marketing Archives - Danny Lacey

HOW I FOUND SOME OF MY BIGGEST CLIENTS

Danny Lacey — Wed, 02 Jun 2021 14:53:08 +0000

In this blog post, I’m going to reveal the methods I used to land some of our biggest clients at Stada Media. Like I always say, these methods won’t work for every single business. However, I hope that reading about my experiences will inspire you on your own entrepreneurial journey! Let’s begin… Since the early days of cold calling, our tactics for finding clients have moved on a lot, and we avoid that particular one at all costs. For me, cold calling reduces the odds of finding the right type of client for our business. It’s just making one phone call after another, playing the numbers game and not doing any due diligence or research. It may be a numbers game, but there’s a high chance that it’s the wrong numbers. One thing that has led to a lot of inbound enquiries for us is our video production portfolio and online presence. However, that didn’t happen overnight – it’s all part of building momentum and something that comes with time and patience. One good video in your portfolio can increase your chances of getting new clients – meanwhile, 20 REALLY good portfolio pieces give you a much bigger chance. What’s more, in the end, those portfolio pieces end up doing the work for you. Another couple of our biggest contributors to revenue in recent years have been 1) hiring a salesperson, and 2) activity on LinkedIn. Those two things have contributed more to sales (outside of me doing my own personal sales activity) than anything else. Now, I’m going to break those down…

Hiring a salesperson

In around 2017/18, I hired a Business Development Manager (BDM), Catherine. It took me months to make this decision. I was worried about it, because you’re talking about a higher salary bracket. It was a big gamble and probably something we couldn’t afford at the time. However, I decided that it WAS time. The company was vulnerable because I was the only person bringing in the sales. If anything happened to me, or if I had a bad period, it would stunt growth. This was a massive investment (at the time, the single biggest investment the business had ever made) with a very demanding salary and bonus structure. However, the gamble paid off in just a few months with Catherine bringing regular 4/5 figure jobs into the business. She literally helped us almost double revenue in a single year, which was AMAZING.

Don’t work with your loved ones!

However, there’s a story here… I ended up in a relationship with Catherine. And, what do you know, this COMPLETELY ruined the working relationship! It’s true what they say: you should never work with loved ones. If you’ve been in a relationship and worked together at the same time, you’ll know exactly what that’s like, and you should avoid it at all costs. However, I don’t regret it one bit. We have a beautiful little boy called Luke and a very happy little family, and I would take that any day over business success. Cat and I no longer work together and everything is hunky dory. We got lucky, and I would do it all over again – and we have! We hired Ben Dews, our Director of Business Development, and he’s having a similar effect on the business.

Activity on LinkedIn

Direct messages

A handful of our clients came off the back of activity I was doing on LinkedIn, which worked an absolute treat. I sent a few personalised direct messages via LinkedIn to the key decision-makers of these businesses, and ended up bringing in over £100k in additional revenue. A couple of these clients were contacts I already had who I’d admired for a while and really wanted to work with. However, the spend on this was zero. It cost me nothing. It took me about half an hour and a bit of research to write each message, and that was it. That’s why LinkedIn is all about conversation and effort. I did my research before sending the messages, and I made plenty of the right kind of noise at the same time. For example, I was already connected with the Managing Director of one of these businesses on LinkedIn. They were all over social media. I’d done my research, I’d written my direct message and I knew how I wanted to approach it.

The message went something like this:

Hi [Name], Hope you’re well. I hope you don’t mind me getting in touch, as I’m sure you get this all the time. However, I loved your recent work that’s featured on your website – I thought it was so creative and innovative. We’re a small in-house team of video production experts just up the road from you guys, and we would LOVE to work with you and your company. We’ve massively admired what you guys are doing for years now, and I’ve finally plucked up the courage to get in touch. Then I told them about what we do, before reaching the most important part of my message… We want to prove how good we are. We want to prove the value we can bring to your business. So, I’m happy for us to create a FREE promotional video for your agency. We’ll come and film at your workplace and we’ll put together a really cool, short corporate video. Not only that, but we will do the first video project for one of your clients at cost. Again, this was a big gamble – but one I KNEW would pay off if we got our foot through the door. It wasn’t a short message, but it wasn’t War and Peace either. I know people say not to write long messages, but it depends what the message is! If it needs to be long, it needs to be long – as long as it’s the right kind of message, and it’s not just blurb about how great you are.

Make sure they can’t miss you

When I hit send, I also did as much activity as I could across their social media channels: liking, sharing, commenting in one go. On top of that, I also sent them an email. So, my name was popping up all over the place! The next day, I’m in Brighton doing a workshop on filmmaking. I get a phone call partway through the day… ‘Hi Danny, it’s [name] from [name] agency. My goodness! Your name popped up everywhere yesterday, what is going on? ‘But listen, I get a lot of these phone calls and emails from various agencies wanting to work with us. However, just because of your approach and the way you popped up everywhere, you did a really good job of grabbing my attention. I want to get you involved!’ Their account management team got in touch with us and gave us a couple of briefs to work with. As a result, they became one of our biggest clients for the next year and a half or so. We also had another two or three clients that came through that exact same method. Today, we still use a similar format to find clients – and it works an absolute treat! I wish I had time to do it at scale, but as you’ll know, running a business is very time-demanding. You can find me on LinkedIn here.

Growing a sales and marketing team

Today, I’m growing a sales and marketing team that can dramatically raise the visibility of our business and to help us get in amongst our biggest competitors in this space. I don’t know what’s happened, but recently, I’ve become REALLY competitive – aggressively competitive, in fact. I want us to be making a dent in the industry and I believe in what we do. However, I don’t want us to grow TOO quickly. I want to make sure we’re getting everything right. That’s why I’m in the process of setting up this marketing and sales department. Because of my experience of hiring my first BDM back in the day and doubling the revenue, I’m now all for making that investment into hiring the right kind of talent. It’s a big move for anyone running a small business.

You’re going to waste money on marketing

I’ve also wasted many thousands on marketing and advertising, and I believe this is part and parcel of finding the best marketing fit for your business. Some types of marketing work better for some businesses than others, but you have to try stuff out – and sometimes that costs money. I don’t care who you are or how great you think you are – you are going to waste money on marketing!

You’ve got to speculate to accumulate

We’re now at the stage where we want to dedicate at least 5% of our revenue on marketing spend to help make more of a dent in this marketplace. Now, more than ever, I’m a big believer in having to speculate to accumulate. You can’t rely on one specific channel for growing your business and increasing sales. Sales and marketing are basically in bed together. Marketing feeds sales, and in the end, sales feeds marketing – it gives it ammunition and assets to go out and market the business. It’s a circular thing. The reason why I’m growing my marketing team is that I need people who know a lot more about marketing than I do and can focus all their time and energy on MARKETING. At the minute, we’re a dot on a massive map, and I want us to be more visible to a lot more people. I can’t achieve that on my own. I’m very much front-loading the business at the moment, but this means we’ll be able to cope with demand as we grow the back side of the business: the production and account management teams. So, there you have it: just a couple of my secrets to sales success. These methods won’t work for every business, but they’re definitely what worked for us and the businesses we were targeting at the time! If you’d like to chat with me more about finding clients, feel free to get in touch here or email me at dannylacey@stadamedia.co.uk!

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SETTING GOALS AND SELLING YOURSELF IN BUSINESS

Danny Lacey — Tue, 25 May 2021 14:38:24 +0000

If you’re an entrepreneur, you’ll undoubtedly have gone on – or you’re still going on – the journey of figuring out what sets you apart from your competitors and how to go about selling yourself in business.

You may also be muddling along, trying to get everything together, but you don’t have any proper goals in place. Well, once upon a time, that was me.

In this post, I’m going to give you a starter to my thoughts on selling yourself in business and how we grew the business so we could get MORE prospects through the door. This will differ from business to business, so I’m simply sharing my story.

So, let’s get straight into it – read on for the next chapter of the Diary of an Entrepreneur!

You can’t survive without clients – and there are plenty out there

People often have the misconception that there just aren’t enough clients out there who are interested in their services. For the most part, that’s absolute nonsense. There are plenty of businesses, and plenty of people WITHIN businesses, that want the products and services that you’re supplying.

When it comes to selling yourself in business, we’ve been in many situations before where we’re pitching against competitors. Fortunately, though, I wouldn’t say that’s where most of our revenue comes from. It’s a dark art and it’s difficult.

We’ve won a small percentage (though a significant percentage for us), but you’re potentially up against 40 other agencies – some who have had way more experience than you, just because they’ve been at it a lot longer, they’ve got a bigger team and they have more resources. So, we try to avoid pitching at the moment.

‘What’s your USP (Unique Selling Point)?’

It always bugs me when people ask this question, because 99.9% of answers will fill that hole with something meaningless. You’ll make stuff up that you know the other person wants to hear.

The truth is, our USP is the fact that we’re there in that moment, having a conversation with the prospect. They know our USP better than we do, because they – the prospect – found us amongst a sea of video production agencies.

Let’s be honest: our USP is our people. There’s only one of me, our Lead Editor Luke, our Production Director Saxon, and so on. We’re all unique! That is our USP. However, getting that across without sounding like I’m trying to cop out of answering the question is really difficult.

The reason I’m sharing this is because it’s cropped up often before, and I’ve always stumbled on it. In video production, it’s really hard to specify your USP because video agencies all have the same things. We’ve all got the same kind of cameras, staff, processes and cool content.

Furthermore, I think it’s more important to know about your VALUE PROPOSITION when selling yourself in business.

Ask instead, ‘What’s your value proposition?’

Your USP is basically your value proposition in disguise. As a business, you need to know what that is.

We’re constantly working on and tweaking ours. It’s not perfect at the moment, because we do a lot of things for a lot of people, and getting that into a succinct, short sentence is really difficult.

The value proposition is: What problem do we solve – and how can we solve it for YOUR business?

What’s more, you need to have a few different versions of your value proposition when selling yourself in business:

Fitting it into just a few words.
Fitting it into a sentence.
Finally, a few sentences – your 15-second elevator pitch that you can use verbally or on your website or social media.

Growing the marketing side of the business

When it comes to sales, one of the big mistakes we made in the early days was just expecting the phones to ring off the hook. We also relied heavily on current contacts and word of mouth – but this wasn’t going to grow my business. We were starting to exhaust that contacts list and sales began to dry up.

This was when I knew there was a problem: the sales pipeline was looking ALL too familiar. It was the same names, and we desperately needed to add new faces to that client roster to feed growth and improve sustainability. We were also getting to a stage where we’d lost a couple of clients, which had had a drastic effect on the business.

So, what was I going to do?

I realised that I had to learn everything I could about marketing. When selling yourself in business, other forces have to be at play other than your little black book (which is all I had back in the day – now it’s my contacts list on my phone).

So, I had to go back to the principles of how I acquired my first client by cold calling – the more proactive exercise. Now, I hate cold calling, and I haven’t done much of it since the early days. If you’ve read my earlier blog post on how I won my first client, you’ll know this already. However, I still had to return to those basic principles of proactively getting myself in front of new clients.

The importance of setting goals and targets

So, there was a lot at play, and I needed to get smarter with my sales. I needed to do things that I hadn’t necessarily been doing beforehand. However, I also needed to set goals and targets so we had something to aim for. This is crucial when selling yourself in business.

Again in the early days, this is something I wasn’t necessarily focused on. I was simply concentrating on bagging one sale, after another, after another. They had pound signs attached to them, but they weren’t in any particular order or organised in any way. There was no orchestration of sales and cashflow vs targets and goals. It was literally whatever we could get our hands on – out of, at the time, desperation.

Reverse-engineering

Back then, there was no method to growth – it was just us saying, ‘Right, who needs a video?’ and just going at it. Now, however, there are goals and targets and we’re reverse-engineering everything. I’ve got a much clearer idea of how I want the business to be structured.

For example, I own the business – I’m the one who’s dedicating blood, sweat and tears to this, and have been for basically my entire life. I want to be able to look after my family and afford the little luxuries – so what does the business need to do and achieve to be able to pay for that? And what are the exit plans for the business?

If you reverse-engineer all of these little things, you hopefully end up with a set of goals and targets. I think it’s really, really important to have that when selling yourself in business – because without it, things are very cloudy. You’re just doing things for the sake of doing things – you’re swinging at a ball without a bat.

Whether it’s revenue targets, an exit strategy, client numbers, staff numbers… whatever it is, it will help you with client acquisition and the lifetime value of clients.

So, that’s my two-cents about succeeding at selling yourself in business. It might not work for every business, but it’s certainly working for mine – and I can only hope that we continue to build on that success.

What are your sales strategies? Have you made any mistakes in sales that have changed how you operate? I’d love to hear your business stories. Get in touch with me here or you can email me direct at dannylacey@stadamedia.co.uk!

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HOW I WON MY FIRST CLIENT IN VIDEO PRODUCTION

Danny Lacey — Fri, 12 Mar 2021 12:44:23 +0000

In this blog post, I’m going to be sharing my experiences of how I won my first client in video production for Stada Media, and the lessons I learned from that miracle moment. This is the Diary of an Entrepreneur. So, let’s get started!

Getting the money coming in

Now, if you’re in business, you’ll know this feeling well: the anxiety and worry going into setting up your own business. You’ve left your job, or you’re already out of a job – and you’ve not got much money. So, you’re trying to find that next thing – the thing that could bring the money in to put a roof over your head, pay the bills and keep the family happy.

When I first decided I wanted to set up a video production company, I spent about a thousand pounds on a camera – that was some of our savings, for this harebrained idea of setting up my own business. I also had the editing software. Back in those days, it was on CD – Final Cut Pro, for those geeky enough to know!

So, I was sat there with all this kit, which was lovely – but I was only spending money, not bringing any in.

So, it was time to find clients.

Cold calling my first client

Picture the scene: I’m sitting at my desk in my spare room at home. I’m looking at my computer screen, thinking, crikey – how and where do I find new clients?

Out of the corner of my eye was a copy of the Yellow Pages (yes, this was the days of the Yellow Pages, for anyone old enough to remember!). I grabbed it, and decided I was going to find a hundred businesses within the Yellow Pages, from all different sections and categories.

Back then, we did have emails, but digital communication wasn’t as popular. So, I decided I was going to start cold calling.

Desperate times, desperate measures

However, finding my hundred businesses took me three times longer than it should have: I was procrastinating, simply because I knew that this wasn’t something I was going to enjoy. Even though I’m good at sales and can handle a conversation, I hate the idea of picking up the phone and cold calling. I’ve not done it since, and I don’t want to again. I just hate it.

However, in this instance, desperate times called for desperate measures.

I wrote a script to work from, to make it easier for me to pick up the phone and start a conversation. I was still procrastinating, but then realised I couldn’t just sit there doing nothing; it was time to hit the phones and make some money.

The first three or four were an absolute nightmare – slamming the phone down, ‘not interested’, ‘scram’, ‘get lost’, ‘you idiot’. To be fair, I can’t blame them for being pretty mean on the other end; it wasn’t the best introduction to me or my business.

However, by call four or five, I was starting to see a pattern and evolve my script. When I got to call number seven, I finally hit the jackpot.

Perfect timing

The guy answered the phone, and he was driving. I remember saying ‘Hi, my name is Danny. I’m calling from a company called Stada Media. I’m wondering if your business would be interested in video?’

This is as far as I got before he interrupted me. He said, ‘Danny, your timing couldn’t be any better. I am literally on my way to one of my clients right now to talk about how we can improve our current services, using’ – you guessed it – ‘video.’

Sealing the deal

Then, things twisted a little back on me. He asked me a question, and I had no idea how to answer it.

I was thinking on my feet, but then he said, ‘Look, I’m on my way to meet this client. I’m going to be there in about an hour. I need to know how much you would charge me for a health and safety video. Just you and a camera, half day, filming five-minute videos.’ I can’t remember the exact amount – but he was giving me a little bit of time to get back to him.

So, I thought, you know what – I’m going to impress him. I was going to get back to him pretty quick with a quote, and hopefully we’ll get the job. I went in with a price – I don’t know why, but £450 jumped out at me. He said, ‘Sold.’

That’s when I asked him who the client was. Guess who it was?

B&Q.

A massive DIY chain in the UK, and I was doing it for £450.

Luckily for me, he went to the meeting, gave me a call back and said, ‘Look, £450… seems a bit cheap.’

Phew!

When your client tells you you’re going in too cheap, that’s definitely a client you want to be working with.

He said, ‘Look, here’s the full brief having spoken to my client. We’ve got a budget of 2 grand. So just go away, give me a breakdown of what you can do for us, and let’s go from there.’

It was a euphoric moment.

I never rang any of the other targets on that little hit list I’d put together from the Yellow Pages. I’d got as far as call 7, and that was my first client. I was off.

I learned loads from that first job. On the video production side of things, I wasn’t very good. The videos were okay, but if I’m honest, they were on the wrong side of average. But it got us started – and the client was really happy with them. So much so that they booked us in for more work, and it just escalated from there.

The power of portfolio

The B&Q health and safety videos weren’t just great on a ‘wow, we’ve won our first client’ level, – they were also the first step in putting a really good portfolio of work together.

I didn’t realise at the time, but this is really important. If you can show people – future prospects and potential clients – a good body of work, it makes sales a whole lot easier.

At that time, I had nothing – I hadn’t created any videos. So, whoever was taking us on as a video production company at the time was taking us on on trust. They’re going, ‘This guy sounds credible. It sounds like he could do a good job. We’ll go with it.’

For the next batch of clients after that, I didn’t do any more cold calling. I decided I wasn’t very good at it – even though I’d won that client, that was just pure luck and timing. I went in many other directions, including print and email campaigns.

Your clients are right under your nose

Once people found out I was producing videos, they were approaching me and asking me for quotes on videos for their business.

Instead of trying to look beyond my resources and capabilities, I decided to look at my contact list. Who do I know who owns a business or works for somebody in a business, and how do I reach out to them? How do I get them interested in my service?

And that’s what I did. We ended up with maybe half a dozen customers.

To this day, it’s the same: when we’re trying to attract clients, we often miss the businesses on our own doorstep. We’re always looking further afield.

So, that was how I won my first video production client. As always, many lessons to be learned – but lessons are a thousand times more valuable for your growth than constant achievements. Look out for the next post in the Diary of an Entrepreneur!

Read my previous post on setting up my first business and learning my first lessons as an entrepreneur!

If you’d like to have a chat with me about business or marketing, feel free to drop me a line at dannylacey@stadamedia.co.uk!

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DO YOU KNOW YOUR WANT FROM YOUR NEED WHEN IT COMES TO MARKETING YOUR BUSINESS?

Danny Lacey — Wed, 28 Aug 2019 14:13:54 +0000

Want and need are terms that are often used interchangeably, giving the impression that they mean the same thing. But when you’re researching potential customers for your business, those that have a want and those that have a need are two completely different things and need be approached in different ways.

So, how you decide what is the want, and what is the need, when marketing your business?

Spotting the difference

Needs can be categorised as essential for survival, e.g. food, shelter, clothing, safety, water. For businesses, equipment and supplies meet the basic functional needs.

Wants, or emotional needs, are desires or cravings that you experience. Joy, relief, security, adventure and comfort are among the common emotions that drive buying decisions.

Do you need that delicious pastry?

When you’re hungry, you’re experiencing a basic need in order to function, and a hearty sausage roll from the local bakery will satisfy that need.

If you walk past the bakery and are drawn in by the display and enticing smell, you want the same sausage roll and may buy it even though you had no prior intention of doing so. This is an emotional response. You didn’t know you wanted one until your senses influenced you to crave and purchase a sausage roll immediately.

Choosing the right channel for the right response

The same theory applies to marketing your business. A need will be searched in Google, e.g. ‘local car dealerships’ and ‘dry cleaners near me’. These consumers know exactly what they need and are actively seeking gratification. The trick is to be found instantly and provide a compelling reason to choose you over your competitors.

Facebook works in a different way. Your targeted customer might be scrolling through cat videos and catching up on family and friends’ activities when an advert pops up for your product. They weren’t thinking about your product, but because of the timing and content – whether it’s a video, blog or promotional offer – they suddenly want it. They must have it.

These two marketing techniques working together can be incredibly powerful. To make it work, look at your business and understand the needs versus the wants of your potential customers and plan your marketing strategy around that.

That’s the way we work with our clients. By getting a deeper understanding of your customers’ wants and needs we can create efficient, effective marketing plans that don’t cost the earth and deliver great results.

I’m the CEO & Founder of Stada Media. We’re experts in video production, content creation and management, SEO, PPC, social media, web design and PR. Find out more here.

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REPURPOSING CONTENT: TURNING ONE PIECE INTO MANY

Danny Lacey — Fri, 23 Aug 2019 08:00:52 +0000

You already know that creating regular, relevant content attracts new audiences and keep customers engaged. But how can you make each piece of content work hard to maximise return?

Repurposing content creates added value from existing work, and helps you to reinforce messages. Here’s how to do it…

Getting started

A good place to start is to write a long-form blog about a particular subject within your business. Try not to be too broad or sales-focussed. Use what you know about your customers to find a relevant topic and go in-depth – answering questions throughout.

For example, if you run a car showroom, it’s unlikely an audience will engage with a generic ‘why we’re better than other car showrooms’ blog. If you focus on a particular car or car part, service that you offer, or the art of selling or buying a car – that’s far more likely to pique the interest of your target audience.

Remember the 80/20 rule – 80% of your content should be educational or fun. It doesn’t need to directly relate to the product or service you’re selling. Its job is to showcase your brand’s personality and draw in your audience. Only 20% of your content marketing strategy is for product promotion.

Making your content work harder

The whole is not always greater than the sum of its parts

Once you’ve found the topic, researched and written your long-form blog, it’s time to get creative with formats and promotion to maximise your reach and engage your audience.

Blog formats – by cutting down your long blog into several shorter formats, you’ve instantly created four or five bits of content from one blog post. You might go from 1000 words to 500, to 300 to 50 and these different formats can be shared across media and blogging channels.

Budget tip – if you’re not a confident writer, People Per Hour or Fiver provides access to creative talent at reasonable rates.

Video – create a two-minute or 50-minute video – whatever suits your audience and brings them value. Publish it on your website or embed it within the blog post itself.

Budget tip – mobile phone videos

Graphics – using pulled quotes, facts and stats to create eye-catching graphics that signpost viewers to your blog.

Budget tip – Online tools such as Canva and PicMonkey to create your own graphics

Social Media – promote your blog across Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest or wherever your audience is. Test what works as loyal customers may respond to a graphic that signposts them to your blog, whereas new audiences may respond to a short video summary.

Podcast – record your blog and upload it to podcast platforms.

Reaping the rewards

So the art of content creation is turning one long blog on an interesting topic into 10 sub-pieces of content, and then another 50 sub-sub pieces of content, and so on. Your long blog post breaks down into a whole range of formats across multiple channels that can be constantly tested and optimised.

And as Google monitors how relevant your content is, your search results organically improve and new audiences become aware of and warm to your brand. Thanks to the art of repurposing content, they’ll receive gentle encouragement to move along the lead generation funnel and become your customers of the future.

I’m the CEO & Founder of Stada Media, experts in video production, content creation and management, SEO, PPC, social media, web design and PR. Find out more here.

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PEOPLE DON’T CARE ABOUT YOUR VIDEO

Danny Lacey — Thu, 22 Aug 2019 08:00:33 +0000

The cold, hard truth is no one cares about your business. They don’t care about your people, your offices, your brand, your history or who you are.

And people don’t care about your video.

Not at first that is. Not when they’re searching on Google. There’s just one burning question in their mind: What can you do for me?

It’s critical to answer this question immediately in your video. First impressions count and your target audience wants to instantly understand the value your business can add to their day to day lives. They don’t know you so why should they choose you rather than anyone else? The hook needs to be right at the start of your video because if a viewer doesn’t feel engaged and excited in the first few seconds, you’ve lost them forever.

So how do you get their attention? That can only be answered through understanding your audience’s motivations and needs. Use insight to pack a punch with your messaging and channel choice and people will stand up and take notice. The most impactful videos are short, sweet and get to the point quickly. They give answers to questions that haven’t even been asked yet.

A single-minded strategy will help you stay on track and avoid a couple of common pitfalls such as…

Don’t show off

There’s no other way of saying it. It’s great to be proud of your showroom but don’t make the viewer endure 10-15 seconds of a logo or building shot before diving into the good stuff – the stuff they’re interested in. They’ll be long gone by then.

Don’t be over-fancy

People want authenticity – to see the real you, what you offer and proof that it works. Slick, polished videos sometimes have the exact opposite effect to that intended and can alienate your audience. Even the biggest brands have started using videos filmed on mobile phones as part of their video marketing strategy to show the human, down to earth side of their personality. For most videos, keeping the content simple and raw helps the audience relate to your brand.

So, keep it simple, keep it short and get to the point. Use conversational, uncomplicated language and make it about them, not you. If you stick to these pointers you won’t go far wrong and will create some powerful video content that will excite and attract new customers.

I’m the CEO & Founder of Stada Media. We’re experts in video production, content creation and management, SEO, PPC, social media, web design and PR. Find out more here.

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DOES YOUR BUSINESS REALLY NEED A CORPORATE VIDEO?

Danny Lacey — Wed, 21 Aug 2019 09:06:56 +0000

This may sound like a crazy question coming from the CEO of a video production company, but it’s an important one.

With research showing that video content is processed 60k times quicker than written copy, 37% more likely to be shared across social media and 80% more effective in converting prospects – it feels like a no-brainer to rush out and create a slick corporate video that your colleagues and senior management will love. Job done.

Getting the most from a corporate video

But then what? What’s the plan? Your shiny new video will only deliver the promised results if it’s part of a structured marketing plan. If the final edit is going to languish, sad and unpromoted, on a web page or YouTube channel, there’s really no point in creating it in the first place.

Whether you’re planning to film a video yourself or use a specialist production company, there’s an investment of time and effort as well as budget. To see a return on that investment, you need to be clear about what your message is, who it’s for and what you want them to do next. Potential customers don’t want to see a video of your new warehouse even if it’s your pride and joy. You need to be relevant, concise and have a hook that leaves your audience wanting to know more.

“We’re not doing our job if we don’t ask what you’re planning to do with the finished video.”

Danny Lacey, CEO & Founder, Stada Media

Find out if a corporate video is for you

If you’re unsure, ask yourself the following questions to determine if your business needs a corporate video:

What are you trying to achieve? – do you want to boost sales or build your brand? Whatever your objective is, quantify what success looks like.
How will your video grow your business? – does it support your business and marketing goals?
Who’s your audience? – what do you know about them and how do they consume information, e.g. online news, Instagram, Facebook stories, the cinema?
What style of video will work? – how will you bring your message to life for your audience? Live-action, animation or even 3D for a real wow factor?
What language should you use? – are you able to reflect the tone and language your audience expects to hear? It’s important to keep language relaxed, clear and conversational, avoiding buzzwords and jargon.
How will you promote it? – video works across every platform and channel so are you able to commit time and budget to website, social, ads, events and every other channel you use?
How will you measure success? – do you have the tools to measure success, e.g. views, completions, social sharing, click-throughs, bounces and time on page? Setting a deadline for evaluation helps create a snap-shot benchmark for future activity.

So… Is a corporate video for you?

If you can answer the questions above, you fully understand the reach and power of video marketing. A corporate video is not the be-all and end-all in itself. It’s the start of a journey to attract, engage, delight and ultimately convert your target audience. If you can’t commit to the promotion and evaluation, your video won’t bring you the return you’re looking for so it may be worth placing your marketing budget somewhere else.

I’m the CEO & Founder of Stada Media. We’re experts in video production, content creation and management, SEO, PPC, social media, web design and PR. Find out more here.

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HOW TO AVOID MARKETING TRAPS AND CREATE MORE EFFECTIVE CAMPAIGNS

Danny Lacey — Wed, 21 Aug 2019 09:03:57 +0000

We’re all guilty of it. If the content plan is packed to the rafters, we look busy (busy = fabulous) and surely the leads will come flooding in after all this hard work. Right?

Wrong.

Many of us spend far too much time on that bit in the middle – creating content for content’s sake and posting it across Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Google AdWords, blogs, TV adverts, radio adverts, press. And if the results aren’t reflecting the amount of work being put in, we just need to work harder, don’t we?

OK. STOP. BREATHE. It’s time to ask what you’re actually trying to achieve.

The most valuable part of any marketing campaign is understanding the audience: Who are they? What is known about them? Are you telling them what they want to know, or what you want to tell them?

Ignore this part of the campaign process at your peril because if your high-value customers are reading Good Housekeeping and shopping at M&S while you’re flooding social media with ‘How to’ videos, no matter how great the content looks to colleagues and clients, it will not engage the audience – if they chance upon it in the first place.

“Too many businesses think about social media in terms of, “We must have a Twitter account. We must have LinkedIn, Instagram etc.” without really thinking about the conversation they’re trying to have with the person at the other end.” – Danny Lacey, CEO & Founder, Stada Media

Understand the audience

Begin working on more effective campaigns by taking the time to research and understand your audiences. Build buyer personas to focus messaging and become more targeted in terms of using relevant channels. Personas will evolve over time as more is learned about the people you’re having a conversation with. Very quickly, you’ll find your communications become clear, relevant and timely, and received in a way the audience is comfortable with.

Analyse, analyse, analyse

If the results are looking positive – great, replicate the winning formula quickly for optimum campaign performance. If they’re not looking so positive, examine how the audience is reacting. Are there a lot of likes on social media but no action? Is it clear what the call to action is? Is this actually the right audience to target or channel to use? Constant evaluation is needed, at least on a weekly basis, to make those little adjustments that can make a huge overall difference to a campaign.

Be less busy and more effective

By using research and analysis it’s possible to join the dots and figure out what to say, who to say it to, and where their attention is. Less time can be spent on the number of communications and more time spent on the quality messaging that will strike a chord with customers and lead to a fruitful, long term relationship.

I’m the CEO & Founder of video production agency Stada Media. We’re experts in video production, content creation, SEO, PPC, social media, web design and PR. Want more effective campaigns? Let’s talk! Find out more here.

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7 SALES TRICKS THAT HAVE RESULTED IN NEW REVENUE FOR THE BUSINESS

Danny Lacey — Wed, 24 Jul 2019 14:18:12 +0000

Finding new clients for your business can be incredibly hard. Time-consuming. Full of rejection. Soul destroying.

A lot of entrepreneurs hide behind the u201cthe economy is strugglingu201d, u201cbusinesses arenu2019t spending any moreu201d wall of doubt and lack of confidence when it comes to selling. Let me tell you, there are plenty of prospects out there for your business u2013 youu2019re just not looking in the right places.

I wanted to share a few sales tricks Iu2019ve used over the years to help find and persuade new clients to use our services. u00a0

Sometimes, you have to think differently to get what you want.

1. Do stuff for free to grab their attention

No, I hear you cry. YES! If you are struggling for sales right now and work is a little light on the ground. Get off your backside and go find a business you want to call your client u2013 and wow them with some free stuff. If you can bespoke it to their business, even better.

There were several businesses we wanted to work for and so I found the name of the owner and we created short animated versions of their logo u2013 for FREE. I sent it to them, letting them have unlimited use of the logo with absolutely no strings attached.

This resulted in a few new clients!

2. Youu2019re looking for the wrong people in the business

Wanting to work for a big organisation? Donu2019t waste your time trying to contact the more senior members of the board or team. You wonu2019t get very far very fast.

Instead, look for account executives, marketing executives, new employees, and other employees slightly further down the corporate food chain. Most of the time they are the ones with the most influence when it comes to looking for new suppliers. Youu2019ll stand a better chance of building strong relationships too.

We work with lots of agencies and I will always contact an account manager or executive in the first instance u2013 theyu2019re the ones looking after their clientsu2019 projects and budgets and theyu2019ll be the ones making the decisions.

3. Strategic partnerships

Find other businesses that want to offer even more value to their own clients and see if thereu2019s any synergy there with what you offer. You scratch mine and Iu2019ll scratch yours type of thing.

For example, a graphic designer might want to offer video to their clients and so theyu2019re looking for an affordable and reliable video company to take this kind of work on. Maybe they donu2019t even realise that this is a possible new revenue and value stream and they need someone like you to inform them.

4. Donu2019t waste your time with networking events

Controversial I know. But, Iu2019ve said it now. Iu2019ve been to countless networking events, drank countless cups of tea, exchanged (and binned) hundreds upon hundreds of business cards from lawyers, accountants, financial advisors, photographers, printers, etc., and stood in a room feeling incredibly awkward trying to muscle in on little groups of business folk chatting about, I donu2019t know what.

Youu2019ll spend way too much time trying to find everyone else business and lose time to concentrate on your own sales pipeline.

I get many spam emails every day for the latest, newest, biggest and best networking events (quote-unquote). Delete.

Stop. Save your energy.

Go to business events like exhibitions, talks, workshops, etc. Youu2019ll have more success (and fun) there.

5. Be a thought leader and own your industry

Stop hiding your knowledge and expertise. Itu2019s time to show the world just how much you know, how valuable your knowledge is and that you are the go-to person in your industry.

We are living in the age of content, my friends. Itu2019s also the most powerful tool for Search Engine Optimisation.

Write blog posts, record short videos and share on your website and social media. As much as you possibly can. Make it relevant and informative and under no circumstances try to oversell!!

Trust me, Google (and other search engines) will love you for this.

6. Itu2019s right under your nose

Look at your current client list. Spend time looking at what you have done for them in the past, think back to past conversations and pick up on any issues they are having. Then figure out what else you can be doing to help them grow their business even more. u00a0

They call it u201cup-sellingu201d, I like to say itu2019s delivering more value.

Weu2019ve been producing videos for our clients for years and now weu2019ve started offering a wider content marketing service u2013 a) to help them get a bigger audience for their video investment and b) to help them find their ideal prospects through other online and offline channels. Giving them everything under one roof.

This is paying off significantly for the business.

7. Be the quickest out of the gate

Do you receive many inbound sales inquiries? Are you tagged in many posts on LinkedIN (and other channels) for people looking for suppliers?

Yes?

Make sure you reply within 5 or 10 minutes! Especially for inbound emails or forms from your website. Always and forever. Youu2019ll be amazed at the results and your prospect will be VERY grateful for your quick response as their time is very precious. This is a great first impression and could be the deciding factor in you winning the world over the other handful of suppliers they have contacted.

And hereu2019s one more as a bonus…….. u00a0

8. Get busy on LinkedIN

Weu2019ve had the MOST sales success via LinkedIN and I could do a whole post on the many sales tricks I use to grab the attention of prospective clients. However, I donu2019t want to give too many of my secrets away.u00a0

I will say, direct messages or InMail on LinkedIN is a massively powerful tool for building and nurturing relationships with potential new clients and you should be focusing as much of your time on this as possible.

Donu2019t be tight, sign up for the Premium account (itu2019s currently u00a339.99 per month) and follow these instructions:

1.u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0Make a list of the businesses you would dearly love to call a client

2.u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0Now find the desired contact at that business

3.u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0Spend at LEAST 20 minutes researching the business and that person (social media etc). This IS NOT about volume!

4.u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0Write a direct message that is at least 50% bespoke to that person and contains info about their business u2013 keep it light and personable and do not try to sell sell sell here!

5.u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0Offer them value u2013 a freebie maybe?

6.u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0Show them that you are credible, trustworthy and reliable.

7.u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0Follow them on all social media and add a few comments/likes to some of their posts (gets your name in front of them)

8.u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0Be patient and do not hound them

Hope you find these helpful and if you have any more to add please do so in the comments below.

Feel free to share this article with your network if you found it useful. And, email me if you think I’ve missed any essential sales tricks! You can get me directly at dannylacey@stadamedia.co.uk.

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