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CONTENT TYPE: Article | TOPIC: Writing

Email marketing has rapidly become all about quality: the quality of the sender's content and the quality of the sender's email addresses. Keeping the content simple and valuable is the key to crafting a quality email message. Trying to cram too much useless information into a message will leave the recipient with little choice but to abandon it with a quick click of the "next" or "delete" button, or even worse—the dreaded spam button. Below, a few tips for boosting quality when creating email marketing content.

CONTENT TYPE: Article | TOPIC: None

Changes in the way customers receive and process information via social-networking sites, mobile phones, and the Internet, combined with shrinking margins, deteriorating customer loyalty, and increased demand for marketing accountability, suggest the need for a new approach to customer-centricity. A. G. Lafley, CEO of Proctor & Gamble, signaled this reconfirmation best with his resounding cry, "The customer is boss." There are four best practices that stand out regarding customer centricity: passion, reversing value chain, building relationships and experiences, and fostering purchase readiness.

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Deservedly or not, industry these days is accused incessantly of greenwashing. It's not surprising, for several reasons, that industry isn't trusted to make truthful green marketing claims and provide information that is credible, straightforward, and useful. So how do we restore trust in industry's green marketing claims and eco-labels? Can industry get its act together and bolster its credibility on its own? Or does it need help from other groups?

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As the Web has evolved, websites have become diverse, particularly in how they are constructed. A wide variety of programming languages and design techniques are now used to build websites. Some of those coding and design techniques are detrimental to search-engine positioning. And if your website uses any of them, it's probably time to build a new website, or at least rebuild in a format that is better suited for search-engine positioning.

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Color is powerful. It's an important personal-branding tool, so use it wisely and consistently to support your personal-branding activities. To make the most of your color, follow these five rules.

CONTENT TYPE: Article | TOPIC: Social Media Marketing

Twitter may be the all the rage, but it's not yet time to pull the plug on your corporate blog and stop monitoring all the blogs where people talk about your brand. The emergence of Twitter as a hyper-popular social-media tool for marketing is not the death knell of the conventional blog; if anything, it highlights just how necessary blogs still are.

CONTENT TYPE: Article | TOPIC: None

Consumers have begun to suffer from "green fatigue." It's not hard to understand why when you can buy organic gummy bears and free-range beef jerky nestled between the six-packs and the rolling paper in a convenience store. For your green message to be heard and translated into sales, you have to make your message relevant not only to the fate of the planet but also to the fate of the people living on it. The question is, How?

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The focus group has lost favor in recent years as marketers seek a more experiential process for gathering customer insights. Although it has lost some luster, the focus group still holds the potential for providing powerful, usable insights. The trick to moving it from something parodied on sitcoms to a credible research tool again is to change how we think about and execute focus groups.

CONTENT TYPE: Article | TOPIC: Writing

You just sent out a request for proposal (RFP). Will it give you the responses you want? Will it set the stage for a great long-term relationship? An RFP is a key step in engaging an outside marketing partner. Don't underestimate its importance. It's not simply a straightforward business communication; it's a brand opportunity. If you're seeking a smart, strategic partner, your RFP should reflect that. Here are seven guidelines to help you create a great RFP—or what I like to call a "really fine publication."

CONTENT TYPE: Article | TOPIC: None

It's tough out there. Budgets are being cut. Markets are shrinking. Prospects aren't buying the way they used to. But you can still sell effectively. You just have to think differently. The message is important, but it's effective only if the right people read it. The process that you use to present your message is what makes the difference. Here are eight tips for securing meetings with the right executives.

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In every email campaign, you should have direct links to specific pages on your website, helping you gauge and track what's moving the meter in your emails. If you're using a proper email service provider (ESP), you should be able to easily see in real time who clicked on those links at what time and on what day.

CONTENT TYPE: Article | TOPIC: Social Media Marketing

Facebook Pages are good for building your brand and creating conversations, allowing users to get more deeply connected with your business. Recent changes have improved their functionality. Check out the following strategies for leveraging some of the key features.