The new economy (post recession) is forcing all of us to reevaluate our purchasing habits. From cars to clothes to restaurants, we as consumers are deciding what we really need, how much are we willing to spend, and if we’re getting the best value for our hard earned dollars.

Big consumer brands have recognized this and have repositioned their products and services to address the new frugal consumer mindset.

For example, in 2007, Walmart changed its tag line from “Always Low Prices” to, “Save Money, Live Better”. Kmart followed suit changing “Kmart  - The Stuff of Life” to “There’s Smart and There’s Kmart Smart”.

Most big business-to-consumer brands have the financial wherewithal to retool their marketing efforts to coincide with changing consumer values.  Smaller business-to-business brands, constrained by reduced marketing budgets, longer sales cycles, and multiple purchasing influencers, have had to make do with their marketing materials.

It is my belief that a majority of business-to-business advertisers could benefit from a brand revitalization, starting with a review of their value proposition.

Formulating your value proposition starts by differentiating your company’s product or service from the competition.

Talk to your customers – engage them – find out what’s on their minds.  What do they like about your product? What do they dislike? In their own words, how do they compare your product or service to the competition’s? Customer insight can lead to a new perspective and vocabulary for describing attributes and benefits for your product or service.

Next, define the selection process. What triggers the need? Where do decision makers and influencers search for information? What factors influence their purchasing decision?  How does the brand experience affect their final decision?

Finally, tap into the decision maker’s value system. This will help develop a value proposition statement which differentiates your product, based on their mindset.

Aligning your value proposition with the decision maker’s mindset helps build a brand preference resulting in improved advertising effectiveness.

If you’re ready to improve your advertising results, we are ready to help you. Contact Bailey Burk at 214-953-0494 ext. 2 or email today.

For example, say you manufacture a specialty chemical used for treating silicon wafers.  The final decision maker may be in the c-suite but the influencers are in engineering, purchasing, and research and development.  Each of the influencer audience has their own set of purchasing criteria that need to be addressed in order to complete the sale.

Relying on advertising to address these wide-ranging criteria may not be the most efficient or effective use of marketing funds.

This is where your “owned” media properties become very important.  Whether through your corporate website, a micro site, a video posted to your You Tube channel, or an e-newsletter, all of these “owned” media outlets provide the ability for you to engage the audience with selected information that influences their decision.  In addition to creating an environment for one-to-one dialogue, these properties also provide marketing ROI via analytics.

Ideally, when we bring a new client on board, our first task is to develop a strategic communications plan. However, in today’s economic climate, marketing budgets are leaner and more project-oriented and, as a result, in-depth plans aren’t always feasible.

While we encourage the practice of strategic planning, we also understand the extreme pressures companies face in achieving communications goals within budget. Many are looking for a marketing touch-up, rather than an extensive remodel. Like a building that is structurally sound but needs an appliance upgrade or some fresh paint, these companies are content with their communications plans and want help with specific marketing and advertising projects, rather than a complete overhaul of their communications goals and tactics.

If your company needs some touch-ups, but you aren’t sure where to begin or how much is enough, consider starting with a creative brief. The key word here is “brief.” This a collaborative document drafted by the agency with client input. Its purpose is to provide the agency team with project direction, the attributes and benefits of the product or service, a competitor overview and the expected budget.

When you begin your relationship with a well written and organized creative brief, the agency-client team is able to see and solve the problem at hand more efficiently and open the window to additional “what if” scenarios that can be addressed by utilizing all the tools in the agency tool box. This allows the agency to bring more meaningful results to the client by encouraging an integrated communications solution while keeping it on a project basis.

At Burk Advertising & Marketing, we are continually improving our STREAMING™ process, a proprietary, strategy-development tool that is designed to help clients do just that. Through the STREAMING process, we custom-design communications plans that integrate the best mix of traditional and digital tactics for each unique situation.

Since we recently made improvements to the STREAMING process, we wanted to share a brief summary with you in our blog. If you want more detailed information, contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it at 214-953-0494, ext. 2.

• The basics: STREAMING happens in nine interconnected steps, which can be revisited anytime throughout the process, as needed, to maximize effectiveness:
• Business goals: Helps your marketing/management team(s) reach a consensus on goals and agree on the best way to measure results.
• Product/service market analysis: Provides a comprehensive look into your product or service, its benefits, the need it meets, its business segments and its target audiences. Also explores purchase process to pinpoint buyer perceptions.
• Research: Creates a solid portrait of your competitive business landscape. Takes into account factors such as comparative Web sites, social media, advertising and published papers.
• Brand Qi: Provides a framework for an effective communications strategy. Helps define points of differentiation and core benefits, establish value propositions and develop key messages.
• Strategy development offline/online: Solidifies the game plan. Includes exploring various combinations of traditional and digital tactics and devising a corresponding strategy.
• Integration: Maximizes resources. Together, we review traditional and digital strategies, technological and financial requirements and key performance index (KPI) metrics to make sure the communications plan lines up with your business goals.
• Tactical execution offline/online: Kicks off the creative process. Once a strategic framework is established, we can begin creative development. Generally integrates traditional and digital tactics to improve results.
• Measurement offline/online: Quantifies progress using a key performance index (KPI). Analyzes offline and online indicators.
• Rethink/adjust: Allows us to review and fix any part of the plan that doesn’t measure up. No matter where we are in the STREAMING process, we can adjust strategy and execution to reflect changing market conditions, target audience perceptions and financial considerations.

It seems like business productivity goes way down around the holidays and this year, for whatever reason – be it the economy, the weather or a combination of factors – the drop feels even more pronounced than usual. To combat procrastination, we’ve tried some relatively simple solutions that have had noticeable results. If you’re looking for ways to be more productive, consider:

Prioritizing your to-do list: At the end of every workweek, make a master to-do list for the next week and a shorter list with just the priority jobs that need to be completed on Monday. This will help you stay focused and enables you to get started on your priorities as soon as you arrive on Monday morning. Continue to make daily priority lists throughout the week as needed.

Setting a deadline: If an item on your list doesn’t have a specific deadline, create one. Setting a personal completion date will help ensure list items don’t slip through the cracks.

Making a game of it: Sometimes people can get more things done on their list if they make a game of it. Try to see how many list items you can cross off in a day. This can provide good motivation without a lot of effort.

Starting a project, any project: As many writers suffering from writer’s block will tell you, sometimes just doing something will spur more productivity – so pick an item from your list and get going!

Finishing the thing you dread most, first: Although it’s human nature to push activities we dislike to the bottom of the list, resist the urge. If you put it off, chances are that it will stay at the bottom and may never get done. But if you tackle the hardest items first, not only will they be finished, but also, other list items will seem easier to complete by comparison.

A word of caution: To-do lists can be extremely helpful in combating procrastination, but be careful not to spend too much time on them. If the majority of your day is spent making lists as opposed to crossing-off completed activities, then you may be using your to-do list as another procrastination tool!