Use Photos as Part of your Marketing Arsenal

Photos should be important parts of your marketing. The photos
are useful

- to document your offers

- to achieve positive acceptance of what you are displaying

- to function as eye catchers

- to bring the buyers in a general positive mood

- to create identification with the use of your product.

In such a way photographic pictures have other functions
than creative art and illustrations that aren’t
photographic pictures.

At the same time it is important to acknowledge, that
pictures are not selling your offers isolated. It is your
copy that sells your service or goods.

In many cases you will need professional looking photos of your products. If possible go for a professional photographer. These photos will enhance your product much better than your own photos.

If you have to do your own photography, use a good digital camera and take plenty of pictures with a simple background. White or blue is often the best background with smaller items. Only use the very best photo of each item, and keep a unifying style of photos displayed at the same webpage.

In between these options you might know a friend or a young person who is much occupied with photography. Such a person might be able to do the job for you with a better result than yourself and at a much lesser expense than the professional photographer.

If you can get good looking models to show the use of your product, include such photos.
If you can’t get such persons avoid such pictures.

Your marketing will often benefit from other photos than the product photos, too.

In some cases the so-called free clip art will do the work for you.
Especially with small print runs and local distribution of
your advertisement. But in larger professional work you
should definitely go for stock photos from pro picture
agencies and photo libraries.

There are many advantages of the photo libraries:
- The pictures in a photo library are not used by ‘every’
business, so the money spend on each photo give your work
some image of exclusivity.

- You will have access to huge quantities of high quality
photos.

- You will have professional support for your requests and
ideas of the images in mind.

- You will have the possibility to contact specialist
picture agencies when an expertise in the field of your products is needed.

Nowadays many stock agencies have online picture galleries. Some offer licensed stock photos, other offer royalty-free photos, and some stock photo agencies offer both.

Be aware of that the typical picture agency only has a
limited selection of the pictures online accessible for
your search. So supplement your picture research by asking
the picture editors of the photo agency to help expand your
choices.

In conclusion, be critical aware of the function of your copy, your product photos and the other photos at your website and try to make the best interaction between these tools in your marketing arsenal.

Get help from Soren Breiting to find ideas for your online marketing at http://www.ALLeMarketingTips.com and receive the latest really useful tips at http://www.StockPhotoNews.com (about pictures and marketing). Soren has written more than 20 printed books, and countless articles in journals and magazines about his special fields of interest. He is widely published on the web, too. Enjoy Soren’s wonderful stock photos at: http://www.azFOTOS.com

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What Exactly Is Podcasting

Podcasting is simply a new way to distribute audio and video files to listeners.

Ipod + Broadcasting = Podcasting

The “pod” in podcasting refers to Apple’s iPod digital music player, but an Ipod is not needed to listen to podcasts. A podcast can be listened to on any device capable of downloading and playing media files.

The most common devices used include ipod’s, other MP3 Players, PDA’s, Cell Phones, and PSP’s. Podcasts can also be listen to directly from your computer or streaming off the internet.

Podcasting is not just downloading media files off the web.

There’s more to it. Much more.

Listeners subscribe to a podcast show. Then special software periodically checks to see if any new podcasts are available. If a new show has been created, the software automatically downloads the audio file to the subscribers PC or directly to a portable media player such as an Apple iPod.

In this sense, podcasting is like “Tivo” for internet audio and video. In fact, Tivo now supports Podcasting.

Podcasting is quickly becoming a major media force. With stations like ESPN and Disney now publishing podcasts on a regular basis, it won’t be long before it’s mainstream to the public.
So who started this monster?

Podcasting has evolved to what it is today because of a number of different technologies coming together.

Portable media players, MP3’s, RSS 2.0, podcatcher software and the popularity of high speed internet all play a big part in making podcasting possible.

Podcasting as we know it today can be traced back to two podfathers.

Adam Curry and software developer Dave Winer are credited with developing Podcasting as it’s heard on MP3 players around the world today.

Adam Curry developed a program called ipodder that allowed him to automatically download internet radio broadcasts directly on his portable MP3 Player.

Dave Winer heavily promoted RSS (Really Simple Syndication), mainly used by bloggers and news-like sites to syndicate their content to RSS-aware programs called news aggregators. Curry and Winer then developed a way to send media files through RSS feeds.

So how can you begin podcasting?

It’s easy. In the most basic form you have 3 steps.

1. Record your audio and convert it to an MP3

2. Create a simple text file called an RSS 2.0 feed that describes your file

3. Upload your MP3 and RSS 2.0 text file to the web.

Head over to http://www.podcastalley.com and check out some podcasts and see what others are currently doing in the world of podcasting.

If you think you might have a show in mind don’t hesitate to get started. Podcasting is still in it’s early stages. You can quickly have a worldwide audience for your show.

Keith DeSantis author of the free mini course “The 7 Most Powerful Benefits Of Podcasting” and the world’s first Podcasting Home Study Course http://www.PodcastingSuperstarSecrets.com

Copywrite 2006 “Real Business Ventures”

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Business Podcast Marketing Case Study Proves Results

Business Podcast Marketing Case Study Shows How Podcasting Delivers Dramatic Results for Client. Podcasting has significant business marketing potential. If the business podcast strategy and online visibility plan is properly executed; podcasting has the potential to be a marketing tool that delivers great marketing results.

The professional business marketers over at marketingsherpa.com have just released a new case study titled “How to Use a Podcast to Promote a White Paper That Generates New Business Sales Leads”.
This case study is about how Bearing Point used podcasting to promote a white paper and saw sign up rates of over 30% versus a traditional 10%. This is a 200% increase over traditional marketing techniques.

Here is a short excerpt: “Dunay wasn’t sure if the podcasts would be a hit or not, especially as his key prospects tend to be fairly conservative. So he didn’t roll out trumpets and strobe lights for the launch.

Instead, the team posted the podcasts and announcements at several related sites including http://www.Podblaze.com, http://www.FreshPodcasts.com, and iTunes (all of which currently promote podcasts for free.) They also rolled out a press release and an email announcement to the house list. Their first podcast launched quietly July 29, 2005.

RESULTS

Joy and exultation! Hundreds of executives downloaded the podcasts. Dunay had hoped that 10% of podcast listeners would respond to the white paper download offer. Instead, 30% did…”

This is a great example of how marketing professionals should and could be using podcasting to help their business. This is the future of podcasting, Podcasting is going to become a marketing tool that communicates, educates and drives listeners to action. In this case the action was to download a white paper and effectively generate leads.

I have been trying to inform the business markets of this trend for the past 9 months. I discussed this very scenario in a Podcasting White Paper that was released a few months back. Read the full case study at http://www.MarketingSherpa.com

Experienced online marketing professionals that have expertise in the areas of podcast production, strategy, and visibility such as http://www.LeveragedPromotion.com can help your business achieve these same levels of results. Just creating a podcast in a vacuum of space is the wrong strategy. Make sure that you achieve maximum exposure for your podcasts so that they can deliver measurable marketing results.

Copyright 2005 Rodney Rumford

Rodney Rumford has over 18 years of experience in the technology field. He has held management positions in Marketing, Business Dev, Enterprise Consulting, Sales and Engineering.

He does corporate consulting in the areas of RSS & Podcasting strategy, execution and marketing. He has developed software solutions in the areas of RSS Feeds, Podcasting and PPC Advertising. He is the CEO of The Info Guru LLC., which operates several web properties that include: http://www.podblaze.com

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