Front Porch Marketing is now 12 years old, thanks to you. What are our marketing take-aways from the past 12 years? We value your support and confidence in us over the years! You and your brands are our jam.

Marketing Take-Aways to Help Your Business Grow

Reflecting back on client trends and opportunities, on our pearl anniversary, we share common pearls of wisdom we saw at the beginning and continue to see today. We hope these marketing take-aways spur some thinking for you!

1. DIY Marketing

It only gets a brand so far. And, once your brand is established and has credibility, DIY marketing is no longer good enough. Time to take your garage band to the main stage. Hire a professional or firm.

2. Hiring One Marketing Person to Do All the Marketing Things

There are only a handful of unicorns on the planet that can do all the things marketing. If you go this route, know they need support. A marketing generalist isn’t your graphic designer, copywriter, webmaster, etc. Give them the resources they need to do their jobs.

3. B2B Websites

We hear from business owners their websites aren’t a priority and aren’t a sales and marketing tool. Not true. What we see most often is that you aren’t closing the sale or getting to the next round of meetings because you are getting the veto vote when potential clients go to your website to validate your credibility. Important marketing take-away: your website is your virtual office. Optimize it!

4. Marketing Take-Away for CEOs, C-Suite Executives or Managing Partners

Your role is strategy, operations, finances, and managing people. We have experienced too many times when you want to get too far in the weeds managing marketing. At that point, bottlenecks happen and marketing doesn’t happen at its best or consistently.

5. Brand Architecture

Without brand architecture, your branding is inconsistent. Define your brand mission, personality, positioning and affiliation. Let all things marketing flow from there. This becomes the filter and guidepost for branding and marketing strategy as well as execution.

6. Shiny Objects

You have Salesforce, but your team isn’t utilizing it. Then you get Hootsuite and ZoomInfo and, and, and. Stop right there. Marketing operations take-away: Make sure whatever technology you currently have is being utilized to its fullest. Then, if needed, build upon that with other tools.

Marketing Take-Aways to Take You Through the Next 12 Years

Cheers to you! Thank you for trusting in us, believing in us and getting us to our 12^th anniversary. Without your support, we wouldn’t be rockin’ on the Porch today and lovin’ every minute of it. We hope these 6 marketing take-aways will be helpful for your business as we grow together over the next dozen years!

Focus on your impression as a graphic designer

As a graphic designer, you are always focused on making brands for someone else. Listening to clients describe the vision and personality of their company, you then make a cohesive new brand that fits what the client described. It’s the same routine every graphic designer has experienced day in and day out.

But why do people say it is important to create a personal brand? Even though you are focused on creating and designing brands for someone else, you have to step back and focus on who is selling that work: you are. Your personal brand can demonstrate your strategic thinking and creativity to potential new clients. So what is your personal brand currently saying about you? Maybe its time to take it to the next level.

Break the process for yourself down into simple steps

Here are 5 ways to help you brand yourself better as a graphic designer, and benefit by standing out from the crowd this year. 

1. Define who you are 

One of the hardest things about creating your personal brand is defining who you are. But if you ask yourself some questions it could help you define it and put it into words. 

Out of all of your work, which is your favorite design that you have done?

As a graphic designer, what motivates you? 

Where do you excel? 

What do you want your clients to feel when they first discover you as a graphic designer? 

How do you present yourself every day? 

2. Establish your audience 

Who do you want your future clients to be? Try to build a personal brand that reflects the audience you want to work with. Look up fellow designers and see how they handle this themselves and market to their target audience (clients, agencies, etc). 

3. Study brands you like 

Just like you would research a company for a new project, take a look at other designers and creative agencies that you like. See what they are doing regarding their brand and take notes on how to enhance your own brand.

4. Image is everything 

Start creating social media updates that reflect your enhanced brand. Make a website where you can showcase all of your past designs in a personal branded format using such platforms as Behance and Dribble. Be judicious when you choose work to show off. You’ll want to highlight work that most reflects the work you want to do in the future.

5. Interaction on social media

Posting regularly about clients’ work or your personal work will give you a presence on social media. This way you can keep up with the audience’s reaction and trends in the design world. Keeping up to date with coworkers or potential clients gets your name out there. Building those connections can help you get future work opportunities.

Your new better brand will get you further

Once you brand yourself more effectively, you will have created a strong impression and help future clients know who you are. It can persuade their decision to work with you. Branding yourself as effectively as you brand your clients is a way to help plus-up your career and focus not only on the work you do now, but the work you want to do in the future.

Do You Have a Plan For Your Business for Next Year?

At Front Porch Marketing, we live and breathe small business marketing success. We love to see our clients grow and thrive, so we’re always sharing our small business marketing tips and tricks! Every week on our blog this year (and past years) we’ve shared some of our insider knowledge on websites, PR, design, content, social media, email marketing and all things marketing to help our readers build their business through marketing done right.

Rock Your Business With These Marketing Tips

Having worked with so many small and medium-sized businesses, in just about every industry, we’ve got quite a bit of knowledge to share. Maybe it might help you set your business up for success in 2023 too! Since it’s the year-end, we’ve gathered up the best marketing tips and tricks for you in the list below. So bookmark this page, and you’ll be building your marketing practice in no time. Need help implementing any of these marketing strategies or tactics? We’ve got you covered, just ask!

Creating your Marketing Plan

Marketing Strategies for Start-Up Businesses

How to do a Branding Refresh

Designing a Logo to Represent Your Brand

Event Marketing Tips

Maximizing Your Marketing Budget

Effective Media Relations

PR Best Practices

Assessing your Social Media

Upgrading Your LinkedIn Profile

How to Do Successful Social Media

How to Write for your Business Blog

Building a Great Website for your Company

Email Marketing Tips

Text Message Marketing Explained

Working with Social Media Influencers

We Hope Your Find Our Marketing Tips Helpful

As we close out the year, we want to thank each and every one of you for reading our weekly blog, and newsletter. Let us know what you’d like to know more about, and we’ll try answering your questions in a blog post in 2023. We wish your business endeavors much success next year.

Put Your Marketing Must-Have Plan in Place Now.

Are you ready to tackle your company’s marketing must-have plans for next year? You’re in luck! We’ve simplified that list for you, to get you started. Your business success can be mapped out ahead of time with these five guideposts put in place to execute against.

Having a plan means you know what to do to build your business according to seasons, holidays, business cycles, trends and more. And, if you need help formulating any of these must-haves — or executing them, please ask us!

The Marketing Must-Haves:

1. Marketing Plan

What are your 2023 business and marketing goals? Define them now. Make a marketing plan. Then add in audiences, competition, SWOT, strategies and tactics. Know who you are and what you’re doing. Know what makes your company unique, and what your brand’s biggest benefit is.

2. Content Calendar

This important calendar includes social media and blogging as marketing initiatives. Know what you’re going to talk about every month and every week using this calendar. Take advantage of social media trends. Every content strategy needs a roadmap with dates, and this calendar is super helpful for engaging your consumer on a regular basis.

3. Marketing Timeline

Calendarize key events pertinent to your business, down to the day. Know what events to capitalize on for business success. Plan out when you will carry out campaigns for advertising, digital or print, as well as event pushes, PR and media relations, holiday and event marketing and more.

4. Marketing operations — including people, technology and analytics

Do you have the right team in place? Do you have enough team to get the job done next year? What tech and analytics tools do you need to execute and then evaluate the effectiveness of your strategies against your goals?

5. Marketing Budget

Once the four above have been defined, put numbers to each of them. Create a marketing budget that maximizes your impact. Plan for this budget quarterly, and then, manage to it monthly. Staying on track will pay off.

No matter the size of your business, start on your marketing must-haves now.

Take the guesswork out of what to do next week, next month, or just next with these five marketing must-haves for planning your next business year! We’ve seen our clients grow year over year when we help them set these must-have marketing goals in place. Then, we work together diligently all year to execute against them for business growth and success. It can work for you too.

Is your brand looking dated or tired? Is it still representing your business the way it needs to? One of our new clients came to us for a social strategy and execution. That is what they thought they needed. But, upon initial discovery, we altogether realized that would be shooting money into the wind. What they needed was really a brand refresh.

How Do You Know When You Need a Brand Refresh?

Examine your brand! This is what we did as a team with this new client. First, we did a deep dive discovery process that included several steps:

• A brand audit laid out all the brand’s existing materials like their website, collateral and social, to see if their branding is still relevant and representative of their current business.
• Internal and external stakeholder interviews uncovered brand insights and allowed everyone to see the business through other’s eyes
• A competitive analysis was conducted of the industry that the brand operates in, and who their competitors are.

The Conclusion? The Brand Needed a Refresh.

There are specific and necessary steps to take in a brand refresh to be thorough. We like to follow this tried-and-true plan when we undertake a company’s very important branding!

1. Project timeline – Stick to it and hold each other accountable. This will keep moving things forward with all eyes on the prize.
2. Brand pillars – Define your vision plus three other very important things. Want to know what those things are? We are happy to share them with you! And our process as well. Just call us!
3. Solicit feedback beyond the leadership team – The more internal buy-in throughout the entire process the more successful an initiative and brand your company will become. Your greatest ambassadors are your employees, so make them part of your branding process.
4. Testing of concepts – Your refreshed brand should connect with both internal and external audiences. So testing the concepts is important to find the clear choice.
5. Roll out plan – A disciplined execution of the branding roll-out plan will make your new brand refresh a success. Whether it’s a new logo, tagline, website, collateral or PR, timing is everything and having a plan is key to making the big splash you want to make.

We look forward to sharing the results of three brand refreshes we are currently working on. Coming to you this fall, y’all.

Blogging for Business Benefits in 2022

Is your business blogging? Blogging for business benefits is a cost-effective way to establish your thought leadership and more. One of our new clients asked us last week why they should be blogging. Working towards being the expert in your industry means sharing your expertise.  Blogging is a simple, clear, cost-effective way to do this. When done properly and consistently, blogging brings benefits to your business. And this translates into more visibility, more customers and customer loyalty.

What are the Benefits of Business Blogging?

Business blogging contributes to your marketing strategy. This particular practice of marketing is called Content Marketing. When you consistently write about topics that are important to your audience, you’ll enjoy these three business benefits:

1. Creating new branded content to share. Are you always trying to come up with something to share on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram that supports your branding? Write a blog! This blog post can then become branded content. Share on your social channels, like our client The Slay Diaz Group does.
2. When you offer a behind-the-scenes look into your product, your process, or your industry, you are building loyalty with your customers. Share insider information — like our client Diamond Brand Gear does — and it will help you build a relationship with your existing customers and attract new ones.
3. You can also instruct people on how to do something specific. Help them achieve a goal or get an answer to a question, like our client Spot On Talent does. Here, you are establishing your authority and building organic SEO (search engine optimization) with Google. Putting keywords that speak to a topic in your headers and copy about that subject in your blog post makes you more likely to be the one that Google sends people to on search results when they ask Google a question.

Sharing Your Business Knowledge Makes You a Leader

If you’re a long-time reader of the Front Porch marketing newsletter and blog, you’ll see that we put these content marketing strategies into practice not only for our clients, but for ourselves. We want everyone to succeed, and we want you to be able to benefit from our business experience. So we share it openly. We want you to be able to optimize your LinkedIn profile, practice successful PR, and know what’s important in marketing if you’re a start-up business.

If you’re ready to level up your marketing and demonstrate to your industry that you’re a leader by adding Content Marketing to your mix, let us know. We can guide you through the process and help you set up an easily-executable calendar, schedule and topics. We can even ghost write your blog posts for you, share your content to your social channels, and optimize your content for better SEO.

Going Digital is the Future

If there’s anything we learned from the pandemic it’s that going digital is the ultimate way to survive as a business. No one expected an event like this to disrupt the world as fast as it did, but we adapted. Lots of corporations switched to being remote or hybrid; and Zoom became a household name. With the world going digital many of us started to realize the importance of marketing ourselves online and there’s no better place than LinkedIn. Membership has climbed to reach over 780 million since the pandemic hit. So there’s no better time than now to upgrade your LinkedIn!

Personal branding is a topic we’re all familiar with. We all know it’s important, but many of us don’t give it the attention it really deserves. Most of the time were just too busy to give it any real time or thought. We think “I know there’s more I could be doing to improve my LinkedIn.” However, in this day and age its crucial to have your personal brand looking clean and professional. Here are a couple of tips and tricks to improve your LinkedIn profile.

Upgrade Your Profile Picture

Your picture is the first thing people see when they click on your LinkedIn profile. It’s important that you get this right. First make sure the picture is a recent photo of you, then make sure your face takes up about 60% of the frame. No long distance shots, and smile with your eyes!

Choose a Background Photo

Choose a background photo that represents either what you do, or your interest in visually interesting way. If you don’t have your own photos to work with, I recommend using a free hd stock image site called Unsplash. Also try to stick with a photo that fits within 1584 (w) x 396 (h) pixels for the best quality.

Get Creative With Your Headline

Your Headline doesnt just have to be what your business is. Try to add a little bit of flair or creativity to it. For example take a look at EA Talent Recruiter Jason Yuan’s LinkedIn headline, “I don’t usually stalk profiles, but when I do I usually have a career opportunity for you. Want to connect!?”. See how he managed to hook your attention and explain what he does? This is what you should be shooting for.

Expand your Network

Linkedin has amazing networking opportunities and has made it very easy to expand your network. One helpful tip is to link your profile with your email address book. LinkedIn will then suggest people you should connect with. Once you start connecting with people you may even notice that you have connections working at companies that you are currently applying for. I strongly suggest if you are in college that you connect with those who go to your school in your major. You never know when that connection may come in handy.

Take Skill Assessments

These are free tests that LinkedIn has created to help you stand out amongst the crowd. According to Linkedin candidates who have certified skills are 30% more likely to get hired. I recommend to getting certified in the Microsoft Excel assessment. It’s a universal skillset that will always help you standout. Obviously the more certified skills you have the better.

Publish Your Own Content

The best way to get noticed on LinkedIn is to publish engaging, long content. You should start pumping these out to start conversations. Make sure it’s interesting. A good tip is to look at the trending articles on LinkedIn News on the right hand side of your account. Look at the trending topics on the platform and share your thoughts or experiences on the topic. If you can don’t be afraid to sprinkle in a little emojis. It may sound stupid but it actually increases reader engagement. Just don’t over do it. Also try to steer away from politics on LinkedIn. This is a platform for professional networking, it’s not Facebook or Twitter.

A Brighter Future Awaits

Upgrading your LinkedIn doesn’t have to be done all in one day. Try to take it in small chunks. These steps may seem trivial at first, but I promise if you knock these out when you have your lunch break, or when find yourself with extra fee time you won’t regret it. Allow LinkedIn to work for you by taking the first step!

Are you assessing your brand right how? Recently I was invited to sit in on a brainstorming meeting about marketing and growth. Here I was able to pick up some powerful marketing tools needed for growth. These tools may be applied both for personal and business growth.

Assessing Your Brand: Assets

In growth, we learn powerful information. So look at and determine your growth, and the path you took to get there. Assess the road your brand has taken – whether it’s a personal or business brand. Revisit where you have been and decide where you’re headed. Assess your brand’s strengths and weaknesses by asking yourself these questions.

• Present your strengths and weakness so that you stand out, sell your brand.
• What is new with you? Determine what you have learned and how it matters.
• Why does your business exist?
• Who are previous clients and why did they hire you?
• Evaluate your goals: where do you see yourself long/short term?

Target Audience Evaluation

Your target audience are the people you want to work with, your customers and potential customers. The internet provides resources to reach your target via platforms such as blogs, newsletters, social media, and alumni groups. Use these resources to be present for your customers, and assess your brand’s voice on these platforms.

• Who are you targeting? Who’s the decision maker that could benefit from your expertise?
• What are the hot topics? What’s trending in your brand’s space?
• Protip: Subscribe to platforms that your target audience subscribes to.
• Listen to your customers. Assess what they are talking about, and their relevance to your brand.
• Protip: Participate on sites that interest you, this is a great networking tool for finding like-minds.
• Become like your target, interact with their “friends” socially to really get to know them.

The Social Media Impact

Social media is more than a picture sharing platform, it is great for networking. Use social media platforms such as LinkedIn to learn about and follow clients to implement current trends.

• Use social media to introduce your brand to your potential customers, potential employers, and to your peers.
• Seek out and become a “friend” to past clients as well as their friends, and network with them, sharing your expertise.
• Your LinkedIn page should mirror the career for which you are aiming. Find websites dedicated to that career and subscribe to them. This will allow you to network and stay on top of any current or future possibilities. Brag about yourself on your profile, be proud and loud.

Plan and Grow Your Brand

Planning is the most important step one can do to get to the next level. So, plan, plan and keep planning. Brainstorm with colleagues and staff about ways to grow your personal brand and/or your business’ brand. Gather, analyze and leverage data, creating a message map of the recurring themes that you see. Really think about: what is your end game – a job, a career, an entrepreneurship? Evaluate and understand what you will need to get there by assessing your brand. Update your skills, explore what’s new and current. Investing in yourself is important to your brand’s growth.

Social media trends for 2022 look a little different than last year.

Social media trends for 2022 will increasingly be about customer experience and personalization. Those agendas are paramount. And, most if not all social media platforms are increasingly moving more and more toward “pay to play”. In other words, platforms want you to pay to get people to see your social media. For instance, this looks like boosting posts on Facebook. Trends that involve an interaction with customers, and especially those that offer some measure of personalization (as opposed to just pushing out a message to everyone) will top brands’ to-do lists.

Here are some of the social media trends we see for 2022.

• Short-form Video – Less is more, and people don’t read. The human attention span is short. So, a video a minute or shorter is plenty long enough. Do a series of short videos each making one point, instead of one long video. Repurpose your existing long videos into shorter snippets and program them for different social media channels. Reveal a different aspect of your company, or solve a different problem on different channels as opposed to playing the same content on the same day on the same channels.
• Customer Service – Customers are conversing more than ever via DMs, Twitter and comments on posts. Monitor these conversations and be responsive on any channel that customers are contacting you on.
• Social Commerce – Customers want to check out immediately on whatever social channel they are on. Social commerce offerings (like buying a dress directly from an Instagram photo) are growing on every channel. Perhaps this social media trend is appropriate for your product or service.
• Paid Social Advertising – Algorithms continue to change. And, platforms continue to ramp up their paid social offerings. There may be a need to add a paid strategy to your organic posts to get wider reach and more engagement. The ultimate goal is connecting with more potential customers, right?
• Influencer Marketing – Micro or local influencers are more important. Work with these influencers who really already love your brand. They can demonstrate your product or service in a way that is unique to them and resonates with their audience.

Content remains king.

Have a plan. Don’t chase squirrels. Plan your content for the year – or at least the next quarter – to meet your brand’s sales goals, branding initiatives, limited offerings, or even just calendar holidays. Planning your content means have a blog and regularly contribute to it. Then, promote your new content on your social media platforms. Build your content marketing practice like you’d grow a garden. Keep at it.

What do customers want to know? Customers want content that is focused on:

• Deeper Meaning – Be authentic. Answer questions that are helpful and offer perspectives that can be touch points for your brand in a customer’s life. Find your commonality. Create your company’s tenets, and do those fewer stronger things in a deeper way.
• Giving Back – Showcase volunteer efforts and donations. A company’s charitable giving is important for 73% of Americans’ purchase decisions. People WANT to love you. Showcase how you are showing love for others. Giving back increases loyalty.

Overall, after the past few years of being disconnected, consumers are craving connection in every aspect of their lives. But make connection with your brand meaningful. Be convicted. Be consistent. Create a connection that will last, create loyalty, and continue these social media trends for 2022 to the years ahead.

How to communicate corporate social responsibility for your brand

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a business’ commitment to philanthropic endeavors and environmentally friendly practices. It is essential for businesses in 2022. Why? Sure, today’s successful businesses are “responsible” organizations committed to profits. But in today’s world they are also responsible for other higher callings. Their consumers now demand it.

Gen Z is all in with brands who demonstrate corporate social responsibility. First, younger generations thirst for buying these products. Next, they want to work for these companies. So CSR gives businesses an opportunity to engage with not only their consumers and their employees, but with the communities in which they live and work in a meaningful way.

Yes, deeper client and customer connections will follow.

CSR efforts benefit the economy, society and environment. They demonstrate how the organization uses its resources in broadly beneficial and ethical ways. Showing that your company or brand is a responsible partner, employer and neighbor will be key to business success going forward.

How does a brand communicate CSR activities?

Talk about your company’s corporate social responsibility with a CSR report. A CSR report highlights your organization’s achievements. It builds social responsibility into your brand’s identity. This report makes the organization accountable to its stakeholders. And it shows progress year over year. Then highlight how your company has saved energy or fuel, renewed land, or reduced their carbon footprint. Finally, showcase better employees work environments with safety initiatives. Also implement DE & I programs that promote equity in hiring and promoting employees.

Your CSR report’s content can then be repurposed all year long as social media assets. Highlight individual specific goals your company has met with this effort. Statistics and data can be turned into compelling visuals and narratives that speak to your customers, your client partners, your employees and your community. Communicate your social responsibility efforts in these ways:

• Email Marketing – create an eblast once a month or quarterly to key stakeholders
• Social Media – create content and consistently communicate, once a week or month
• Internal Communication – utilize existing intranet or internal emails to communicate CSR activities

What size business needs to show Corporate Social Responsibility?

A CSR report may be easier for larger businesses to execute. But, small to midsize businesses can do it too. These businesses are exercising the same values albeit in smaller, yet still remarkable ways. And that is worth talking about. CSR activities can separate your business from the competition in a truly meaningful way. So consider incorporating this important effort into your business.