We’re stronger together

Firstly I trust you and your family stay safe and well. My thoughts are with you all as we all navigate through this new phase of business and beyond.

It’s business as usual here at JFM Creatives, and I would like you to know if we’re currently working on a project for you, this will continue on as normal. 

We’re here to fully support you through these times, helping you to update and communicate with your clients and network in the form most appropriate for you.  As the dust starts to settle and some staff is working from home, you might be thinking about what can do now. 

Not sure what you could be doing right now? Here are a few ideas to get you started;

  • Update your website home and contact page to confirm your current business operational status, hours, points of contact, service expectations etc
  • Create a client or network newsletter or set up Mailchimp so you can communicate as and when required to your clients.  An email group can be great too
  • Update social media graphics to reflect your current offer/brand building
  • Google place – check yours is updated with your current hours and points of contact
  • Social media channels – check contact details and about sections are up to date
  • Pin a post to the top of your Facebook page which features your latest update
  • Group chat with your team/clients/suppliers – so everyone’s informed and updated
  • If you can connect with clients virtually, book appointments online (Microsoft bookings, Timely, Acuity are all great) or connect with them via Skype or Zoom
  • Create a daily focus within your team, to keep everyone connected and engaged. Voxer is great for those who love talking, typing, sharing images…  something for every type of communicator
  • Create video tutorials on products and services or even a company update.  Loom is a fabulous platform
  • Database cleanse – what no one truly loves doing, but it allows you to easily and effectively communicate
  • Check answerphone messages are updated with the latest contact points and directions – including mobiles for staff who are on leave or working reduced hours, along with out of office replies
  • If you have on-line booking software for face to face meetings/appointments – check the status of these links
  • Lastly, there will be plenty more things to check-in with, as the days go by… 

What’s staying the same?

The business model at JFM Creatives is virtual and continues as normal. All my virtual team, have the resources and virtual software platforms to carry out any project like normal for you.  My team happens to be around the country – Sam (Christchurch), Teesha & Taryn (Wellington), Terry (Napier) are all safe, well, and ready to help and support you.

If you would like to update your website, communicate with your customers, or talk click my email link below and then we can quickly get your update or new project underway.  Email –   jo@jfm.co.nz.

What’s changing?

Maybe rather than meeting in person we can connect on a video Zoom call?  That’s about all that will be changing around how we might work together.

How will you and your teams maximise this time?

Already for some, this moment in time is creating superb focused planning space and for others project team brainstorming sessions are getting underway, to kick start those projects you know are so very important (for one client that’s an eCommerce store).  As the old adage goes, it’s not what you have, it’s what you do with what you have, that counts… 

Stay safe, keep well and be kind.  Kia Kaha.

Jo x

Mob: 027 292 5004

Click here to schedule a time to connect on Zoom over the next few days and weeks ahead. Even just to chat and have a laugh!

P.S.

(At the close of day 1 yesterday, my son Ryan had created the first pillow mountain, and indoor “camp out” as he calls it).  I think Terry summed it up the best… “It’s like sheltering for a cyclone, except the mess is all indoors!”. 

Tips for crafting Covid-19 updates

If you’re going to be sending out some comms to your clients or internal team here are a couple of quick tips:

  • Start your message out positive
  • Keep your message calm but not dull
  • Make it clear what you’re asking them to do, if anything.  (It might be info only, tips and tricks, book a call to discuss revised budgets etc)
  • Make it easy for them to connect with you – skype/zoom details/links, contact numbers
  • Include as much information as you need to on your update, but no more.  Many are overwhelmed
  • It can be a time for some industries to over-communicate, even daily, and others it might be just one or two updates over the journey
  • Tailor content to the industry if required, to increase the intimacy of the information 

Most importantly send personal emails, text messages and phone calls, when a mass update is not required.  The personal touch of checking in and making sure those important to you are well, will be long remembered…

Let’s get creative during and post lockdown!

Strong communities are forged by kind and compassionate people working together. I’m hearing amazing stories already, from some of my clients on how they’re taking care of their people and I congratulate you. 

The rule of reciprocity states, if you give something to someone, they feel obligated to give something back, and I know you’ll be amazed how their kindness will show up not only to you but your customers in the future.

It is essential we all work together and support each other on this “new voyage” both in business and also personally. For some that will mean thinking outside the box and getting creative on how they do business and for others, there will be the adventure of keeping families entertained whilst juggling work commitments.

My team will be sharing with you daily on our Facebook page, one of our magic moments from the day.  And no doubt some of the antics will resonate, inspire or even just make you smile. 

JFM Facebook   |  JFM Instagram

Precision Cutting – Brand Launch

? The Dream We were honoured to deliver a full rebrand for the fabulous Amanda and Josh O’Malley at Precision Cutting. This included logo and brand mark, collateral, signage, and website.

? The Recipe

The Precision Cutting icon has been carefully crafted to represent the quality and premium precision of the steel plate construction at Precision Cutting. The custom stylised ‘P’ icon creates a visual of cutting line work which represents precision, production, and excellence. These visual identities tie to the company values which are driven to achieve the best performance. The colours and gradient we have chosen are drawn from the tempering process. The rich tones of blue convey the feeling of stability, trust, loyalty, precision, and intellect. The full stop makes the brand name an absolute statement. It gives a feeling of assurance and confidence in the quality of their work.

?The Magic

The result is a brand that their whole team and community is proud of, and not to mention a handful of new clients!

*Consistent brand communication across all their collateral and channels

*Improved company reputation and visibility in the marketplace

*Ongoing access to support with all brand updates and marketing needs

JFM Featured In ‘Canterbury Today’ Magazine

Our creative director has featured in Canterbury Today Magazine on why having a digital strategy is essential.

Canterbury Today Magazine goes out to 11,245 business decision-makers from Nelson to Waimate – do you receive a copy? We fully recommend reading her entertaining and revealing commentary on social media!

Click here to read the full issue here with our article on Page 12 

Introducing our new Facebook Advertising workshop

It is always challenging for business owners to know how to promote their business products and services. Facebook Advertising is an easy medium for business owners to use that can reach a large number of people quickly and best of all, with a detailed and measurable approach.   JFM Marketing + Design is pleased to launch our second social media workshop in August called Facebook Advertising workshop.

This course covers a variety of subjects including:

  • Setting Up Ads Manager
  • Campaign Objectives
  • Choosing A Target Audience
  • Creating A New Advert
  • Calls To Action
  • Difference Between Boosted Posts and Advertising
  • Factors of Successful Ad Campaigns
  • Budgeting
  • Terminology
  • Statistics And Insights

We will be running this workshop in two locations, Ashburton and Timaru. The Ashburton session will be held from 9am – 12pm on the 16th of August in the Rakaia Room at Community House, 44 Cass St Ashburton 7700. The Timaru session will be held from 9am – 12pm on the 17th of August at the Comfort Hotel Benvenue conference room, 16/22 Evans St, Maori Hill, Timaru.

If you would like to find out more, please read our Facebook Advertising web page. If you would like to secure your place on this course, which is already proving very popular, please head to our booking page.

Five ways to maximise Facebook for your business

Social media has become part of daily life, especially Facebook. Even if you aren’t on social media, that doesn’t mean that people aren’t talking about or looking for your business online! Having a Facebook business page is a great idea for any business and here are some tips to maximise your account.

  1. Planning and preparation is key to building engagement

Social media is all about engagement and building rapport with your customers. Creating guidelines and a plan will help you to keep producing quality content for your Facebook account. Guidelines can outline your standards relating to spelling, grammar, content you will use, subjects you will/will not talk about, your tone and how you’ll respond to complaints. Writing social media guidelines can help keep you and other contributors on track to represent your brand consistently. An annual social media calendar should include important events and dates for your company, community and country, as well as post ideas for those occasions. The best social media accounts have a lot of planning involved, it is actually quite challenging to be spontaneous and planning removes the pressure.

  1. Show off your latest work and products in different ways

Facebook has the benefit of allowing video, images and content, allowing you to promote your products how ever you like which prevents the content getting stale. For example you can write a blog post, create a competition, showcase a testimonial, show a video, write an FAQ about a product, talk about something topical within your community or upload a brochure and hopefully get your customers interacting with your posts. Always remember that Facebook is about having an ongoing conversation with your clients rather than the hard sell; keep talking to them and stay in their mind. Have fun with the different options available to you.

  1. Use targeted area advertising to get more customers

If you are happy to pay for Facebook advertising, there are some great benefits including targeted marketing. Facebook takes note of user locations, what pages they like and where they check into. This record of locations and interests is useful when advertising, as you can create an advert and specify criteria for people who should see the advert. This is especially powerful if you have a local business. For example, if you have a bobcat business that only provides services in Mid Canterbury; it doesn’t make much sense to pay to advertise to someone in London. You can also target people manually based on age, interests and behaviours. This means you only spend money advertising to relevant potential clients.

  1. Create generic replies for frequently asked questions

Facebook is making it easier for business pages with regular updates and improvements. One such improvement is the ability to set up automatic acknowledgement responses to messages, helping business owners to quickly respond even if they are busy at the time. People using social media expect a quick response and this helps you to meet their expectations. To set this up, go to your business page, click on settings, select messaging, under response assistant click “Yes” next to “send instant replies to anyone who messages your Page”. To change your instant reply message, click Change, update the message and click save. To turn the message off, simply change the “Yes” back to “No”.

  1. Always separate your personal and professional life

Always remember that social media used for business purposes should be kept professional and polite at all times. You should make sure any personal Facebook accounts are kept private, so you can relax about any photos or posts on your personal page. Facebook has made it easier to access your privacy shortcuts. Look in the top right hand corner of the screen, click on the padlock button, expand the options and make sure “Friends” is ticked for the option “Who can see my stuff” rather than “Public”. There are other security options you can take, accessible in the expanding menus.

Remember, social media is about building engagement and strong relationships, which results in sales over time. Give these Facebook business page options a go and tell us how you went. If you need any help putting any of your social media goals into practice or would like to learn more about social media, give us a call at JFM Marketing and Design.

Mail Chimp and Facebook Ads, together at last!

Mail Chimp is an online tool to build attractive emails to send to your customers. The system templates allow people to create well-designed eDM’s (electronic direct mail) to send to their email list of customers.

Mail Chimp has now partnered with Facebook for Ad Campaigns. This means, if you already use Mail Chimp and are thinking of using Facebook Advertising, life just got a whole lot easier! You can use the same interface you know and love to build your Facebook Ads.

This relationship is a great idea for small business, as users of Mail Chimp will already have their photos and customer details loaded into the system. The reporting tools of both platforms are integrated, so you get smarter data to give you an idea of return on investment.

For more information on this feature, read the blog post from Mail Chimp here. If you would like to use email or Facebook Advertising as a tool for your business but would prefer we implement it for you, give us a call at JFM Marketing & Design.

Does Facebook advertising work?

Does Facebook advertising work?

With over 2 million Kiwis active daily on Facebook, and together with some sophisticated advertising features recently added to their platform, Facebook has emerged as a highly effective and powerful advertising medium for all businesses.

It’s very accessible to small businesses and now supports features that allow some very nice targeting options including localised geo targeting down to 3km. Facebook advertising is ideal for small businesses wanting to drive relevant traffic to their website for the purpose of generating leads and sales enquiries. The cost of advertising on Facebook is also very competitive compared to other forms of online advertising and can produce some attractive cost per conversion rates.

Facebook Ads work really well for mobiles
It’s also a great medium through which to target audiences on mobile devices as Facebook provides a great mobile user experience and this is reflected by 90% on NZ users now accessing Facebook daily on their mobiles.

How much do Facebook ads cost
You can advertise on FB from as little as $5 per day and having a big organic presence in FB is not a prerequisite, although you do require a FB page. Facebook advertising is highly complimentary to running Google ads and an ideal channel to extend your online presence. Its fast becoming a must target channel for generating leads and enquiries and you should at least have some of your budget dedicated to FB ads. Boost your organic reach with ads Many of those businesses that invested heavily in their organic Facebook programs are now frustrated and struggling with much lower organic reach. The advertising options provide the best way to more comprehensively reach followers and other target audiences.

Flexible audience targeting
Options FB provides a good demographic spread with over 50% of users being over the age of 40 and its slightly more female centric than male. Below are some of the audience targeting options and these can be used in combinations to better reach your audiences:

• Location (by area/city)
• Age brackets
• Gender
• Language
• Relationship/marital status
• Parental status
• Income
• Interests (lifestyle and entertainment interests)
• Behaviours (range of options based on online behaviours)
• Custom audiences (like Remarketing lists and email databases)
• Connections ( including followers that have liked your page)

Facebook marketing tips…

Facebook marketing tips to help grow your reach…

Know your Facebook audience
Use Facebook Insights to find out the demographic breakdown of your audience. This data is useful as it gives you insight about content that resonates the most with your audience, and what communication style your audience responds to the best.

Don’t focus on selling on Facebook
One of the main reasons why Facebook is changing its algorithm is because more and more businesses are posting sales-driven content, as opposed to resourceful content that will provide value to their audience. Facebook is trying to steer away from this model, as they want to make Facebook’s user experience more enjoyable. Therefore, if businesses are prompted to change their Facebook marketing strategy, there will be more valuable content given to their audiences. 

Post your best content on Facebook
Facebook wants people to see only the best content on their News Feed. Which means that in order for a business to see engagement on their posts, choose content that has been successful on other social media channels or your business’ content marketing platform. Content that has the most retweets, clicks, and traffic will more likely also do well on Facebook (and remember the golden rule: the best content is the content that provides your followers value).

Empower your employees to engage with your Facebook page
One of the simplest way to increase your Facebook organic reach is to empower your employees to engage with your Facebook page. The more engagement, likes, shares, clicks, your Facebook posts receive the more you can increase your Facebook organic reach.

Don’t forget to respond
If you want to receive engagement on your Facebook Page, you need to also engage with your audience. If you receive a comment, reply to that comment; if you receive a post on your business Page, reply back to that post. Adding the human touch can help your Facebook presence drastically.