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We've been doing marketing consulting
for small business for over 25 years. And as you can see from
the partial list of clients below, we've been the marketing
consultant of record for small business owners in a wide variety of
industries all across the United States and a bit in the EU. Click on the links to learn more about
the company's marketing issues, what we did and what happened as a result. . .
Jacoby & Meyers
Plaintiff's
personal injury law
Teli USA, Inc.
Consumer electronics
Atlanta, GA
VoiceTel of Arizona
Telecommunications
Scottsdale, AZ
Resources Planning Group
Financial planning
South Bend, IN
Sunrise Custom Doors
Custom residential doors
Scottsdale, AZ
TRIMS, Inc.
Software
Scottsdale, AZ
SOUTHtech
Silicon wafer carriers
Tempe, AZ
The University of Phoenix
Adult learning
Phoenix, AZ
Vista Clara Health
Retreat
Health retreat and spa
Galisteo, New
Mexico
Prairie Edge
Plains Indian art and artifacts
Rapid City, SD
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Company: |
Jacoby
& Meyers, Phoenix, AZ |
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Product: |
Plaintiff's Personal Injury |
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Situation: |
An
established brand was disappearing |
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Solution: |
Jacoby &
Meyers is what is known as an "advertising law firm." That is, a
firm that provides legal services to lower to middle income people
and attracts its market by advertising on television and outdoor.
The firm hadn't changed their marketing approach in several years
and, as a result, watched their business shrink each year for
three long years. We recommended a radical new advertising
strategy and, to our utter amazement, the partners agreed to try
it. We completely scrapped the traditional positioning model
(showing a lawyer trying to look sincere, professional and tough,
or using testimonials) and created a blue bulldog cartoon
character for easy recall and to represent a more accessible firm,
added a jingle to boost recall even more and introduced a 25%
discount fee as their unique selling proposition. In a no
growth/slow growth industry their business increased 62% the first
year. We then assisted the partners in a name change to
Petersen Johnson. Their revenues went down, as we knew they
would, but we were able to minimize the decrease and build the
business back up by keeping the bulldog, jingle and 25% discount
fee. In the year of their name change business went up 31%. This
represented a return to their height as Jacoby & Meyers, a
recognizable, established brand, in just 10 months.
They then fired us in search of a firm they thought could give
them more media buying experience (go figure. . .lawyers!).
After two years of absolutely no growth they hired us back.
We grew their revenues 18% the first year back and are now helping
them add bankruptcy and criminal practices to their personal
injury practice.
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Company: |
Scottsdale Seminars, Scottsdale, AZ |
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Product: |
Corporate
Training |
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Situation: |
After
conducting over 3,000 seminars for a national training company,
Jonathan Clark had gone out on his own to promote his own
seminars. He wanted help growing his business with larger
organizations. His previous marketing attempts had not generated
results. |
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Solution: |
We
recommended he not compete with other, larger training
organizations by promoting the many types of seminars he was
capable of presenting, But rather, we created a strategy where he
led with his strongest, most unique seminar, business writing
skills. We developed a multiple-step direct mail and
telephone prospecting program targeting companies with 500+
employees. We do all the implementation; Jonathan simply approves
copy and design and sends the checks. Even though only the first
three of five steps have been implemented, his business grew 80%,
generating $8 for every $1 spent on marketing.
Within
four weeks after September 12, 2001 over 90% of his customers
canceled all their planned seminars. Jonathan was
essentially out of business. We continued to market to
existing customers, albeit on a smaller scale, and gradually
earned back every canceled seminar. We "hung in there,"
become more active on-line, have introduced his training on CD
and this year his business in on track to surpass pre-9/11 levels
by 50%.
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Company: |
CDC
Pools, Gilbert, AZ |
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Situation: |
CDC Pools
renovates pool interiors and decking. They also build fire places
and pits and barbeques to enhance a backyard. Their primary
customer was pool contractors (wholesale). They wanted to
decrease the number of contractor customers and increase the
number of direct customers (pool owners, or retail). |
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Solution: |
Pool owners get
multiple quotes before they make a decision. They typical
assumption is they do so because they're looking for quality and
price. Our homework showed that while quality and price are
important, they shop because they need to educate themselves and
find a company they can trust. We recommended CDC go with a
quality/information/trust positioning. That is, they do their
best to educate people in every marketing contact, never
over-promise, be straight with people and only sell one thing:
quality. Consequently, their marketing materials are instructive
(do's and don'ts, how-to's, "if you were my brother-in-law here's
what I'd tell you") and straightforward, never attempting to be
persuasive (here are your choices, here are the pros and cons, you
decide).
To deliver this somewhat unusual
message we selected fairly traditional means: home shows; color
ads in a local home decor magazine; and post cards. We also
recommended an aggressive "grassroots" campaign of sending a
personal letter to 100 neighbors of selected jobs, complete with a
photo embedded in the letter and testimonial from the pool owner.
We supported all these efforts with a net-based identity that made
responding to the traditional marketing easy and delivered lots of
information:
www.redoyourpool.com. We put
their URL on everything, including trucks and yard signs, and have
a paid link on the home improvement page of the largest local
portal site.
The results have been gratifying.
Simply put, they had two crews when they hired us. Now they
have five.
If you live in Phoenix and need to
redo your pool, you will find no better, more honest,
straightforward company to work with.
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Company: |
CIS,
Phoenix, AZ |
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Product: |
Enterprise
software system for publishers |
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Situation: |
Owner
wanted to grow faster than his referrals were taking him. |
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Solution: |
We created
and assisted in the implementation of the first formal,
disciplined marketing effort the company had in its 17 history.
We refined their message and designed a prospecting system that
targeted ALL five potential decision-makers inside publishers.
Software sales increased by 65% as a result.
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Company: |
Teli
USA, Inc., Atlanta, GA |
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Product: |
Consumer
telephones and fax machines. |
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Situation: |
Swedish
company entering U.S. market required marketing strategy and plan. |
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Solution: |
Developed
marketing plans for entry into the U.S. consumer electronics
industry for the company's Swedish-made telephones and entry into
the U.S. office equipment industry for their facsimile equipment (Teli
AB, Stockholm, Sweden). The consumer electronics plan included rep
selection and roll out strategy by retailer type. While the
company achieved first year sales of $5 million, their consumer
telephone division was ultimately closed down due to consumer
price resistance. While we identified this problem prior to
launch, Teli AB was not able to attain low enough manufacturing
costs in Sweden to adjust their retail prices. Their office
equipment division has since been acquired by the Gestetner
Corporation.
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Company: |
VoiceTel of Arizona, Scottsdale, AZ |
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Product: |
Integrated
Voice Messaging |
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Situation: |
Owner
wanted to increase sales, thought he needed to hire more
salespeople. |
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Solution: |
We interviewed his salespeople, customers and individuals who had
been presented to, but who had not bought. We found his
salespeople were doing what they were trained to do, but that as a
result, they were making ineffective presentations to too many
unqualified prospects. We recommended he reduce his sales staff by
50%, take the prospecting responsibility away from his
salespeople, develop a direct mail prospecting program instead and
direct the face-to-face sales presentations toward a customized
need satisfaction approach.
As a result , sales from new customers increased 400% and his cost
of sales went from "I don't even want to know about it" to 10%
(for every $1 of prospecting cost he generated $10 in sales).
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Company: |
Resources Planning Group, South Bend, IN |
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Product: |
Financial
planning for individuals able to invest a minimum of $100,000. |
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Situation: |
A father
was turning the business over to his sons and expanding the
business regionally. He consequently wanted a form of prospecting
that does not rely on referrals. |
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Solution: |
We
discovered their exclusive target market relies very heavily on
referrals in selecting their financial planner. With this primary
method not available to us, we designed a very subtle marketing
program that attempted to duplicate the impact of a referral. This
system pulled a 6% response from a cautious market that gets
heavily prospected for financial products.
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Company: |
Sunrise
Custom Doors , Scottsdale, AZ |
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Product: |
Custom
residential and commercial doors. |
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Situation: |
New owner
wanted to grow the business in a declining local market. |
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Solution: |
We
recommended he stop pouring money into the Phoenix market and
start focusing on other, healthier markets. We helped him trim
local advertising, hire salespeople in two new states and created
a brochure that made his company look much bigger than it was.
Sales increased 500% over a two year period.
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Company: |
TRIMS,
Inc., Scottsdale, AZ |
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Product: |
Grounds
maintenance software. |
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Situation: |
18 month
old company struggling to introduce new software. |
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Solution: |
We
repositioned the company's entire marketing effort away from
software after discovering potential users were not comfortable
using computers. We focused solely on the benefits of reduced
paperwork and allowing more time spent outdoors maintaining the
grounds or golf course. We developed a two step mailing program
that pulled a 16% response for information requests and a 20%
closing ratio (the software costs $1,000). The company sold 76
systems in five months, after selling 23 systems their first 18
months in business.
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Company: |
SOUTHtech, Tempe, AZ |
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Product: |
Silicon
Carbide Wafer Carriers. |
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Situation: |
The
company has a patented manufacturing process that allows the
custom manufacture of wafer carriers at standard prices. |
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Solution: |
After interviewing their salespeople and customers we determined
the company had "lost its focus" by burying the one key reason
people perceive them as unique in with several benefits that all
their competitors tout. The result was they appeared too similar
to their much better known competition. We simply had their
salespeople re- focus on their single unique factor, re-focused
their printed material on this factor and increased the number of
contacts they were making on prospective customers.
The result was a 400% increase in bids for new business and a 40%
increase in business from new customers.
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Company: |
The
University of Phoenix, Phoenix, AZ |
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Product: |
Adult
degree programs. |
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Situation: |
Fast-growth company wanted marketing plan to support more growth
at their eight campuses outside Arizona. |
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Solution: |
Developed
marketing plans for graduate and undergraduate business degree
programs, and graduate and undergraduate nursing degree programs.
In response to our recommendations, the corporation restructured
their internal marketing function, broadened their target market
definition, and implemented a customer contact program to better
anticipate the changing needs of their customers. The plans
created a step-by-step process that improved their 12 month
forecasted growth by $6 million.
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Company: |
Vista
Clara Health Retreat & Spa, Galisteo, New Mexico |
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Product: |
Premium
health spa. |
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Situation: |
Startup
high end spa ($4,500 per person per week). |
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Solution: |
We
developed a very aggressive, yet low key prospecting system. That
is, one designed to attract a large number of inquiries quickly,
but make the prospect feel they "discovered" this exclusive spa
themselves. We created and implemented a highly personal direct
mail program that generated over 3,000 inquiries in four months
from the super wealthy market segment. The spa enjoyed initial
bookings three times above the industry average for new spa
openings.
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Company: |
Prairie
Edge, Rapid City, SD |
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Product: |
Plains
Indian art and artifacts. |
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Situation: |
Owner
wanted to grow sales in his two galleries and catalog. |
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Solution: |
We
correctly identified a key reason people buy this type of art:
They connect with the story behind the individual piece, or the
legends it honors, versus its specific visual aspects. We
retrained the gallery personnel and highlighted the legends behind
each piece in the galleries. We developed a direct mail program,
"The Prairie Edge Ledgers", that also highlighted the legends for
catalog customers. We also created a very personal follow-up
system designed to help people buy from the galleries "long
distance," because the majority of their galleries' business was
one-time purchases from tourists. Gallery sales increased 48% in
the first 12 months of the program.
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Our
Mission 
