Recently we have had the pleasure of working with a new up and coming construction company called JH Exteriors. Just as many new companies, JH Exteriors needed to create their company image. With an already deep list of clients, they needed to be able to help their clients spread the word. So we at Trileaf Designs developed a way for them to accurately display their work, a medium for growth. We did this by developing a new company logo, business cards and a website. The identity of the company was there, we just illuminated it.

JH Exteriors is a new branch of their parent company, JH Construction. While this may be a new company, it is rooted in experience. This experience allows JH Exteriors to ensure the highest quality service at an honest price by allowing their employees to solely focus on the exterior of the home. JH Exteriors is a family owned company that takes pride in only hiring clean cut, respectful, knowledgeable employees.  Their motto is “Honest Products, Honest People” and that pride that they take in their work is shown from start to finish. To ensure that you have a good experience, the project is discussed with the client prior to any work being done. After speaking with them it is comforting not only to know what is going to be done to your house, but why and how.

I personally love the quality over quantity approach. Customer service is lost on many construction companies today that have the “on to the next one” approach. JH Exteriors has a great reputation with their clients and the majority of their new clients come from word of mouth. Whether you looking to replace your windows or fix your roof from storm damage, you want the job done right from honest people. The exterior of your house is many people’s only impression of you, it is important to make the right choice. You can check out some of JH Exteriors work and get more info on upgrading your windows, siding, roof, or doors check out their website here.

Written by Ryan Farrell

How to sell great creative

First off, you have to be able to develop great creative.

And what exactly is great creative, anyway? It’s advertising or marketing communications or experiential marketing that grabs your attention and makes you think. It stops you in your tracks and makes an impression – pulling at your heartstrings or punching you in the gut or making you smile – and all the while, strongly delivering whatever your selling message is in a big way.

Great creative really isn’t great unless it makes an impact and delivers on what the original strategy was. If you have a generic strategy, you’re going to wind up with generic communications.

So great creative begins with a great creative strategy – something that has been seen and signed off on by your client. If your presentation doesn’t begin with an overview of your creative strategy, you’ve already lost.

What you need to do is review that strategy. Focus on the key message that your communications are going to deliver. Get agreement and buy-in. See heads nod up and down in affirmation. Then, if the work you’re presenting clearly answers the key message that you’re conveying, you’re more than halfway there.

Many people like to present more than one concept to a client. That’s okay, as long as each concept is on-target and on-strategy. But it also makes your selling job a little more difficult. Most times, but not always, your client will choose the safest of the executions you present and the concept you really wanted to sell will be relegated to your “ideas that never made it” file.

So by showing multiple ideas, you may be shooting yourself in the foot. Of course, if you only enter the room with one campaign and your client asks, “Is that all you got?” then maybe your work wasn’t quite as powerful as you may have thought.

But if you truly believe that what you’re presenting is the absolute best solution for your client, you need to be a warrior. You need to fight for your ideas because ultimately, that is what your client is paying you for, right?

It’s a fine line to walk. You need to fight and defend in a way that shows your client you are passionate about their business and doing what is best for them.  If the work you’re presenting truly is right on target and they bought off on the strategy, that’s a sound argument on your behalf. Perhaps your idea could be tested or run by your target audience for their reaction. If you can do this before you present and have it in your pocket, that’s all the better.

Sometimes, though, all the reasoning and logic in the world won’t help to sell your great idea. That’s when you need to go back to the proverbial drawing board and top it.

We’re in a business where logic and reason doesn’t always apply. You need to have thick skin. And you need to always be ready to re-group, re-energize and realize that if that first great campaign or concept didn’t fly, you’ve got another one in your pocket that will.

Written by Thomas Blood

Here at the TriLeaf marketing department, one of our main focuses is social media. We specialize in social media solutions for small businesses. Because this technology is so new (it’s only 5 years old!), many companies are unsure how or why they should utilize it.

Social media can be a great way to spread awareness for your company and give your customers or clients a forum to interact with your brand.  However, social media must be utilized in the right way to achieve desired results.

Below are a few basic do’s and don’t's about marketing your business through social media:

DO:

• Create dynamic, engaging content that encourages user interaction. (Polls, pictures, videos—don’t be afraid to mix it up.)

• Be creative. People will notice—trust me.

• Create company pages that accurately reflect your brand. For example: If you want your company to come off as fresh, creative and knowledgeable, make sure your social media pages reflect that.

• Become a knowledge resource for your industry. Keep up on industry news and trends and post about them. It legitimizes your brand and makes it more memorable to potential customers.

• Post information about the people behind your business. It helps people feel like they are getting to know you, which builds trust. Give people a glimpse of what it is like to work at your company.

• Post information about community activities your company is involved in. Collecting toys for underprivileged children for Christmas?  Talk about it! It makes people feel good to know they are investing in a company that gives back to the community.

• Set up company policies regarding social media. Make it clear to employees what kind of content they can and can’t post. (Note to employees: be smart when posting information to your personal social media pages. Bad mouthing your company or complaining about your boss is a good way to get yourself fired.)

DON’T:

• Just sell to people. Everyone hates to be sold to, and if that makes up the majority of your content, it will turn people off.

• Post controversial content. Keep your political or moral opinions to yourself or you risk alienating customers.

• Ignore your users. If you respond to comments and interactions in a timely manner, people are more likely to interact again. It’s nice for people to know they are being heard.

• Create social media pages and forget about them. If you create a social media page, commit to it. Post content regularly to make sure you are engaging users.

Social media is constantly changing, so it’s important to stay abreast of updates. Building a social media campaign takes time, energy and creativity, so if you’re not sure if you can commit to regular content updates, hire someone to do it for you. It takes several months to build a successful social media campaign, but if it is done correctly, it can yield great results for your company.

Here are some articles about brands and companies that are getting it right:

http://mashable.com/2011/11/21/brand-voices-social-media/

http://thenextweb.com/socialmedia/2011/07/04/meet-the-top-20-brands-on-facebook/

If you have questions about social media, please email us at info@trileafdesigns.com.

By Lauren O’Brien

In 1838, a man named John Adam Lemp came to St. Louis, Missouri from Eschwege, Germany. He started a brewery which made him a millionaire which he was able to pass on to his family that took over the business after his death. Their mansion is located at 3322 Demenil Pl in South City. If you go to their website, you can read up on the history of the family and the mansion. What makes the Lemp Mansion so interesting is that it is claimed to be haunted due to the tragic deaths in the Lemp family. They offer tours, banquet services, restaurant dining, murder mystery dinner theatre, a yearly Halloween party and overnight accommodations. They have some really great amenities, but although they are usually booked around this time of year, I think the Lemp could be revived back to the fame it once had if someone would take the time to give their website and marketing a little TLC.

If you go to their website, it is obvious that the desired style is antique and old fashioned, and I completely agree with this decision, however, I think it could definitely use some cleaning up. First of all, I think that the link to the family history should be on the very top, because that’s what brings people in and gets them interested.

The family history is the main selling point, and therefore should be at the very top due to its importance. The site also needs to be centered on the page instead of off to the left side, because it seems unprofessional, as though it was done without the proper coding knowledge. I do really like the drawing on the homepage and I see no reason to do away with it, it just needs to be handled differently. I see it as not the only design element on the page, but maybe one that is included with other design elements to help liven up the design. The yellow color along the edge is to represent old and antique, as in the color paper turns when it has aged, but the weird dot pattern within it throws it off. I think a nice paper texture would work much better.

If you click on the “paranormal tours” tab, it will take you to a flyer. I like the idea of an online flyer, because it can be easily printed off if need be, but the style of the flyer is completely different from the style of the website. The same goes for their dinner and lunch menus. They have the old fashioned look to them, but they need a little bit of cleaning up and more relation to the website. That just goes back to a previous blog of mine about making sure all of your marketing pieces reflect one another so that people relate each piece with your business identity.

I think the Lemp Mansion is a really cool place with some intriguing history behind it and with a redesign on the site, menu and marketing piece, I think it could become a very popular and well known St. Louis attraction built off of it’s old fashioned and professional style. If you take a look at the photo below, or visit the sites immediately following, you can get a better idea of the styles I believe would work great for the Lemp Mansion.

Sensi Soft Website

The Dollar Dreadful Family Website

by Jen Ebenrick

You know how you can tell if a company has been successful in marketing itself? If you are able to recognize their identity when you come across it in everyday life. For example, I was watching football the other day, and the players, coaches and cheerleaders were all wearing pink, and without even having to be told why they were wearing pink, I knew it was because they were supporting Breast Cancer Awareness, and all I could think was that their marketing people sure know what they are doing. Not only did they get these items especially made in pink for EVERY professional NFL player to wear, but the items will be auctioned off as well.

To get my point across on what makes great marketing, I’d like to play a game called “Guess That Logo”. Below is a portion of a very popular logo, and I’d like to see if you can guess what company it belongs to. If you can, this will prove that the company has gotten their name out there so often that you can recognize their brand without having to see the name or the entire logo. I consider this company to be successful in their marketing (however not always in their customer service in my personal experience), so let’s see if they have done a good job in getting their name out there to the public. What logo is below?

by Jen Ebenrick

It is important to make your company stand out when you market it.  An article on About.com provided some helpful principles on how to become noticed in today’s attention deficit market audience.

• Know your company’s competitors.

Research and list competitor’s taglines. Compare yours and find ways to be superior by doing the following:

• Two heads are better than one.

Get advisors together and brainstorm various marketing positions

• Select and research target markets.

Choose distinct and growing markets. After choosing appropriate target markets, research them.

• Create a tagline.

The tagline is essential to the marketing of your business.  Develop it and make it stand out.  The tagline should be one sentence and describe what your business does.  The tagline should also be aimed at the target market you researched earlier.

• Get feedback.

Ask target market customers and industry experts for advice.  You should be aiming for a “Wow!” response, especially from customers.

A well-thought, strategic marketing plan can really help a business stand out.  Standing out via marketing is tough to accomplish because of the low attention span of today’s society.  Follow the above principles and maybe your company will gain notice with its target market.

by EP

The success of your business really depends on your company’s image. In my opinion, there are two main aspects that can shape that image. The first is obviously the quality of the services you provide. If people are happy with your construction or contractor work, they are more likely to use your services again and/or spread the word. The second, however, is how you market your business. If you don’t have a set “identity” for your company, people will never be able to recognize it or remember it. After you do have a logo, corporate identity and a set mission designed for your company, you can then begin to leave behind business cards from one customer or aquaintance to another, getting the word out about your services and how they are valuable.

You don’t have to start out by doing expensive marketing campaigns that are going to cost you more than you will get out of it. The first step is to get yourself a logo. The logo needs to properly represent what your company is all about, and to achieve this successfully, you need to find a designer that is going to listen when you describe your company. They need to be able to design a logo that is going to attract the kind of clients you are targeting by listening to what you are trying to accomplish through your company and then portray that through colors and graphics all within one image. This image then needs to be taken to the next level.

A business card is a must. It is a way to leave behind your contact information after you finish working with someone or describing and selling your services to a complete stranger. If you do not have a business card, how are they supposed to follow up with you or let you know when they have found someone that they think would make a great client for you? Creating a business card sounds simple enough, and you would think almost anyone could do it, but professional designers are often underestmated. Trained designers have knowledge and creativity that specialize in getting your business positive attention.

They have to think about things like how the information on your card is organized, and make sure that none of the elements on the card are competing and that everything leads the viewers eye smoothly from one object to another. They also have to make sure the business card reflects the same identity that is present in your logo. if all of your marketing pieces do not match in style, people will get confused on if the business card they have is the same company as the website they visited. Also, if your marketing pieces match, your identity looks more professional and legit because it shows you took the time and effort to have that developed professionally.

After you have your logo and business card, you can begin getting brochures, flyers and promotional items made, such as personalized tape measures, construction hat keychains or traffic cone stess balls. Your promotional items need to reflect your services because you want people to relate the two. Whether you are just starting out your own contracting/construcion business or already have one developed, it is never too late to get yourself a professional looking brand.

by: Jen Ebenrick

Are you looking for an upcoming networking event? Look no further. Powerful You! creates and facilitates venues for women who desire to develop connections that will assist in growing their businesses. They aid in the creation of lasting personal relationships and provide insights and tools for women who seek balance in all facets of life. Women’s’ networking group is to empower and inspire women in their business and personal lives. They have a luncheon each month with topics for discussion and speaker with the next meeting taking place on Friday August 5.

There are many opportunities to network in virtually every community on some scale however, I think this is a great networking opportunity for woman looking to get the name of their business out there and establish some connections. Effective networking can be your best form of marketing, as well as being extremely affordable. For more information visit http://powerfulyouwomensnetwork.com/ for membership information and meeting future dates.

Are you a member of Women’s’ Powerful You Networking Group? Tell us about the group.

Written by: Craila Nixon

With QR codes being all the rage and hitting the US like a flash flood many businesses have jumped into the water before making sure they were ready. QR codes are like a hyperlink from the real world to the digital world so you want to make sure that when and if they reach the digital world they see what you want and are rewarded for doing so. An article that I came across talks about five major mistakes to avoid when using a QR code marketing campaign.

Like all good technology and strategies you have to know the background and ins and outs of what you are about to do, it’s all about being prepared. Like I have said in previous blogs, QR codes are going to lead us to something even greater that further blends the digital world with the physical world.

What mistakes are people making when it comes to QR codes?

http://mashable.com/2011/08/02/qr-code-mistakes/

Written by: Joe Farinella