In an earlier post, I reported that it was great to see the Gen Y kids driving the tremendous outpouring of financial support for Haiti relief via texting.

I’m happy to report that the American Red Cross “Text ‘Haiti’ to 90999″ campaign has raised $24 million to date. See the DMNews story here.

Think about this campaign for a moment. It has achieved some amazing accomplishments – in a short period of time – since this devastating earthquake hit Haiti just last week on January 12th:

• $24 million has been raised via $10 individual donations to help the Haitian people – 1/5th of the amount the American Red Cross has raised to date – breaking all records by a huge  margin.  Reference note: After Hurricane Katrina – a mere 4.5 years ago – the ARC only received $120,000 via texting – and Katrina occurred on American soil!
• The ARC has built a valuable mobile text database for future marketing communications and financial appeal efforts
• The ARC’s core donor base skews older and texting gave the Gen Y folks an easy, quick and convenient channel to offer their support (marketing lesson – treat different people differently)
• The campaign execution of  the ARC and its mobile firm partner mGive was flawless – amazing too – considering the fact that they started to work on the texting campaign the evening of the earthquake
• The viral goodwill spread of the “Text ‘HAITI’ to 90999″ campaign in Social Media channels such as YouTube, Facebook and Twitter (100K tweets/retweets)

If you think young people these days are inconsiderate, selfish, concerned with only themselves and wear their “pants on the ground“…think again.

Soon after the devastating Haiti earthquake hit, @RedCross tweeted: “You can text “HAITI” to 90999 to donate $10 to Red Cross relief efforts in #haiti.”

Kudos to the Red Cross marketing folks for being prepared (excellent online disaster newsroom) and recognizing the fundraising opportunity available to them in this terrible time of crisis.

And, much more kudos to the kids that drove this “texting bus” because they’re the ones credited with leading this Red Cross effort which has raised over $10 million for the cause since this record breaking mobile fundraiser was launched last Tuesday.

This is a great example of using technology to build rather than destroy.

Watch text marketing grow from this effort and put in on your list of things to test for your business too!

P.S.: Here is a list of 8 ways you can help Haiti by texting:

1. Text HAITI to 90999 to donate $10 to the American Red Cross
2. Text HAITI to 25383 to donate $5 to International Rescue Committee
3. Text HAITI to 45678 to donate $5 to the Salvation Army in Canada
4. Text HAITI to 20222 to donate $10 through the Clinton Foundation
5. Text HAITI to 864833 to donate $5 to The United Way
6. Text CERF to 90999 to donate $5 to The United Nations Foundation
7. Text DISASTER to 90999 to donate $10 to Compassion International
8. Text RELIEF to 30644 (to connect with Catholic Relief Services who will instruct you how to donate money with your credit card)

…the 9th way to help is to pray.

During recessionary times, the first place people cut back is with their eating and drinking out dollars.

Sure, there is a progression. First, white table cloth restaurants are the first to feel the pinch, then casual, fast casual and then fast food.

After a scorching sales tear for some time, McDonald’s is now considering a $1.00 breakfast menu nationwide.

With unemployment at 10.2%, no one is safe.

Now it appears that people are buying less at the supermarket.

More are using shopping lists, feel prices are to high, hate the experience and nearly 8 out of 10 would flip brands on a deal! Loyalty be damned.

The restaurant and hospitality industry isn’t the only one suffering – every industry is suffering and only the smart, speedy and strong will survive. So, what can you do to succeed in these tough times?

Here are five marketing ideas to put on your shopping list that will help you survive and thrive in these tough times.

1. Do remarkable things that add value and drive word-of-mouth. Pretty simple statement, easy to understand, but so few do it. So, you do it. Positive word-of-mouth drives customer referrals, online reviews and media coverage while keeping your marketing costs low. Do something remarkably well.

Value offerings for specific reasons make sense (e.g., Anniversaries), but you need to watch it because deals are so easily copied and it’s difficult to move to higher prices when times get better.

You need to work on creating unique value priced offerings. People are re-thinking all of their purchases, so if you’re not truly giving value or a exceptional experience you better start. This requires packaging creativity and more customer focus.

List all the possible value-added services and amenities you offer and then look for ways to improve your customer’s experience for little or no cost to you.

If you’re in hospitality you could offer things such as free parking, free upgrades, late check-outs, drink certificates etc., and look to your marketing partenrs to help defray the costs.

Deliver value in creative unique packaged experiences.

If you’re average player in a today’s recessionary economy, you’re running backwards and you’re a loser.

2. Keep the Heat On. If you’re out of sight, you’re out of mind. Don’t just arbitrarily cut your advertising, but look for ways to more effectively spend or not spend it.  Get into social media marketing, improve  the search results of your web site, network.  Create stronger, more emotional appeals for your goods and services.

3. Strengthen Your Customer Relationships. Strengthen your sales force and put together win-back and retention strategies. Work to maximize the lifetime value of your key customers and integrate all of your communication messages into relevant targeted appeals.

4. Build a Centralized Segmented Marketing Database. The bedrock of all customer relationship management strategies is a unified, centralized and segmented marketing database. Fortunately, it’s easier than ever to set up and manage a CRM system today.

5. Become a Direct Marketing Master. Direct marketing needs to take a greater role in your business plan whether it be direct sales, email, mail, phone etc., The most effective weapon is email marketing to current customers (but smartly segment them).

This is a good list to follow, but make sure you do not skip the first step!

Bravo and May God Bless Them!

It’s amazing how real visuals and a simple clear message presented in a personal and fun way can drive results.

I sure hope this isn’t a one time gig for the Catholic Church.

Just goes to show you that if business as usual isn’t building your business you need to take a different approach.

I’d love to know how it did for business. It’s certainly driving word of mouth buzz

P.S.: But wait there’s more from this new book about the history of infomercials.

 Life's a Pitch and Then You Buy!

I enjoyed reading this article in the LA Times about Billy Mays whose loud, enthusiastic, direct response pitches for brands such as OxiClean, Kaboom and more have made this Pittsburgh native a millionaire and "the most successful direct-response
salesman in TV history."

As a marketer, I've followed guys like Mays and Ron Popiel (even read his book) and I've admired how they can sell! Mays' deliver is always interesting to me, although his loud voice upsets my wife – I know what he does works because of the number of products he represents – net, he'd not be on the air if he wasn't moving products. And, now Mays' is starring in a realith show called "Pitchmen" which debuts April 15th on the Discovery Channel.

The lesson Mays, Popiel and others like them have mastered is something you can too.  It's something you learned way back in Kindergarten and that's the skill of "Show and Tell."

Successful pitchmen like Mays knows that if you can repeatedly demonstrate clearly and consistently (hears wears the same outfit in every pitch) why your product or service works better than others you will win more sales – simple as that.

The next time you go on a sales call, make sure you're prepared to Show and Tell Well!

I guarantee you'll close more business than if you simply "Telled Well!"

E-mail is now the most popular form of direct response marketing, per a new
survey of large U.S. corporations conducted by Direct Partners, New York.

E-mail is used primarily by 35% of companies compared to 25% which use
traditional direct mail and 21% who use package, statement stuffers or free
standing inserts

This research ties-in to research conducted last fall from
MarketingSherpa, where participants reported that "house e-mail marketing"
delivered the best return-on-investment in terms of direct response.

Caught this article in Ad Age, Sampling: the New Mass Medium. It’s a good article to read to inspire you to build a sampling program for your brand.

Sampling has been around a long time, but it has come a long way.  You see it in Supermarkets,  Costco and more brands seem to be baking it into their marketing plans.

Even huge mass media brands such as McDonald’s, Dunkin’ Donuts and Coca-Cola are doing it big time and treating it as a media buy.

In tough economic times, freebies are apprecoated by consumers and its a less expensive way for Marketers to get their messages out, sample products and generate trial and word of mouth buzz.

Scott
Thurston, president of Street Sampling, says that a giveaway of 50,000 samples
would require 250 man hours translating to between $15,000 and $20,000
for labor. The company can then add on publicity stunts, promotional
vehicles and the like. Compare that with $335,000 to produce a
30-second spot, according to a 2006 study conducted by the American
Association of Advertising Agencies, and somewhere between $100,000 to
$250,000 to run that spot during most prime-time network TV shows.

Sampling provides brands with a quality impression and its accountable too.

McDonald’s is doing it big-time.  For example, it has sampled its Chicken strips a few years ago, Southern-Style chicken biscuit and Southern-Style chicken sandwich and McSkillet burrito.

Compared to discounting over the long term, sampling actually builds brand equity.

Try it, you’ll like it and so will your customers.