Inside the Envelope

If you're planning to introduce a new product into the market, here are a few tips to help you create a likeable product name that will also be relevant and memorable: Choose an expressive name that describes what the product does. Avoid acronyms. Give your product a full name, and use brief acronyms internally only. Consider naming similar products together as a family. For example, Apple's operating systems have used similar names such as Panther, Jaguar, Leopard, and Lion. If you have a tiered product line (good, better, best), name your products accordingly to show order of ranking. Add a prefix or suffix to a common name, such as the iPhone, iPad, and iPod. Choose a name that gives people a mental image of the benefits your product provides or how it works. Select a name that is easy to pronounce. If your audience can't pronounce it, they likely won't remember it. Creatively change the spelling of a real word. The popular cereals Kix and Trix are good...

Most of us are familiar with the infamous "to do" list. We dutifully populate the list with task after task that needs to get done. But we're never sure where to start. There are only so many hours in a day, and all the tasks need to get done. We can't fit a square peg in a round hole, and even if we stayed awake 24 hours, we wouldn't be able to finish all the tasks on our list. When faced with this dilemma, most of us are ready to tear up the task list and just wing it. A better option might be to use the Elimination Technique instead. What is the Elimination Technique? It's a method to help narrow your focus. It starts with a series of questions to ask to begin eliminating options to get to what is most important. Take a look at your current task list and ask the following questions: What tasks take more time than I have available? Are there tasks that don't have to be done today? Are there tasks that can be automated? What tasks can be...

Years ago, many companies lived by a "once a customer, always a customer" philosophy. However, in today's competitive business world full of endless choices and tempting opportunities, customers can be easily lured to a competitor even if they're happy with your products or services. Here are a few tips to help you show inactive customers they're missed and invite them back: Create a postcard, self-mailer, or email with a message such as "we haven't seen you around lately, and we miss you!" Be sure to thank customers for their previous business and include an apology for falling out of touch. Consider having the owner or president of your company reach out, showing the customer's importance to your business. Provide an attractive offer, such as an X dollar off coupon, free shipping, BOGO (buy one get one), a value-added bonus, or a percentage discount to help make their decision to return easier. Provide a quick reminder of why customer...

Productivity and time management go hand in hand. If you're feeling inefficient, STOP and give this quick four-step method a try. S ee your objectives clearly. If you don't know where you're going, how can you possibly know the best way to get there? Take a few minutes to identify your goal and the steps you must take to reach it. T arget the issues you're facing and the reasons behind what you're doing. Analyze your current course of action to determine if it's the most efficient and effective way to reach your goal. O rganize your options. Ask yourself if there are any faster but equally effective ways you could be doing what you're doing. Even seemingly small things can make a big impact on your efficiency. P lan your work -- and work your plan. Start to put the things you uncovered in the previous steps into action. You might be surprised just how much more productive -- and happy -- you feel.

You've probably heard the phrase "tactics vs. strategy" countless times. People love tactics. Tactics can be fun and exciting. They're relatively easy to pick up and seem to have magical quick results (at least for a short time). Social media in the form of a few tweets is a classic example of a tactic. But there's a critical part most businesses seem to miss, and it's why tactics often fail in the long run. To be successful, you have to put all the tactics together in a logical and cohesive way to make it all work. That's where strategy comes into play. Without a well thought-out strategic plan, all tactics will ultimately fail. It's not the fault of the tactic that it didn't work. It's the fault of the person behind the tactic who thought it would be the magic pill it didn't turn out to be. A strategy is a plan to get you and your business where you want to go. Without a strategy, you are lost in the Sahara with no com...

Marketing your business can be a nonstop, exhausting task. Here are a few ways to avoid feeling overwhelmed and get the most out of your marketing efforts: Create a SWOT analysis, which is a strategic planning method to evaluate your company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. By identifying and understanding these four areas of your business, you can more easily create a strategy that will distinguish your company from the competition, so you can compete successfully in your market. Hire a talented assistant. An assistant can help you manage your workload, get things done faster, and relieve the stress of looming deadlines. Even a part-time assistant can help you free up time to focus on more important tasks. Find a marketing intern. Interns can provide a lot of value... if you let them. Interns are best utilized to help you reach business goals. For example, consider assigning interns to manage social media accounts, write articles and other blogs to increase...

We've all heard the saying that one bad apple can spoil the bunch. The same is true of negativity in the workplace. A single employee's negative attitude can bring coworkers down and hurt morale. So how can you combat it? Confront the offender. While it may seem easier to ignore a problem and hope it goes away, that rarely works. In fact, the problem usually just keeps getting worse until you have no choice but to act. When you see someone displaying a negative attitude (or hear about it from coworkers), sit the person down and let them know their attitude is not acceptable. Get to the root of the problem. In your meeting, try to discover the cause of the person's dissatisfaction. Perhaps they feel slighted by something that happened at work. They may think someone else received preferential treatment over them or that what they do goes unnoticed and unrecognized. Whatever the case, hear them out and acknowledge their feelings, even if you disagree. Share your own thoug...

In the world of email marketing, many companies are so focused on encouraging people to opt-in or subscribe to their emails that they overlook the wishes of recipients who may want to unsubscribe. If unsubscribing to your messaging is not easy, you run the risk of increased spam complaints and ISP blocking, annoyed customers, and a weakened brand image. More than 40 percent of email recipients click the easier option (the spam button at the top of their email) rather than searching for an unsubscribe link. This occurs most often because many companies hide the link, push it down to the bottom of a message, or purposely blend the "unsubscribe" text into the background. One way to make unsubscribing easier is to place an "unsubscribe" button at the top of your email. In addition to making your unsubscribe button more noticeable, you may also want to offer other options (change email address, change/reduce message frequency, choose different types of message...

When it comes to upselling your product line, a tiered marketing strategy can accelerate the research-buying process for your customers, give you a competitive edge, and increase your bottom line through increased revenue. Here are a few tips to help you take advantage of a tiered selling technique: Provide a comparison chart that outlines various differences and focuses on the most importance benefits to motivate buying. Describe product differences using an emotional appeal rather than technical verbiage. Use descriptive headlines or titles that distinguish between the product service levels. For example, try basic, premium, and ultimate; or fast, faster, and fastest. When displaying in your store, group your products in close proximity to one another, making it easier for customers to comparison shop. Provide upselling options in sales proposals, especially if an RFP asks for minimum or bare bones specifications. You may be surprised how many organizations choose higher pric...