To bag million-dollar sales, home builders depend on identifying personality types. There’s no reason why we can’t learn a thing or two from them. Here’s how they sell:

• The detail hounds want to know every nugget about the home – from the brand of insulation to the caulking in the shower. They analyze every word you say and they’re not afraid to correct you if you slip up. So hit them with the minutia and expect them to take a while to make a decision.
• The family types want to please everyone. They’re concerned with what their loved ones think, and they often change their minds based on others. Because they’re passive, they don’t respond well to pressure, so avoid the hard pitch. Be their friend and re-assure them about their purchase.
• The bottom line types just want you to get to the point. They’re not concerned with the details or lengthy pitches. They make quick decisions and seem bullish because they’re impatient. So give them what they want: Reasons to buy and nothing more.
• The flashy types wear expensive, brand-name clothes and love attention. They’re upbeat and care more about chat than business. Offer them praise, connect with their interests, and keep your pitch exciting and full of energy.

Remember, each person is a mix of at least two personality types. But once you pick up on the cues, focus on their traits and, hopefully, you’ll nab a sale.

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You know them as millennials, or maybe Generation Y, or the Facebook Generation. But forget those names. Tech-crazed Americans aged 18-34 are now known as Generation C, according to the Nielsen Company.

The “C” stands for connected because millenials they’re hooked up to the latest technology more than any other generation. But, let’s be honest, the moniker doesn’t matter much. It’s how they consume media that has marketers salivating. Here are the facts from Nielsen:

• They comprise 27 percent of all visitors to social-networking sites and blogs.
• They own 33 percent of all tablets in the U.S.
• The use 39 percent of all smartphones in America.

With that in mind, here’s a blog post on how to market to millennials, Generation C, or whatever you prefer.

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These days, everyone from celebrities to big-name CEOs sets Twitter ablaze with personal meltdowns. So, what do you do if one of them is your client or disgruntled employee? It’s important to be prepared. Try these tips for handling a social-media crisis:

• Assess the situation and respond accordingly. No two scenarios are alike, so gather the facts (like making sure the person is OK) and decide the best course of action. If your client Tweets a drunken rant, it’s probably best to delete the post and issue an apology. If your fired co-worker wages e-war, it might be best to post a public statement explaining the situation.
• Educate your audience. If a disgruntled employee is falsely defaming your company, post a statement with the facts. But make sure you investigate and find out if there’s more to the story from the employee’s side.
• Don’t engage in a public feud. The worst thing you can do is throw down the gauntlet and battle on Facebook or Twitter. Instead of disputing any claims, you’ll open your brand to a public spanking.
• Time heals. Sometimes, the best remedy is to ride out the storm. Liz Vogel, Ideopia’s director of public relations, said, “Sometimes, just be happy you didn’t make it worse.” She’s right. You can’t always fix it, but you can control if you fuel or extinguish the flames.

As social media continues to grow in popularity, so will e-meltdowns. So be prepared. Looking for more defense? Check out our video on crisis management.

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Last February, Google released nearly 40 updates to its search service. Among minor ones, like improving and standardizing search images, is an entire set of changes that takes aim at over-optimized sites. This is huge because over zealous sites may lose rank, or get booted from the listings altogether.

Mathew Cutts, Google’s mouthpiece to the world, explained that this is an effort to diminish sites that game the system, and provide equal opportunities to sites with the most relevant content on any given search.

Warning Signs of Over Optimization

Even though your site has avoided black SEO tactics, check it for these signs of over optimization:

1. Excessive number of links on a page, especially to the same URL. Count the links on navigational drop downs and your footer. The danger zone starts at more than 50.
2. Overuse of keywords within copy, e.g. “Ideopia is an advertising agency, also known as an ad agency, that takes being an advertising agency very seriously.”
3. Back links that lack relevance from suspicious domains.

Google is serious about finding the best content for users. And no matter where you are on the SPAM-SEO continuum, this is a good thing. Maybe now we can allocate more budget to create engaging content, and spend less on SEO.

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Cincinnati, OH (May 3, 2012) — For the second year in a row, the Cincinnati-based creative branding agency Ideopia won honors for its healthcare advertising. The agency earned Gold Aster Awards in two categories: magazine advertising and mobile applications. The Gold Awards place Ideopia among the top 5% nationwide for advertising excellence, according to the Aster Award’s organization.

The winning magazine campaign on behalf of Reliance Medical Products leverages the company’s history of hand crafting its products in America. It calls on doctors to consider the U.S. economy when they make their purchasing decisions. Reliance has manufactured ophthalmic exam chairs and instrument stands in Ohio since 1898, sourcing most of the materials from vendors within 50-miles of its Mason, OH factory. Below the interactive portion of the campaign is also shown.

“Great advertising moves the meter,” said Ideopia’s Creative Director Bill Abramovitz. “Our marketing strategies for Reliance Medical have helped to fuel 21 consecutive years of double-digit growth for that organization.”

For New Jersey-based Topcon Medical Systems, a subsidiary of Mitsubishi, Ideopia created a mobile app that qualifies prospects by guiding them through five simple questions. It was designed for use during sales calls and at medical conferences, where the cost of staffing a booth has made it imperative for sales teams to use their time effectively. The Qualifier App works on iPads and is also available through Topcon’s website.

“The app works because it’s good for doctors and for Topcon,” explained Abramovitz. “It lets doctors determine for themselves whether Topcon’s Synergy software is the right next step for their practice. It avoids the relationship misstep of pushing a product to a practice that does not have the infrastructure to get the most benefit from it.”

A panel of judges chose Ideopia’s work from approximately 3,000 entries. Ads were evaluated based on creativity, layout and design, functionality, message effectiveness, production quality and overall appeal. Ideopia and its ads will be featured in the magazine Marketing Healthcare Today.

About Ideopia
Founded in 1992 Ideopia Advertising and Interactive is an advertising, public relations, web design and social media agency that believes in branding without boundaries. With headquarters in Cincinnati, Ideopia lives in the cloud at www.ideopia.com.

MEDIA CONTACT: Liz Vogel (office) 513-947-1444, ext. 18, (cell) 631-741-7700, email: lizv@ideopia.com

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“How does this make you feel?” psychiatrists frequently inquire. Now CompassionPit.com wants to know, too. All that attention without bills, pills, and anger management classes. Sounds like a dream shrink, right? Compassion Pit randomly shoots volunteer Listeners into chat rooms with Venters. Think of it as a digital confessional. Topics range from crime and relationship problems to conflicts at the office. Maybe it’s a way to blow off steam to avoid going ballistic, or as Compassion Pit puts it, “get it off your chest without it biting you in the ass.”

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1. Landing pages are perfect for generating buzz about a campaign, pumping new products, collecting user info, and supporting events. They can also confuse people, overwhelm them, or make them want to gouge their eyes out.
2. Lucky for you (and your eyeballs), we have some tips to help you navigate the pitfalls. A good landing pages uses:
3. Concise headlines to tell users exactly what to do
4. Consistent design, graphics and language between the landing page and email
5. Offers to encourage signups and participation
6. Clear calls to action
7. Short, simple forms with large form fields
8. Buttons with specific labels to prevent confusion and reinforce the call to action, e.g. “Enter Contest”, not “Submit”
9. Clean layouts without distractions between the copy and form field.
10. A/B testing to enhance performance and click thru

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Some products are just too big, complicated or radioactive to demonstrate at a trade show or sales call. That’s why real marketing directors use apps. For example, an iPad app we designed simulates a doctor’s exam room and allows the user to play with settings on a new lighting unit. Interactivity, like this, increases learning and recall, and it delivers an experience that would either be difficult or very expensive to render on terra firma. Another benefit, apps are self-contained and don’t need the Internet, a big plus in a trade show setting.

Quick Tips

• Clearly define what features you want to show
• Build-in fun (yes, FUN) interaction for your prospects
• Capture prospect information with a signup screen
• Leverage your investment by creating iPad, Smartphone and web site versions of your app.

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It’s always cool to show geeks that we know stuff, too. So, tomorrow morning, get your web team on the phone and demand to know why your site doesn’t have a Viewport tag. If they get surly and say they you already have one, just say oops and send over a case of Mountain Dew. Otherwise ship them this scrap of code.

This is called the Viewport tag, and it should appear on every page of your website. This nifty scrap of code tells mobile phones how to display your site on handheld devices, i.e. vertically or horizontally; zoomed in or out; and height and width. The viewport tag isn’t a substitute for a true mobile site, but it makes your site hipper to smart phone junkies.

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A news story. pitched via public relations, can do the talking for you as an unbiased third-party endorsement. That’s why we found our news coverage on display in a distributor’s booth at a recent medical conference. The savvy distributor understood that having a trusted magazine to spread the word adds credibility.

News coverage also entices new customers to try a product. Finish Line’s David Clopton works with distributors. They sell his company’s bicycle maintenance products to bike shops throughout North America. Clopton believes publicity is a valuable branding and awareness tool. But more importantly, he says: “It’s a way of going beyond the dealer (or distributor) to the customer. If customers come in and buy Finish Line, then the store has to order more.”

Let new audiences fall in love with your company. Go direct. Educate prospects about why to choose you over your competitors. Then extend the value of the coverage by reusing the articles as collateral. Your distributors will love it!

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