Marketing Eye

Meet Ronan Farrow; the son of actress Mia Farrow and filmmaker Woody Allen. He’s also a journalist, lawyer and former U.S. government advisor. In his position many would have submitted to nepotism and explored the bright lights of Hollywood, but not Farrow, the 26-year-old is busy using his business acumen and social capital to change the world around us.

Ronan Farrow is a Social Entrepreneur, the hungry breed of Generation Y philanthropists. They are a group of marketing and tech-savvy movers and shakers (typically, PR pros) that find innovative solutions to solve the world’s most pressing social problems, and Farrow is just one of them leading the way. Here’s a look at four other social entrepreneurs shaping the way we look at business, and its ability to shape our future for the better:
Published in Culture
Let’s be honest.  Generally, businesses in general are happy to celebrate their wins, and sweep their losses under the rug.  We drink champagne when our marketing strategies work, and suck lemons when they don’t.  But the minute we stop running from our failures, we can stop and examine them to find solutions and refine our approach. 
Socialmediabomb

Not every marketing campaign comes to fruition; sometimes you win and sometimes you lose.  Let’s get very honest and face the five possible reasons yours flopped:
Published in Marketing
Tuesday, 20 May 2014 00:00

Why married women are more successful

There are many advantages of being single; you can do what you want when you want, you will never wake to snoring, and you never need to get out of your pajama's if you don't feel like it.

You can kiss as many boys as you wish, decide on the spare of the moment to fly abroad, and eat baked beans on toast without having to consider another.

If you are married; you need to consider your other half, compromise often, and ensure that a hearty meal is on the table each night. And your holidays, well, it's a joint decision and more often than not, it really is one person pushing to go to a particular destination.

There may be socks and towels left on the floor, the disgusting smell of someone passing gas, but hey, you will have a diamond ring on your left finger and be entertained endlessly by your single girlfriends who secretly envy your married status.

But in business it's a clean cut story. Our married counterparts have the upperhand.
Published in Mellissah Smith
Friday, 16 May 2014 00:00

Ideas that are so BAD, they are good

As seen on LinkedIn:

When examining our culture at Marketing Eye, one idea usually sticks out at people; that is, our stance on bad ideas. Taking a unique approach (remembering nothing we do here is status quo), I encourage my team to share their ideas daily; the great, the good and the terrible.

Why? Because I truly believe there is value in bad ideas.

If you look in to the journey behind the biggest accomplishments in the world, they’re full of bad ideas. In fact, it’s the mishaps, the arduous trial and error procedure that leads to greatness. A bad idea simply paves the way for a new and improved one. Bad ideas are often discouraged and quickly discounted as failures, but in reality, they identify solutions.

I need my team; from the marketing managers to the interns, to feel that they have an open forum to exchange their ideas with ease; we are, after all, a creative company. And during a consultancy, our marketing managers will implore our clients to lay all of their ideas on the table. And often we find gold from the very idea our clients are hesitant to tell us.

What I know - when you shut down the idea on bad ideas, you close it on future good ones too.

Published in Culture

Midwest Medical is a leading provider of facility programs that provide ASC or Outpatient Surgical Centres with Sequential Compression Devices and sleeves.

As the company has continued to grow and prosper, they launched into the US market the revolutionary Venowave Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT) device DVTlite. With this addition to their range of products and services, Midwest Medical realized that their business was going through an evolution and during the tranformational phase required a rethink of how their brand would look and feel going forward.
Published in Marketing

Just recently, US Airlines were left embarrassed when an employee responded to a customer with a cryptic tweet – an image of a woman and a very strategically placed toy airplane.  Understandably, this social media marketing error horrified the world and the image went viral.  In addition, the airline’s bizarre apology was retweeted over 12,000 times.

The PR failure from this ill-advised US Airlines post served as a reminder of the power of social media and how it can cause devastating damage to a company’s brand.

Here are the six lessons to learn from this PR plane crash, and other social media disasters:

Published in Marketing
Tuesday, 06 May 2014 00:00

My secret to flirting and business

I’ve got a not-so-secret weapon to reel clients in.  It’s called marketing automation.

You walk in to your favourite shop and immediately, something beautiful captures your attention.  You need it, you want it, it would be just right for you.

Summoning all of your courage, you walk over to that breathtaking prospect and begin your introduction.  And no, I’m not talking about a man, or a pair of Jimmy Choos -  I’m describing something else that makes my heart beat; engaging with a potential new client; that instantaneous allure of a new connection.  And I’m not going to lie; you must approach business like you would a date.

Yes, I’m encouraging you to flirt with your customers.

Published in Marketing
Yesterday, I spoke at Cebit 2014 on sales process automation.

It was an interesting topic because so many Australian companies have yet to realise just how much more efficient their sales process can be through sales automation and the ROI in terms of revenue acquired because of having an effective sales process automation system in place.

Collaborating CRM, marketing automation, workflow automation and email marketing, sales process automation is one of the most important areas for businesses to focus on in 2014. 
Published in Marketing