As President of theAgency, Heidi oversees the strategic direction of all accounts. The passion she feels for advertising manifests itself in a forward –thinking, comprehensive approach to each project. Heidi peels away the layers of every assignment to clearly define expectations, needs, obstacles and the opportunities to obtain the highest level of success. She developed theAgency’s foundation philosophy of Empathetic Branding, a belief that every marketing message should ‘give’ rather than ‘get’ attention.

Heidi’s strengths in account planning, creative and promotion, combined with her natural attention to detail and leadership mean that while focusing on the short-term benchmarks of a given campaign, she never loses sight of the long-term imperative of building brand value. This commitment has delivered results to a broad range of clients including Chevron, Wells Fargo, 1928 Jewelry, Sharp, Intuit and Activision.
 
After earning her degree in Marketing from the SDSU School of Business, Heidi began her career at J. Walter Thompson and went on to run a promotion agency for nine years before joining theAgency in 1997.  Heidi continued her studies through Harvard Business School and took what she learned to extend theAgency’s services to both qualitative and quantitative research.

An animal-rights advocate, avid equestrian and master gardener Heidi lives in Camarillo with her husband of 17 years, and Trevor the dog.

Thank you Seth! From Seth's Blog.

Why do some organizations look great... and get great results from their design efforts and ads... while others languish in mediocrity? I think it has little to do with who they hire and a lot to do with how they work with their agencies and designers.

1. If you want average (mediocre) work, ask for it. Be really clear up front that you want something beyond reproach, that's in the middle of the road, that will cause no controversy and will echo your competition. It'll save everyone a lot of time.

2. On the other hand, if you want great work, you'll need to embrace some simple facts:

3. It's going to offend someone. If it doesn't offend them, then it will make them nervous. The Vietnam Vets memorial offended a lot of people. The design of Google made plenty of people nervous. Great work from a design team means new work, refreshing and remarkable and bit scary.

4. It's not going to be easy to sell to your boss. That's your job, by the way, not mine. If you want me to do something great, you've got to be prepared to protect it and defend it. Come back too many times for one little compromise, and you'll make it clear that #1 was what you wanted all along.

5. You can't tell me you'll know it when you see it. First, you won't. Second, it wastes too much time. Instead, you'll need to have the patience to invest twenty minutes in accurately describing the strategy. That means you need to be abstract (what is this work trying to accomplish) resistant to pleasing everyone (it needs to do this, this and that) and willing, if the work meets your strategic goal, to embrace it even if it's not to your taste.

6. Help me out by pointing out the work you'd like this to be on a peer with. If you want a website to be like three others (in tone, not in execution) then point it out. In advance.

7. Be clear about dates and costs. Not what you hope for, but what you can live with!

8. You don't know a lot about accounting so you don't backseat drive your accountant. You hired a great designer, please don't backseat drive here, either.

9. If you want to be part of the process, please go to school. Read design magazines or take a course from Milton Glaser or get a subscription to Before & After .

10. This one may surprise you: don't change your existing design so often Not when your kids or your colleagues tell you it's time. Do it when your accountant says so.

11. Don't get stressed about your logo.

12. Get very stressed about user interface and product design. And your packaging.

13. Say thank you.

The Strategic Use of Sales Promotion….
Not Just for Consumers

Over the years, theAgency.SP has become aware of a general group of misconceptions about sales promotion and its role in a marketing strategy.

Here are a few of the more effective and overlooked uses of sales promotion as well as some of the more commonly overlooked implementation pitfalls.

It is also not our intent to cover the many brand strategy considerations that should be considered before any advertising and sales promotion plans are drawn. We will attempt to clarify the strategic use of sales promotion to bolster a marketing plan in several product lifecycle scenarios. It is comforting to remember that 15 years ago, the ratio of advertising dollars to sales promotion dollars was approximately 60:40. Today, in many categories that ratio has reversed.

When Does Sales Promotion Work?

Sales promotion is most commonly thought of as cents-off coupons, sweepstakes, scratch-off games and certain “giveaways” aimed at consumers within a short period of time and meant to generate quick sales or short-term volume.

While sales promotion can be produced in a relatively short period of time and does not carry the same indirect costs associated with traditional advertising, sales promotion is not thought of as a way to build a brand or enhance an image. Fortunately, these misapprehensions are not necessarily true. Sales promotion, when folded into a comprehensive marketing plan, can contribute to a company’s brand, employee utilization, distribution channels, training and much more.

Sales promotion can “smooth” seasonality, inventory or pipeline inefficiencies. Because of its immediate impact on the market, sales promotion can be used to test pricing issues and clarify price elasticity or inelasticity. The ability to improve short-term volume can also be used sparingly to lower per unit costs.

The key is to avoid using sales promotion merely as tourniquet to stop bleeding in an unforeseen crisis. When this happens, it is much harder to make sure your message maintains fidelity to the longer term marketing strategy, formed when things were calm. While it is true that sales promotion can work effectively in emergency situations, and should not be overlooked, it is ultimately more effective when it is a regular part of your marketing arsenal.

The most common use of sales promotion is to attract consumers to your product. Traditionally, it is used against products in the latter stages of life. To a lesser extent, it has been used to introduce a product, stimulate consumer trial and generate interest from distribution channels in new products.

Sales promotion is used more often when you are faced with a large number of competitors. It helps pull your product out of the pack. It can also help when your distribution channels are limited and wield a great deal of power.

A few questions to ask as you consider consumer directed sales promotion:

• What do you hope to accomplish with the promotion?
• Have you ever run a promotion in support of this product?
• If so, what were the results and did they represent the goals of that promotion?
• What is your budget and where is it coming from?
• Is your product regionally, nationally, or internationally distributed?
• How will the laws governing certain promotion designs impact your promotion?
• Will you have to post bonds in certain states?
• Will perfect results from the promotion solve the underlying reason for the promotion?
• Have you guaranteed your cost/liability exposure?
• Does your promotion design further your brand positioning?
• Does your promotion design conflict with your brand positioning?
• Are your competitors also running promotions?
• If so, will your promotion be lost in the clutter?
• Have you explored possible (and appropriate!) tie-in partners?
• Will you receive cooperation from your distribution channels?
• Will your promotion design impact future product pricing issues?
• Does your promotion support your sales efforts?
• Does your promotion conflict with or undermine your sales efforts?
• How important is implementation to the success of my promotion?

How to chose a promotion design.

There are as many promotion types as there are creative minds to design them.

COMMON CONSUMER PROMOTION TYPES

• Sweepstakes
• Games of Chance
• Skill Games
• Continuity
• Premium/Value Based
• Gift with Purchase
• Purchase with Purchase
• Rebates
• Coupons
• Sampling
• Cents-Off
• Clubs
• Free Trial
• Tie-In Promotion
• Cross Promotion

Each promotion type has distinct characteristics suggesting its appropriateness. It is important to keep these in mind when developing a promotion plan.

What if you gave a party and nobody...

How you plan to “distribute” your promotion is an important decision.  For example a coupon can be:  in-pack, available at the point of purchase, part of a direct mail program, or in print or online media.

The choice of distribution will impact how many people are exposed to your promotion, its cost and effectiveness. Your choice will be dependent on the category, what your competitors are doing, the length of the promotion, the scope of your market and the promotion type.  Always keep in mind how you will distribute your promotion to your audience and make the determination early in your planning.

Sales promotion directed elsewhere.

Trade promotions have been around even longer than consumer promotions.They are so common that in many industries, they are practically a required part of doing business.

Trade promotions are used to:

• Drive a channel to carry your product.
• Drive more product into the channel.
• Persuade a channel to contribute to the marketing of a product.
• Persuade a channel to “recommend” one product over another.

Unfortunately, in many industries, trade promotion has become a bloody battlefield between the marketer and the distribution channel. No industry is a better example than the grocery business, where slotting fees are mandatory and the number of brands carried shrinks yearly. (This unfortunately is becoming the standard in other industries such as computer software retailing as well.) If your product category is one in which trade promotions have become mandatory, innovative thinking may help protect precious margins. In trade promotions there are fewer “types” and thus the decisions are somewhat easier and their applicability much less sensitive.

Common trade promotion types.

• Trade Shows
• Sales Contests
• Off-invoice Pricing
• Free Product with Order
• Co-op Dollars
• Guaranteed Consumer Advertising & Promotion Support
• Premiums

Inner directed promotions.

Often overlooked is the use of promotion to incent and train employees. Here again, creativity is the only limiting factor in promotion’s use and effectiveness. While it is not uncommon to use a promotion to invigorate a sales force, promotion can also expand a sales force by enlisting the aid of retail clerks, consumers, customer service and repair forces.

• Low-wage employees can be trained with games of skill, driven to “push” a particular product or service and be made a more cohesive team by banding together to make a contest goal.
• Quality control issues can be addressed with contests.
• New technologies can be introduced to a company’s work force in a much less disruptive fashion if connected with a well constructed promotion.

A well designed, on-going promotional plan can help turn a hostile, disenfranchised work force into an evangelizing “family”. This is particularly well documented in industries where takeovers have produced widespread employee unrest.

We hope this has helped you begin your thinking about the use of sales promotion. As in every other form of marketing communication, sales promotion must begin with a clear, competitive strategy. Remember, marketing is civilized warfare and you must have a battleplan.