Why Your Franchisor Hates You
Why Franchisors Whiff on Using SEO to Drive Leads
Why most franchise brands whiff at using organic search to drive online leads. The good news – there are only two major ways to impact your brand’s online search results: organic search and paid search. The bad news – driving real results can be tricky. Just ask the long line of franchise marketing vendors and in-house digital marketing gurus that have been vaporized by impatient franchise execs over the years. The two primary methods for driving online leads are known as search engine marketing (SEM) and search engine optimization (SEO) and respectively. PAID SEARCH: SEMFranchise marketers have plowed tons of […]
919 Marketing Honored in Inc. Magazine’s Inc. 500/5000 List
919 Marketing Company, a full-service marketing and PR agency, was recently featured as a top 200 marketing and PR firm on Inc. Magazine’s 2010 Inc. 500/5000 List of the nation’s fastest growing private companies. 919 Marketing was highlighted as number 189 among other national firms and number 5 among other NC-based firms in the advertising and marketing industry with a three year revenue growth of 131%. 919 Marketing, similar to other companies in the Inc. 500/5000 list, has faced brutal economic challenges from 2006-2009. Despite those challenges, 919 Marketing was able to rapidly grow because companies took notice of its […]
PR Technologist: Why You Need One
(And for up-and-coming PR Pros, why you need to be one) Image courtesy of: http://authenticblogging.wordpress.com/ Many of the biggest stories in the last year broke on Twitter first – Whitney Houston’s death, the raid on Bin Laden’s tomb and the verdict in the Amanda Knox trial. Press releases aren’t just for journalists anymore – they help keep your website fresh with content. Many journalists respond better to pitches via Twitter and/or Facebook than email. A story on television is nice, but it’s even better when there’s an online story to go with it. Why? For search engine purposes, of course! The list […]
i9 Sports Knows Its Youth
A survey commissioned by i9 Sports was featured by a wide variety of the nation’s most well-known publications like USA Today, Parenting Magazine, Real Simple, The Christian Science Monitor, and She Knows. These media outlets were interested in the national survey of children ages 8 to 14 because more than 80% of respondents quit or wanted to quit sports and more than a 1/3 wish their parents didn’t watch their games. Articles related to the story appeared throughout Q2 and Q3 and positioned i9 Sports as a vocal leader bringing fun back to youth sports. View the full story here: NewsBrief
Many franchise development execs aren’t leveraging PR and social media to increase franchise business margins and improve close rates
We work with a lot of new business franchise executives and have noticed a wide range of perspectives regarding the use of marketing, and particularly PR as a critical component of company growth. I can reference multiple times where our PR efforts have led to an immediate, direct increase in sales leads and conversions. However, that’s selling short the power of effective PR programs. PR shouldn’t be solely judged on the number of qualified leads flowing into the lead pipeline. This is a misguided perspective, where portals, national advertising, PR, direct mail, telemarketing or the slew of other marketing tools out […]
919 Marketing CEO Explains to News & Observer Why Wall Street Execs Don’t Seem to ‘Get It’
As the recession deepens across the country, there’s a constant question being asked from the corners of Main Street to the sidewalks of Wall Street, where out-of-work stock brokers hand out resumes, ‘Why don’t the big Wall Street executives seem to get it?’ ‘All companies and CEOs have a blind spot,’ David Chapman, founder and CEO of 919 Marketing tells the Raleigh-based News and Observer’s Rob Waters. ‘When you think trees are growing to the sky, when you’re hitting one out of the park, you can lose perspective. They feel like they don’t need to talk to or respect their […]
How to Streamline Communications
Remember the 1990’s? You know – when the height of technology meant you could download the new Bare Naked Ladies album from Napster with your cool, new dial-up internet connection… as long nothing else was open and the stars were perfectly aligned? Fortunately, computers can handle a lot more data nowadays, but us humans haven’t evolved quite so quickly. My rough estimate is that the average person’s capability to take in messages is about that of an old school floppy disk. It’s our nature – we’re easily overwhelmed with data and messages. That’s why it’s so important to keep your messaging consistent. What’s the biggest road block to […]
Avoid Analogy Aneurysms
Analogies are great. We certainly love them here at 919 Marketing and use them all the time. They’re an excellent way to bridge the communication gap with clients. They’re great motivating speaking tools for colleagues seeking advice/help. They can make a big difference…period. But they can also be a huge hindrance when they’re shot out left and right without application. You know what I’m talking about – it’s those days where you take an issue to all the people you care about (your Mom, your boss, heck, your priest) and they all give you different yet similar cryptic analogous responses. […]
Shiny Object Syndrome Isn’t Cute: 3 Examples of Tech-Love Gone Awry
I proudly wear “early adopter” like a badge. I love being on the bleeding edge of technology – having all the newest gadgets. I’m consuming information and beta testing a dozen different website and tools you probably won’t hear about for months. This “cool kid” status is not poisonous for me, since it’s my job. I’m supposed to have shiny, object syndrome so that I can tell you what is and is not worth your time. But when marketers and business get distracted and shiny object syndrome permeates into a global marketing strategy, the outcome can be harmful. I’ve seen […]