marketing to federal government

Top 5 Tagline Tips: How to Create the Brand Experience in 5 Words or Less

August 8, 2017 by Gal Borenstein

“Just do it.” “I’m Lovin’ it.” “Rethink Possible.” “The Ultimate Driving Machine.” Do these phrases sound instantly familiar? So familiar, in fact, that you immediately envision the product, you imagine the sensation, you taste the sweat and smell the Big Mac, you grip the wheel with your dream hands and stamp down on the accelerator. You experience the brand – all thanks to a few simple words. That’s the power of a great tagline.

Many people may assume that since typical taglines use just a few short, crisp words, a great tagline should be fairly easy to create. Fewer words, less trouble, right? For those of us who make a living one letter at a time, nothing could be further from the truth. Crafting an impactful tagline involves many steps, from researching the product to identifying strengths and weaknesses of the competition to learning the likes and dislikes of the target audience. Plus, tagline creation requires a comprehensive command of the subtleties of language, an ear for poetry, and an eye for design. Here are a few great tips to use when creating a tagline for a company, product or brand:

Make it Memorable: It sounds easy, but the most important factor to consider is that in addition to the brand name, the tagline captures the minimum information that consumers need to know about a product or company. The only information a consumer has access to when they are not face-to-face with the product, is what they have stored about it in their heads. Short, concise phrases that capitalize on existing idioms or conventions of speech are always great places to start.
Keep it Modern: Just like fashion or interior design, language has cycles in which certain words, grammatical conventions and patterns of speech become more popular and more commonly used. Today, with the prevalence of social media, there is a trend toward casual and conversational tones in nearly all writing outside of academia. You can see it overtly in blogs and tweets, but it’s even present in journalism and editorial work. A tagline of today should capitalize on this informal tone – the brand and the consumer can speak on the same terms.
Add Aural Appeal: Taglines love great rhymes. With clear rhythm, meter and time, good lines stay stuck in the mind. Alliteration packs a powerful punch. Plus, repetition is a really, really, really relevant tool. Lame language games aside, infusing aural appeal – or highlighting the sound, not just the meaning of the word – can be a very effective tactic in tagline creation.
Ignite the Imagination: The tagline is a conceptual piece. A tagline that relies on nebulous or conceptual language is much more likely to inspire new ideas and stimulate the imagination than one that uses declarative language to describe precise details of the brand. A good tagline should take risks, should be open to interpretation and should entice the mind, without shifting focus away from the brand, or mixing up the message. Don’t be afraid to break the rules.
Trademark It: During the ideation process, it’s important to check each tagline concept thoroughly on Google and USPTO.gov. It can be quite a disappointment (and legally tenuous) if you’ve developed fantastic messaging around a tagline someone else owns. If there’s no record of the tagline in existing patent files, the word or phrase can be trademarked – then it’s yours.

Finally, keep in mind that taglines are temporary. Each tagline should reflect the current moods and market trends. If you continue to strive to develop new tagline ideas based on these easy principles, your brand will stay relevant, captivating and profitable.

For more information on branding strategies in the B2B and B2G arenas, please give us a call at 703-385-8178, or visit our Contact Us page.

Do you have any tagline tips you’ve used in the past? How does the tagline play into your current digital marketing efforts?

What’s Your Messaging Equation? Creating a Compelling Messaging & Positioning Strategy

July 15, 2017 by Gal Borenstein

What does your company do that’s different and better than everyone else in your market? For many, this is a difficult question to answer. At The Borenstein Group, we recommend that clients consider the following constructs as they create their own brand equation. How do you meaningfully communicate this value proposition? That’s a harder challenge.

Does everyone in your organization who interfaces with clients, prospects and industry leaders deliver the same message? Even tougher.

Compelling messaging and market positioning must quickly and effectively communicate why a prospect would choose you over another product or service provider. It qualifies the prospect and clearly articulates what you offer.

Effective messaging and positioning will firmly define your offerings, mission, and benefits in language that matters to your universe of buyers. This is a critical step as companies move toward cohesive processes and consistent delivery of the brand message. Messaging must include the problems the company, solution or product solves and how it improves the lives of your customers.

This is ambitious work and calls for a careful process. It also calls for an honest assessment. Be prepared to answer some big questions like:

How does my company impact our clients?
How should we be selling against our competitors?
What do our clients say about us?
Why do our clients or customers buy from us?

At a very basic level, here is the messaging equation:

Ready to learn more about practical tips to create or improve your messaging and positioning strategy? contact us or call 703-385-8178×28

Six Ways to Boost the Value of Your Case Studies for Higher Marketing Impact

June 22, 2017 by Gal Borenstein

Your most innovative applications and far-reaching solutions with the biggest ROI can be used aggressively to help your company reach its sales objectives.

B2G and B2B Case studies can have a measurable impact on your company’s sales pipeline. Are you leveraging them for maximum ROI? They have the potential to touch prospects in various stages. At The Borenstein Group, we come across many companies that have great past performances that never see the light of day in the form of a well-written case study, thus, failing to share with the decision makers the ‘how’ behind their success.Just like fine art, if no one sees it- your best and most valuable stories may go unappreciated, sitting at your capture manager’s share drive, unless brought to life.

Here are some ways you can make use of these powerful tools, including some new ideas for even the most seasoned marketing pros.

1. Begin with the bottom line in mind. The best case studies are the ones with the most compelling ROI. The most sophisticated technologies and innovative solutions only matter if they can impact someone’s bottom line. For commercial clients, that often means costs saved and profits increased. For government clients, the ROI may be based on strategic outcomes, better positioning for funding, compliance achievements or other objectives. Think strategically about the products or services you want to aggressively promote and ensure that the outcome is clear and compelling.

2. In general, be specific. Good case studies enable prospects to place themselves in the position of the client whose success you’ve profiled. To do this, they must be able to relate. The problem being solved should be both specific enough to tell a story, yet broad enough to appeal to a greater audience. A government buyer is going to be far more interested in how you helped a peer agency succeed than they are in how you helped a hospital. One way to accomplish this is to target your case studies to industries or market segments. But the rule of thumb is to make it easy for the prospect to put themselves in the shoes of the client. It’s basic sales. Give the buyer a reason to qualify themselves out of your solution and they’ll take it.

3. Make marketing the champion. Case studies work best when they have a marketing focus. They lose their luster when prepared by proposal departments and technical professionals. They are ultimately sales tools and must be framed in that manner. Technical professionals may provide good content, but sometimes the “so what?” question is missed. Marketing people do the best job of asking the right questions.

For example, we interviewed the customer of a client on how their flagship product helped the business. We asked the same question a few different ways before getting to the “aha!” The product was instrumental in helping the small business increase five-fold in 1½ years. This story usually won’t tell itself. It requires tact and skill in extracting it from executives and technical staff.

4. Determine the impact on the sales process. So you have dynamic studies of how you’ve dramatically improved the lives of the people who buy from you. How will you use these studies to ensure these amazing examples reach the people who haven’t bought for you, but should?

Here’s the take-a-step-back-and-look-at-the-big-picture question. What should case studies do for your company? If the prospect is unfamiliar or less familiar with your firm, should case studies be early on in their experience? Then consider adding them prominently to your homepage. Make them part of lead generation activities. Include them in materials at conferences and post-conference follow-up communications.

Case studies should certainly be part of your sales materials. But consider the presentation. Many companies use them as one-page slicks. Others use a broader brochure approach that can make a greater impact to a wider audience. This is a single piece that conveys the impression that you are immersed in a particular industry, federal agency or line of business.

5. Expand your base. These stories can also be re-purposed into press pitches by targeting specific industries or pubs that accept by-lined articles. Your greatest story with the most solid ROI and tales of innovation can be converted into abstracts for speaking proposals. Both of these are fantastic examples of reaching outside of your prospect and customer databases.

6. Let your customers speak for you. One of the smartest ways we’ve seen to extend your case studies is to utilize them as video testimonials. Get a few of your best customers and let them speak about what you did for them—on camera. Granted, this will take some out of their comfort zones, but you can make it worth their while. More and more companies are using this tool very effectively. Customers can speak more powerfully than even our best sales reps. Think about how much value you could get out of these—on your web sites, at trade shows and conferences, during sales meetings, at road shows and so many other marketing opportunities.

Not every project or sale can be converted into a show-stopping case study. But your most innovative applications and far-reaching solutions with the biggest ROI can be used aggressively to help your company reach its sales objectives. Best of luck as you tell your client success stories to the world.

If you need help extracting more value from your case studies, or need to build a new arsenal of effective past performances, Borenstein Group can help. Reach out via the web, or by phone at 703-385-8178.

“Butts-in-Seats” or “Brains-in-Seats”? That’s How Your Federal Small Business Might Be Valued.

June 1, 2017 by Gal Borenstein

Remember that feeling of accomplishment you had receiving your college diploma? “I’ve made it,” you probably thought. “I’m finally ready.” Then came the sobering discovery—the realization that post-graduation life from the status of making it in the ‘real world’, has its own challenges and impediments.

It’s the same story for Small Business. Once they’ve graduated from the SBA program in an IT NAIC code, they find themselves competing in a different world. It’s called ‘No Man’s Land’ where titans and gnomes are equally competing for the same RFP capture. So, often we see the smaller companies’ revenues drop; key employees get poached; worst of all, buyers use “comparables” to consistently undervalue their company’s true worth.

According to a study from the Merrill Advisory Group, the four critical components of Government Contractor Valuation are:

1. Business Focus
2. Financial Operations
3. Unique Characteristics
4. Company Brand

But what are Unique Characteristics? That’s the question most Small Business government contractors aren’t prepared to answer. Assuming all things are equal (including past performance, business focus, and financial operations), what makes your company worth more than your competitors?

Often, the answer is rooted in a company’s Strategic Brand Proposition (SBP), or lack thereof.
SBP, like marketing in general, may sound superfluous to most government contractors. But you’ll find it’s intimately and inextricably linked to your company’s growth post-graduation. Buyers and investors have many names for it, “Good Will,” “Intellectual Property,” and “Reputation with Customers, Suppliers, and Partners,” to name a few.

When stakeholders visit your Web site—your digital brand identity—what will they find? User experiences, thought leadership pieces, and collaborative technologies that demonstrate your unique value proposition? Or a hollow, unconvincing mission statement bootlegged from a competitor: “We’re the only company that’s truly customer-focused,” or “We deliver solutions!”

Few Small Business entities have invested the proper time to position themselves for optimal value. The same IT systems integrator can be perceived as an “Architect” (highly skilled strategic partner), or as “Mr. Fix It” (low-cost vendor). Savvy entrepreneurs know that brand equity and the art of strategic communications can make or break perceived value to both Federal customers and potential buyers.

Often, we hear Small Business graduates lament that they can’t afford marketing, advertising, or public relations. It’s the equivalent of bemoaning the need to buy a suit for your first real job interview. Image matters, particularly when you’re building your company for higher valuation. And that, Small Business graduates, is the bottom line.

Ready to chart a different course? Contact us at The Borenstein Group and we can help evaluate what you need to do to make the neccesary changes.

How to Leverage & Scale PR in Your GovCon Marketing Efforts

May 22, 2017 by Gal Borenstein

Government contractors come in a tremendous variety of sizes of what PR can do for them. PR programs should too. Some companies use public relations extremely effectively, with favorable stories appearing in a variety of relevant sources. The most impressive are often small and mid sized firms with limited resources that are able to maximize the value of their PR. This kind of ongoing coverage gives the coveted impression that the company is much larger and has a greater market footprint than actually they do.

Regardless of the size of your company or your marketing department, we, at The Borenstein Group, have identified some ways to scale PR to your company and get the most of your media relations efforts.

Don’t Go for an All or Nothing Strategy
Sometimes PR folks attempt to boil the ocean and take on too much in an attempt to “get coverage.” By tracking all editorial calendars and reporters who so much as dance around the edges of the story you’re trying to pitch, you’re probably taking on too much and will get too little as a return.

Rather, an industry specific approach probably makes more sense. (This isn’t the solution for everyone, but it is often a way to better target your efforts.) By targeting the editors and reporters in you industry, through trade pubs and online sources, you’ll get more bang for your buck.

Establish Uber-Strategy
Big question: what sort of coverage will have the most significant impact on revenue growth for your company? Coverage for coverage’s sake isn’t the solution. Is the answer investment-driven business publications, local business sections, trade publications and online sources, features sections, or a mix?

Most of us who work in PR have heard it from a CEO or other key executive. “We need to be covered in ________.” Sometimes that becomes the central strategy, even if it’s untenable. Regardless, you need to work with the hand you are dealt to get the results leadership desires.

Identify the key outlets you want to be in, story by story. Determine what you have to offer each publication. If you’re going after trade magazines, determine what you have to offer that’s compelling to their readers and work your pitch from there. This may sound like old news to many PR pros, but success often lies in the basics—and strategy always does.

Tips for Identifying Media
Here’s another important question: What are your prospects and customers reading? Not sure? Have your sales reps who visit them ask them and/or take a look around their office to find out. Those publications should be on your short list. If you do customer surveys, ask the question.

Another good way to establish key media is to determine where your competitors are appearing. Their story is clearly of interest to the editors and readers of those outlets. Maybe yours is too.

Maximize PR’s Value—Article by Article
The value of coverage is by no means limited to the day or month in which it appears. Including favorable coverage on your web site is a no-brainer, but what else can you do? Reprints of significant articles can be valuable for sales kits. Direct mail campaigns can include, among other things, a case study that ran in one of your industry’s leading magazines.

You should link to coverage in your email newsletters or other electronic communications. When sales reps are working to move a lead through the pipeline, they can forward on coverage that highlights a problem that prospect is facing. Even if these articles aren’t read verbatim, they go a long way in establishing credibility for your organization. And of course, by hyper-linking to articles that appear online, you’ll be increasing your search engine visibility.

Don’t Forget Letters to the Editor
Many trade publications and other publications run letters to the editor. If your company is following a significant trend or you have feedback on coverage, craft a letter to the editor for your CEO, president, etc. Not only is this quick-hit coverage, it can pique the editor’s interest and lead opportunities for your organization.

To Byline or not to Byline?
Should we do by-lined articles? What value to they have? We get these questions a lot. The answer lies in two questions. First, do the publications you’re pitching run bylined articles? For some industries, such opportunities are limited. For others, such as healthcare, there are opportunities, but rarely for vendors.

If there are opportunities in your industry, and you have a story to tell, do you have the bandwidth to support bylines? Sometimes it’s easier to get the opportunity to submit the story than it is for the executive, developer, subject matter expert, etc. who will contribute to the story to provide information. It’s important that you know what you’re getting into, particularly if the article is to be technical and require much time from others in your organization.

Determine how you’ll measure.
How will you gauge PR’s impact on your overall marketing program? Frankly (and intangibly), CEOs love to see articles about themselves and the organization they’ve helped build. While not necessarily quantifiable, this is eminently important.

Measure spikes in web traffic when stories appear. Measure the referral sites that push readers to your site. These are good indicators of editorial impact.

The questions your inbound sales reps ask should include asking how the prospect heard about the product or service. Even if they report something vague like, “I saw it in a magazine,” try and have them push for where they saw it. Even if they don’t remember the publication, they may tell you it was a trade publication. This helps eliminate variables and determine if more calls are coming in around the time editorial hits.

To learn about how to scale your government contractor marketing and public relations program, contact Borenstein Group via the web or at 703-385-8178.

This Year’s Top Trends and Tips for B2B Content Marketing

January 30, 2013 by Gal Borenstein

Content marketers in the B2B space know that the game is always changing. First, it was all about the blog, then Facebook ruled. Now, case studies and video content are each surging in popularity and importance. Recently, MarketingProfs along with the Content Marketing Institute released a fascinating study of “The State of B2B Content Marketing In North America,” with loads of great insight into the content tactics top B2B marketers are using to raise brand awareness and generate new leads. Let’s take a look at some of the highlights:

91% of B2B marketers rely on content marketing as the central component in their integrated approach. That other 9%? Well, we probably haven’t heard of them anyway.

Social media takes the cake as the top tactic for B2B marketing, with 87% of survey respondents citing it as a primary focus. The top 30% of effective tactics are all digital. Web articles, videos, case studies, blogs, all direct email marketing all ranked in at 70% or higher. Games/Gamification is a newcomer to the list, but at 11% definitely indicates a trend toward interactivity as a lead gen tool.

LinkedIn rules the roost when it comes to social media channels that B2B markets identified as most effective outlets to distribute content. The use of LinkedIn is up almost 8% from 2011 with 83% or respondents referencing it at the top spot. In a lot of ways, this makes sense. B2B marketing is often a matter of appealing directly to decision makers. LinkedIn is where the decision makers dwell. In fact 59% of respondents tailor content to directly appeal to individual decision makers.

In the past year, the use of videos as a B2B marketing tool has increased by almost 20%, with 70% of respondents listing video as a primary tactic. (Check out this Borenstein-produced video created for a client in the defense-aerospace sector)

Good news for content creators: 54% of respondents say they intend to increase their content marketing budget in 2013. That means the focus on content as a B2B brand promotion and lead gen source will only intensify over the coming year. Also, it’s the small companies that will be spending a larger percentage of total marketing budget on content. Micro biz (less than 10 employees) is expected to spend 42%, while big business (1000+ employees) will top out at only 24%. So, keep those keyboard fingers nimble!

For most marketing professionals, the biggest challenge in content marketing is simply keeping up with the demand for new, meaningful content. And It’s not enough to produce quantity – quality content is still king. If you’re considering ways to improve B2B content marketing efforts for your business, or you’ve got great ideas of your own, we’d love to hear from you. Check out our Contact Us form, or give us a call at 703-385-8178.

“Butts-in-Seats” or “Brains-in-Seats”? That’s How Your Federal Small Business Might Be Valued.

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