inconsistency just might cost you that sale…

Another thought – maintain your corporate image throughout all your stationery. Speaking recently with a solicitor, I suggested that if she was to attract expensive clients she should think carefully about advertising her expertise and professionalism via what the world outside sees, eg all her correspondence through her headed paper, envelopes, franking design, presentation folders, website, signature on her email, electronic or paper communications – not just her business cards.

Now for the action: take a look at your literature, establish whether you have maintained corporate consistency, think about how your can improve and/or expand on it, and then go ask Alice!

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