Jean Gazis Copywriting & Content Development

One of the last pieces of sales collateral I wrote when I worked for Ziff-Davis Central Ad Sales almost ten years ago (!) was about the need for continuous advertising and marketing during slow business periods, headlined Slow Times Call for Fast Action.

Fast forward to the current downturn, and – what do you know? – the very same advice turns up in The Entrepreneurial Mind blog on my Google Reader, linking to a newspaper article titled Don't ease up on marketing in these slow economic times.

I said: "Coasting is no way to win a race. During a period of slow sales, one of the first things you may be tempted to do is cut costs by reducing your advertising budget. It may seem like an obvious move, but it’s the wrong move... you can’t get something by doing nothing. When times are good, advertising is important. And when they’re not so good, it’s essential. A strong marketing program — selling to new customers, expanding into new markets, increasing ad spending — will solidify your customer base, take business away from less aggressive competitors, and position your business for future growth."

He says: "One of the expenses that entrepreneurs are tempted to cut back on is marketing. However, a weak economy is not the time to cut back on communicating with your existing and potential customers... With customers cutting back on their spending, small business owners must fight even more aggressively to maintain their revenues. That is why marketing and advertising become more important than ever."

I still think that was one of my best pieces. It's nice to see that it's as true as ever.

I've let my public radio membership lapse but I will rejoin one of these days. Meanwhile I sent in a website suggestion, and I think they're going to use it:

I've been scanning business cards collected from various networking events to get the contact info into a database. I can see why someone might want a two-sided card to put a nice big logo or tagline on the back. But why, why, WHY would anyone design the card so that the actual business name and URL – or worse, their name and title – don't also appear on the front of the card at all? That is just stupid, people!

Effective Marketing Rule #1: Put all the information people want where they can get it easily!

I liked this piece by a customer of mine (I did the initial blog setup) on why scheduling some quiet time for yourself gives tangible results by fostering creativity.

Read it at Ducks in a Flow, Alers Consulting's business blog.

The new, improved Urban Organic website launched over the weekend (December 8-9). I built the site in Drupal, based on the "Golden Hour" theme, using some gorgeous fruit and vegetable images from freedigitalphotos.net. I think it looks nice - I hope you agree.

Using Drupal will enable the Urban Organic staff to update the site more easily and quickly than their old static HTML site, as well as provide the option to add more features later.

And by the way, it's good quality produce!

This was filler text on a web design page I was looking at. Isn't it cool?

"Li Europan lingues es membres del sam familie. Lor separat existentie es un myth. Por scientie, musica, sport etc., li tot Europa usa li sam vocabularium. Li lingues differe solmen in li grammatica, li pronunciation e li plu commun vocabules. Omnicos directe al desirabilitá de un nov lingua franca: on refusa continuar payar custosi traductores. It solmen va esser necessi far uniform grammatica, pronunciation e plu commun paroles.

BtoB Online has an interesting, short item on what really keeps people coming back to your site. It's not whether the site copy contains more of the keywords that pulled them in, it's whether the content is engaging, relevant, and provides a clear call to action.
Read the article here: Keywords attract potential prospects, but content is what keeps them around.

You're Ulysses!

by James Joyce

Here's some very good advice for freelancers and others, because after all, self-promotion is what this site's all about!

1. Specialize (tell people what you don’t do)
2. Stay the most focused when things look the most difficult
3. Be the tortoise, not the hare (be in it for the long haul)
4. Mitigate the fear of starvation (but use it as a motivating factor)
5. Know yourself, really, so you know when to shut up