http://www.blog.totalmarketingsolutions.co.uk Total Marketing Solutions is a specialist marketing consultancy whose purpose is to help the owners of small and medium sized companies achieve their business objectives for growth in sales and profitability. In short, we help business owners deliver results Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:56:35 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en It seems that you can't avoid emails or blog posts on how to survive in a downturn at the moment. Now I'm a positive person so all this 'noise' on this subject to me can come across as just more negative sentiment that is having the effect of becoming a ... http://www.blog.totalmarketingsolutions.co.uk/2008/11/21/everybody-is-offering-advice-on-marketing-in-a-downturn-pt-1/ Following on from the previous post (Time for marketing to drive growth?) which shows that marketing becomes even more important in difficult times, it's interesting to see how businesses are reacting in different ways. Marks & Spencer have announced that they're cutting their marketing spend by 20% following a huge ... http://www.blog.totalmarketingsolutions.co.uk/2008/11/05/how-cutting-advertising-spend-could-help-marketing-budgets/ A recent article pubished by Deloitte has highlighted the fact that more and more CEO's are now turning to marketing to deliver growth in this difficult economic climate. Malcolm Williamson, head of Deloitte's marketing effectiveness team, stated: "As market conditions deteriorate, growth is like gold dust. Our research has found that ... http://www.blog.totalmarketingsolutions.co.uk/2008/10/15/time-for-marketing-to-drive-growth/ When was the last time you took a good, long look at your website? It's a process we're undertaking ourselves at TMS, having realized that our own site was in need of a little attention. So we recognize that we aren't perfect, but when did you last visit your own ... http://www.blog.totalmarketingsolutions.co.uk/2008/10/01/digital-marketing-does-your-website-need-a-little-tlc/ Are you starting to feel the effects of the credit crunch? For your business, will it be a storm in a teacup, or the end of the civilized world as we know it? Whatever your opinion, take a look at few simple suggestions on how to market your business more ... http://www.blog.totalmarketingsolutions.co.uk/2008/09/24/if-the-credit-crunch-is-starting-to-bite-then-chew-on-this/ What's the one thing really worth keeping when you're in business? Yup, your customers, of course. It might seem blindingly obvious but this small yet rather crucial point in our experience is surprisingly overlooked by many companies, both large and small.In a recent post by John Jantsch of Duck Tape ... http://www.blog.totalmarketingsolutions.co.uk/2008/09/18/customer-retention-once-youve-got-em-keep-em/ Sometimes two inter-connected stories hit the press on the same day and even the least cynical amongst us must cock an eyebrow in a conspiracy-theory-sort-of-way. Well today is one of those days - firstly it emerges that a computer with personal details of more than one million people (including their account ... http://www.blog.totalmarketingsolutions.co.uk/2008/08/26/what-is-personal-data-worth/ If life is starting to get a little tougher for you now, then perhaps now is the time to break the mould and redefine how you do business. It's easy to get stuck in a rut with familiar marketing techniques that have worked well for you in the past, ... http://www.blog.totalmarketingsolutions.co.uk/2008/07/30/marketing-strategy-when-the-going-gets-tough-the-tough-get-creative/ There are still a great many people even within the marketing community who have not yet really grasped why social media should now be an essential and integral part of the way in which they 'go-to-market' with their business. In the following 'colourful' presentation, Marta Kagan makes the argument quite ... http://www.blog.totalmarketingsolutions.co.uk/2008/07/25/social-media-why-should-we-be-bothered-about-this/ Back in the old days, that is the 1990's, when Altavista used to rank web page content solely according to its relevance to the user's query, bless 'em, life seemed so much simpler somehow. Since the arrival of Google's algorithm, content is ranked according to 0ff-the-page elements as much as, ... http://www.blog.totalmarketingsolutions.co.uk/2008/07/09/online-marketing-consultancy-tips-the-spooky-side-of-seo/