Marketing Agents are a bit like Real Estate Agents: they work on commission, they are only paid in the event of a sale, and it's good to find one you like and then commit to him or her for a long term relationship.
The MN Chapter is probably going to need a marketing agent. It is possible that we could go out and buy ad space or air time directly - but much like buying a house, there are pitfalls and it can get pretty complicated.
A lot of the information I have come into recently has been courtesy of Blaine Lock's agent, Tom*. He has something like 20 years of history in this region with a variety of clients - in particular, he has prior experience with non-profits.
Right now, Tom* is our only candidate. That's fine if everyone agrees - but all suggestions are welcome. The commitment isn't contractually binding, but we still shouldn't undertake it lightly.
It may be advisable to interview other marketing agents in order to corroborate some of Tom*'s advice and to make sure that we are making informed decisions. Then again, we're also pretty fond of networking in the organization and we would be acting on a recommendation from one of our members.
This issue will stay open for the summer - we'll accept suggestions for a couple of months at least and put it to a vote no sooner than September.
You can tell I'm smack on the fence about this - anyone who has any experience with ad agents or with advertising in general should chip in here.
*I also don't know what internet/blog etiquette says about using last names in semi public places - so for now, I'm leaving them off to play it safe.
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Marketing Committee Meeting 05-18-08
The Marketing Committee had a phone-in meeting on 5-18-08.
Rosemarie, Eric and Rebecca attended.
The meeting went fairly well - the phone bridge system provided by Eric was quite functional - although with many people on line at the same time it would be very important to plan against background noises and for everyone to be familiar with the mute button on their phones.
The current status of the marketing campaign is as follows:
Manufacturers (like Schlage and Assa) are not very free with their discretionary marketing funds. In general, they want to see 3 things before they would consider contributing financially to our campaign:
1. A marketing plan - a detailed outline of what we want to use the money for and how it will benefit them to give it to us.
2. A resume - who are we, anyway, and why should they trust us with their money?
3. Money - we've got to have it in order to get it. Manufacturers are not inclined to give money to organizations with no resources at all - they are much more likely to match existing funds.
(Reference casual interviews with mfrs and mfrs representatives as well as conversation with Tom, professional advertising media agent - more on him later).
Being as the committee is pretty small, we're taking this a little bit at a time.
Rosemarie is working on publishing the soundbites from her radio spots on cards that can be given to locksmiths to give to their customers. They will follow a basic format of "Tips for finding a good locksmith, " with a general suggestion that a good starting point is to check their membership in MN ALOA.
This is a little bit of marketing the marketing in order to increase participation in the committee by immediately enhancing the value of a chapter membership. It will also serve as a basis for the Marketing Plan and Resume - the more the manufacturers' contributions can be requested to enhance an existing, functional campaign - the more they will want to participate.
Eric is working on website applications. The chapter's website at http://www.locksmithnews.com/ has been a great tool up until now, but it is managed with a commercial software product. The increased availability and quality of open source software has led us to conclude that we may be able to do far more with a website by spending less money. At the very least, it's worth looking into.
The motivation for updating the website is to provide a more dynamic platform where we could, well, do more stuff: specifically, more interactive stuff - forums, announcements, calendars, monetary contributions and dues payments.
Rebecca is putting together this Blog. Just as an experiment in communication. We'll see how it goes.
Rosemarie, Eric and Rebecca attended.
The meeting went fairly well - the phone bridge system provided by Eric was quite functional - although with many people on line at the same time it would be very important to plan against background noises and for everyone to be familiar with the mute button on their phones.
The current status of the marketing campaign is as follows:
Manufacturers (like Schlage and Assa) are not very free with their discretionary marketing funds. In general, they want to see 3 things before they would consider contributing financially to our campaign:
1. A marketing plan - a detailed outline of what we want to use the money for and how it will benefit them to give it to us.
2. A resume - who are we, anyway, and why should they trust us with their money?
3. Money - we've got to have it in order to get it. Manufacturers are not inclined to give money to organizations with no resources at all - they are much more likely to match existing funds.
(Reference casual interviews with mfrs and mfrs representatives as well as conversation with Tom, professional advertising media agent - more on him later).
Being as the committee is pretty small, we're taking this a little bit at a time.
Rosemarie is working on publishing the soundbites from her radio spots on cards that can be given to locksmiths to give to their customers. They will follow a basic format of "Tips for finding a good locksmith, " with a general suggestion that a good starting point is to check their membership in MN ALOA.
This is a little bit of marketing the marketing in order to increase participation in the committee by immediately enhancing the value of a chapter membership. It will also serve as a basis for the Marketing Plan and Resume - the more the manufacturers' contributions can be requested to enhance an existing, functional campaign - the more they will want to participate.
Eric is working on website applications. The chapter's website at http://www.locksmithnews.com/ has been a great tool up until now, but it is managed with a commercial software product. The increased availability and quality of open source software has led us to conclude that we may be able to do far more with a website by spending less money. At the very least, it's worth looking into.
The motivation for updating the website is to provide a more dynamic platform where we could, well, do more stuff: specifically, more interactive stuff - forums, announcements, calendars, monetary contributions and dues payments.
Rebecca is putting together this Blog. Just as an experiment in communication. We'll see how it goes.
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