As advocates of good copywriting, we couldn’t believe our ears when we heard that book chain Waterstone’s is denouncing the apostrophe in their company name. Giving the reason that ‘in a digital world of URLs and email addresses, a more versatile and practical spelling was required’; Waterstone’s will now be known as Waterstones.
We’re up on our high horses here! For a company that sells books and encourages reading, surely they can’t spell their own organisation name incorrectly. If McDonald’s and Sainsbury’s can cope, there is no problem.
We can understand that Waterstone’s is a brand name now, rather than traditionally known after its founder, Tim Waterstone. So we can see that for their website address, having an apostrophe isn’t essential, but nor have they ever been in urls. And apostrophes can create broken links on website headings as they are not picked up by the website’s coding system. But to alter the company name and spell it incorrectly within the copy on their website is just not on!
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It’s always good to hear other experts’ opinions on website developments, so we attended an event this weekend with The Chartered Institute of Marketing.
Marketing trainer, Richard Groom, offered insights for writing for the web, reiterating the differences between writing for print materials, and producing copy for websites. And SEO Consultant Andrew Goode, presented on the importance of search engine optimisation.
It was also useful to speak to other marketers during the breaks to find out what’s important to their organisations. We came away with complete confidence that we’re bang up to speed on website copywriting and SEO. Read more…
Here at Marketing Zone we’re keen to support professional development. So we’re pleased that our copywriter, Stephanie, has completed her first year of The Chartered Institute of Marketing’s Continued Professional Development (CPD) Programme.
The Chartered CPD Programme provides a framework for professional marketers to manage their ongoing development. Stephanie attended events and lectures, and took part in community work and private study to accumulate 35 CPD hours over the course of a year.
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WMS Technology tasked us to help launch NodalSure, their online compliance management tool to fifteen leading construction organisations in Hong Kong. With just seven weeks from start to finish, the heat was on, the timings were tight, but there was no stopping us.
After the launch, Managing Director, John Morgan said, “I found the action plan from Marketing Zone following our meeting and remember thinking how on earth are we going to produce all the material in time. I shouldn’t have worried. Team Marketing Zone kicked into action and we had everything we needed – branding, a website, banner graphics, business cards, presentations and a twenty page brochure. The visit went like clockwork and the marketing material you produced was a major contributing factor.”
If you have any colleagues who are involved with major construction projects that you think could benefit from NodalSure software, get in touch with John. NodalSure is currently deployed by BAA for the Heathrow T5C developments.
A simple question. Marketing agencies like ours often assume that clients need and want blogs. We forget that they might not be comfortable creating content and might not even be sure they have content they want to share. So, when we have a client that stops and asks us a simple question like, “why should my business have a blog?” it’s a good time to stop and get back to some basics.
For starters, blogs are not another way to get your carefully crafted messages out to unsuspecting customers. That’s what ads, brochures and a lot of other communications materials can and should be doing for you. People want to see sales messages where they expect to be presented with them. And that seems only fair.
Blogs are where you can start conversations with your customers and your customers can start conversations with you. It’s a less formal and often less rigidly branded or business-like setting. For example, you could put up a picture and a short paragraph talking about a recent event you went to, and the things you learned about your industry at that event. Your colleagues, customers and competitors can join in by talking about what happened to them at the same event or even ask why you weren’t at a different better event. Or, you could talk about an innovation that’s changing one of your products. You might include graphs, photos or links to another site that’s working with your business. At least once a week you should post content. You could even, with his or her permission, post a letter, comments or a review from a customer. Whatever your business does, it has an audience that’s interested in it and that’s who your blog should aim to talk to.
Blogs can give your business some personality and they’re a great way of getting other members of your team or people from other parts of the business involved in something new – something that different groups and department can all use.
Blogs are evolving and many businesses are using them to support their Search Engine Optimisation efforts. They can also be linked to twitter and a range of other social sites. Over the next weeks, Marketing Zone will be offering regular tips on business blogs. Our goal will be to share some of our experiences, and find out what you think.
