Having worked for a direct sales company heading up web stuff for most of the past eight years, it’s funny how familiar themes continue to crop up. There’s one that no doubt tops the list, though, and I’ll fill you in on that in a bit. If you don’t know, direct sales companies always have LOTS of stuff going on, all at once. There are product launches, and events, and contests, and recognition, and more events, and campaigns. And there’s business builders and product purchasers and members and prospects. And let’s not forget leadership, of course. The best example I can give is it’s like a church, with lots of activities and different people all liking and going to the church for different reasons.

In other words, there’s a lot going on for a lot of different segments.

So it’s inevitable for a guy like me to get lobbied by everyone in the building who has something they need to “promote.” People want rotating banners and starbursts and scrolling text and red font. Someone always pushes me too far and asks for a pop-up window. Don’t get me started ….

I then get to be the bad guy and tell them we have limited promotional space and their request hasn’t been deemed as the highest priority right now. (Which is often code for “your idea sucks, leave me alone”)

Without fail, the resolution proposed is that we need more promotional space. More banners, more flashy things, more pop-up windows.

You Don’t Need More Promo Space

Sound familiar? Standard practice for companies is to come up with promotions, prepare the promotion and then figure out how to communicate (or promote) the promotion. That’s when all parties meet head-on at an extremely busy intersection. That’s when people start cage-matching for priority status. That’s when some genius hops on the soapbox and starts preaching for more strategy.

Good companies have a lot of good things to talk about. Great companies know how to focus on the best stuff and not overwhelm their fans. They keep it simple, and they give their consumers a chance to consume their message.

Your problem is not a lack of promotional space. It’s an overabundance of messages.

————————————

Subscribe now to MarketingInProgress.com by email or RSS.

————–

Subscribe now to MarketingInProgress.com by email or RSS feed.

You’ll automatically be notified whenever something new is posted.

———-

This article was originally posted at http://www.marketinginprogress.com.

Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.