The Marketing Mix

THE MARKETING MIX

This is a document I created to assist our customers on the advertising and marketing side of the business. - It will only be shown be here for a little bit.   As I do not like the blog formatting on this document.

This ‘marketing mix’, is the equivalent of a fisherman’s guide – a person who takes you to the best place on unfamiliar water, shows you where to fish, and has some ideas about the best flies to use. The guide doesn’t do any fishing but makes sure that the fisherman has a more enjoyable and successful time than you would on your own.

In simple, factual terms, to provide a good understanding of what a good marketing brief is, and should also accomplish three main objectives.

First, it should give any marketing team and the client a realistic view of what the advertising & marketing needs are, and is likely to achieve. Second, it should provide a clear understanding of the people that the advertising must address, and finally, it needs to give clear direction on the message to which the target audience seems most likely to be susceptible.

Quite simply put, the best advertising, represents a partnership between the client, the advertising and marketing creatives, and the consumer.

This is fundamental to a successful marketing campaign.

Finding the ‘right solution’ rather than any party being ‘right’ themselves, are much more likely to produce more effective advertising campaigns.

That process is seldom, however, as straightforward as it should be.

INTRODUCTION

Peter Ducker one of the best thinkers in the world has previously stated “that the purpose of the business is not simply to make money, but to create and keep customers” both in the short and long term.

“Most companies fail not in their attempts to be innovative or creative, most of them fail because they undervalue the importance of Professional Selling”
- Sir John Harvey - Jones

“If you want to succeed, you’d better look as if you mean business”
- Jeanne Holm

We are in business of selling products and services.

And that’s our responsibility, we give to our clients

With advertising it’s generally about branding and a single message to market, using as little amount of words and images, as possible to communicate this to the customer.

Marketing is different it’s about planning and ‘the management process responsible for identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer requirements profitably’ – British Chartered Institute of marketing.

This definition if read carefully, covers just about every aspect of business, from what you pay for your raw materials right through to how you make, price, distribute, advertise and sell your product.

SERVICES AND PRODUCTS: “THE MARKETING MIX”

Advertising and marketing is not hard to understand, despite the best efforts of advertising agencies and marketing theorists with a penchant for quasi-academic jargon. Like all professions there is a wish to dignify the craft with a little mystery for the benefit of the end users and clients. But really it’s about applying commonsense. Nonetheless, success does not come without great attention to detail. In few businesses, can so many things go wrong so quickly if you don’t pay attention!

Once you know learned where you are now, and where you would like to be eventually, you have to determine how you get there.

You have to plan.

Any plan is better than no plan!

Hierarchy of marketing thinking

From the beginning…

From where Davmark can help…

STRATEGY AND PLANNING

Davmark delivers persuasive strategic marketing services including specific marketing action plans and strategic guides to address a variety of marketing challenges including:-

• evaluating existing marketing budgets

•  creating new marketing programmes

•  creating or increasing brand value

•  improving marketing communications

•  improving customer and channel satisfaction and loyalty

•  developing new products / markets

•  defining web strategies

•  increasing revenues and protect revenue streams

•  improving or optimising customer base

MARKETING STRATEGY

A marketing strategy identifies customer groups which a particular business can better serve than its target competitors, and tailors product offerings, prices, distribution, promotional efforts, and services toward those market segments.

Ideally, the strategy should address unmet customer needs that offer adequate potential profitability. A good strategy helps a business focus on the target markets it can serve best.

In highly competitive markets, companies must be able to integrate customer, channel partner and company needs. Balancing the different needs is not easy and costly missteps may occur quickly. In addition to customer, channel and company needs, a company has to watch the competition. So how can your company succeed and thrive in a competitive market?

There is no single strategy that works for everybody. Different companies need different strategies depending on the marketing and business goals they want (or need) to achieve; the strength and weaknesses of the company; the competitiveness of the industry; and general industry and market trends.

Yet, a clear understanding of these issues will lead to strategies that are focused and can be implemented. Hence, these strategies guide you in achieving your short- and long-term goals.

Your organisation’s performance is closely linked to its marketing strategies.
Your strategy must be unique in order to address the needs specific to your customers, channel partners, competitors and the company itself.

Davmark delivers persuasive strategic marketing services including specific marketing action plans and strategic guides to address a variety of marketing challenges including:

• increasing revenues and protect revenue streams

• increasing customer and channel satisfaction and loyalty

• improving positioning

• creating or increasing brand value

• improving marketing communications

• deepening market penetration

• developing new markets

• optimising product development

• defining web strategies

• obtaining buy-in for your projects

• helping business, marketing, sales, and product planning and decisions

• seizing new product opportunities

• guiding company start-up

• answering competitive threats

• improving or optimising customer base

Davmark as a service through being employed to undertaking a marketing strategy review can deliver a detailed independent analysis of the current position and future outlook for your business, clarification of key objectives and an assessment of successful and unsuccessful strategies. The review normally also assess the implementation process itself for our clients.

This service is critical if a business is to ensure that it is following a pre-determined direction.

Marketing strategy:

Unsure of what direction to take? Losing momentum? Let us put your company back on track. Speak to us about pursuing different markets, changing the corporate image, or anything else that may be affecting your results.

“Anyone who says businessmen deal in facts, not fiction, has never read old five-year projections”

Malcom Forbes

MARKETING RESEARCH

Davmark can also arrange for marketing research, this method is always recommended by most marketers.

This is a specialist area and we would normally call on the skills of one of our business alliance partners to undertake theses works.

A work of caution for our clients with major innovative products or led solutions.

Marketing Research discourages major innovation!

WHY?

Relying on customers to give development of new products has sever, limitations. This is because customers have difficulty articulating needs beyond the realm of their own experience.

Ideas gained form Marketing Research, as compared with ‘Science Push’.

‘Technology innovation is the process that ‘realises’ market demands that were previously unknown’.

‘We don’t ask consumers what they want. They don’t know. Instead we apply our brain power to what they need, and will want, and make sure we’re there, ready.’
- Akio Morita, Sony Corporation

CREATIVE DESIGN

“In the modern world of business, it is useless to be a creative original thinker unless you can also sell what you create. Management cannot be expected to recognize a good idea unless it is presented to them by a good salesman”

David M. Ogilvy

Creativity is not as many people believe, a process of invention from nothing. Instead, it’s a painstaking exercise in reduction, of removing all the bits that don’t look like a good idea.

Memorable, original, effective:
Successful creative marketing is all about making an impact.

Your campaigns are not only fighting for attention against the campaigns of your competitors, but are also up against those of every other business out there.

Davmark tries to ensure your marketing has to deliver something extra. It has to creatively engage your audience to deliver results by:

Engaging and exciting customers’ imaginations so that they have a clear vision of what is on offer and respond.

Davmark understands the need for engineered demanding products with elaborate and a complexity of features and benefits provided to the customer, but with the quest for simpler words, finding the essentials, and that way down deep at the heart of the extraordinary complexity is the …. extraordinary simplicity to be conveyed.

Simple ideas have more impact than complicated ideas. They are more memorable in the short term, they are easier to pass on by word of mouth, and in the longer term they endure.
Simplicity is the hardest to achieve.
Simplicity does not mean dumb.

Single minded communication works better than that which attempts to communicate a number of ideas simultaneously.

Communicating in an appropriate language that delivers the key messages about the product and or service you are selling.

Simplicity should not to be confused with the amount of body copy text to be included.

With the use of advertising terms can, Davmark both act as your accounts director and planner for your projects.

An accounts ‘director’ is the one who runs the account and brings more of a business perspective, while the planner has more of a consumer’s orientation in mind, both working on the strategic positioning and share responsibility for working with creative teams.

Davmark have the ability of its planners to look at the same information as everyone else and see something different is invaluable. This part of the creative stage is where it’s necessary to take information of all sorts, shuffle it around, and rearrange it into new patterns until something interesting emerges. Although this is not the exclusive province of planners, with a need to take the wider view in analysing and solving advertising problems.

Davmark allows its planners the ‘luxury’ of some distance from the client, whenever required, which is essential to require a balance and insightful vision.

Davmark employs planners who are strong both strategically and creatively. Planners also are architects and guardians of their client’s brands, the detectives who uncovered long hidden clues in the data and generally coerced consumers into revealing their inner secrets, and warriors who stood up an fought for the integrity of their strategic vision.

What Davmark set out to do is to guide account planners to be able to be honest and clear about consumer response without sniffling creativity.
David Slade – Managing director

BRANDING

A brand is at the heart of what you are and what you do; it describes your business and how you position yourself in the marketplace.

Davmark can assist our clients create new brands for clients and also take existing brands and develop them into more contemporary forms.

Davmark combine brand-building strategies with real business generating activities, looking at both internal and external factors affecting our client’s future success.

Corporate branding:

A strong, consistent brand is fundamental to the success of an organisation. Davmark can either create and develop a new identity or give your current branding a complete face-lift (without surgery).

In summary, day to day, branding seems simple, but your brand is properly a blend of elements, with relationships between them as important as the elements themselves.

Can you really test the elements in isolation?
Would it mean anything?

Branding is clearly a vital part of the marketing process, and since branding in the proper sense of the word includes defining your target audience, working out how best to appeal to and engage with them, finding and consistently communicating a point of difference to the competition, and, indeed, adding value to your business over time, Davmark believe most businesses will fail without embracing this aspect of marketing. No need, perhaps, to “spend a fortune”, but neglect it at your peril.

Too often, design is seen as the decorative part of branding, when in reality it is intrinsic to every successful product.

A key stage of the design process is locating a consumer need and then analysing what kind of product or service will not just meet this need, but supersede expectations.

It is important never to make assumptions. Douglas Adams wrote in his novel Mostly Harmless: “A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.”

Brand owners must also avoid underestimating the talents of designers. Designers are frequently treated as suppliers, rather than collaborators.

Most start up SME’s, it all started with a simple business idea, and finding a simple logo to use, to represent their company / service……

No matter how good an idea, unless there is a clear and viable route to market, it will always be a struggle.

With some people still under the impression that company branding was just the ‘logo’!

ADVERTISING

“The art of advertising is making an advert for the masses. But designed to be talking to them one at a time - individually”. It has to be relevant to them, a connection with its audience. “The audience is not listening to what you are saying. They are listening for what it means to them”

The principle of advertising should not be a one way communication, as ads are normally made, but the most effective are as a two-way communication and creating campaigns that are designed to engender relationships and interaction with its target consumers.

Advertising is merely a means to a desired end – a person thinking or behaving differently.
Everything an agency does should be geared toward getting into peoples heads to figure out what they currently think and understand how best to influence them.

It this perspective that of the consumers, in whose heads the real work of the advertising will be done. Their options have to be understood before they can be manipulated, and the consumer research is meant to unlock the hidden truths that may define the nature and content of the message. As for the message itself, the role of creativity is to gain entry to the consumers’ minds and act as a catalyst for the desired thought process and change of option or behaviour. And the client’s business, or commercial, perspective defines the precise action that consumers are to be asked to take.

The process is seldom, however, as straightforward as it should be.

“The obligation of advertising to sell” – David Ogilvy on Advertising

The best advertising solutions tend to demonstrate the application of common sense and creativity to research, the combination of rational analysis and lateral interpretation, the ascendancy of subjectivity over objectivity and simplicity over complexity, the positive energy that is created by combining several different perspectives, and the celebration of change, uncertainty, and risk as powerful, constructive forces.

Another powerful and underused method is to allow the customer to make up their own minds about the meaning. The participate by figuring it out for them selves. Simply, paint a picture with the communication, join up a few of the dots for its audience and leave the rest for them selves, thus allowing them to participate.

Your customer normally gets bombarded with ads what it is, and what to think, and small difference in the ad is good and refreshing.

The best connection with the customer is to be seen to be attractive, interesting: attributes like respect, intelligence, wit, humility, and an interest in the other person. By asking questions instead of making statements.

Another tip is to use plain old fashion honesty, a much undervalued and under used commonality to connect with the customer, this has been shown to increase you brand worth and it’s been demonstrated that your customers will give you a second chance.

“Advertising is not a right, it’s a privilege” – Howard Gossage (one of the first advertising men to stand against the normal one-way communication method the industry were use to.

The advertising agency and client should consider themselves lucky for any attention that a person pays to their advertising. Advertising is like a person that you meet at a party. You meet, you deciside very quickly whether you like him or her, and if you do, you stay and listen to what the individual has to say. If you don’t, you spot a long-lost friend on the other side of the room and move on. Your new acquaintance could have given you the most important piece of information you have ever heard, but if he or she had already bored you or insulted you, then you would not be around to hear it. So it is with advertising.

The reality:

Thirty seconds on television.

A few second when a person is flicking through the magazine.

That’s all the time there is to create a connection and engage a person sufficiently for them to pay attention to the message.

How do you do that?

By adopting the same human characteristics that make a stranger at a party seem attractive and interesting: attributes like respect, intelligent, wit, humility, and an interest in the other person. By asking questions instead of making statements.

For advertising the first duty is not to the old sales curve, it is to the audience – In other words, if you have the audience’s attention then the sales curve will follow.

“In bating a trap with cheese, always leave room for the mouse” - saki

Making sure your marketing message stands out has never been more important.

Davmark’s strong, distinctive and energetic approach makes sure our clients’ campaigns are unmissable. Originality, creativity and effectiveness are the criteria for your success and ours.

‘Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted, and the trouble is I don’t know which half’. Originally said over 100 years ago,

Sir Alan Sugar recently reiterated this comment in an episode of BBC TVs UK version of ‘The Apprentice’.

It seems that for many advertisers, the inherent conflict between the forces of art and commerce in advertising is difficult to resolve. This ought not to be an issue, as the desired end of advertising should be commercial, and, are merely one of the means to that end (with different roles, there should thus be no reason to confuse the two). Unfortunately, not every one in the business sees it that way. Those who regard advertising as an art form have somewhat arrogant “if-I-create-it-they-will-come” attitude to consumers (and, for that matter, a somewhat nave view of what it’s like being a “real” artist), and that is not always conducive to relationship building.

Art is a vehicle that can make an ad more distinctive, more memorable, and at its best, carry a message in such a way that it will be more effective in influencing its audience. But that’s only at its best, and it only happens when its creator, knows that the artistic and commercial elements have to live together in an almost symbiotic relationship. If one starts to dominate at the expense of the other, the relationship becomes more parasitic than symbiotic, and its effectiveness, both in the short and long term, will be compromised.

There is also a larger and more scarier group, whose definition of advertising is more closely resembles that of a science. This view of advertising-as-science is counterproductive to the aim of embracing consumers, and it is also based on some erroneous assumptions about how science is actually practiced, because science itself changed. It is perilous not only because advertising and the human mid by their very nature defy such scientific analysis, but also because those who adhere to these principles, like many ‘artists’ are basing their philosophy and process on an entirely erroneous view on how scientists practice science.

This scientific method was based on a model of how the world works that was developed in the seventeenth century by Sir Isaac Newton, Descartes, and others. Their approach was based on the belief that any object of study, physical things or systems alike, can be stripped down to its component parts and reassembled, the underlying assumption being that the workings of the whole can be understood through comprehending the function and contribution of each individual piece. This is termed the machine model, which Market Wheatley – Leadership and the new science, describes as “Characterized by materialism and reductionism – a focus on things rather than relationships and search … for the basic building blocks of matter”

In this kind of science, everything has its place. Everything is separate from everything else. Everything obeys a law. And knowledge of those laws, everything can be predicted. It’s objective, it’s simple, it’s orderly, and constituent piece by constituent piece, it’s easy to control. In the end, it is the illusion of control that makes the Newtonian universe such an attractive place and has led to the adoption of its principles way beyond the scientific community. Advertising is is no exception. The scientific method of advertising development divides agencies into separate “disciplines” and puts consumers into neat little compartments where they can be targeted: nonusers, occasional users, heavy users, believers, nonbelievers, household income, pioneers, early adapters, early mass-market, and mass market targets.

There is a vital role to be played by research in advertising (when it is done right), but that to regard advertising as a science that can be built entirely on facts and measured, even predicted, is perilous indeed.

Consumers are passive recipients of both research and advertising; both are done to them as opposed to with them. Ideas are dissected until every component part is understood, but like a dissect rat, they are then very hart to put back together so that they work as a a living, breathing whole.

This puts a barrier between the client and there customers in achieving a direct communication between the two.

Another Davmark warning we would give is the use of poor advertising research that is sometimes carried out, good research is pure gold, but normally much less useful, and often counterproductive.

We are so busy measuring public opinion that we forget we can mould it. We are so busy listening to statistics we forget that we can create them.
Bill Bernbach

For many people, the first answer that springs to mind may seem too obvious, and it may be obvious, because it is actually right. This is sometimes viewed with fear, with which most people regard such obvious answers to the solution. Feeling that a complex problem deserves a complex answer, and that somehow if they choose the solution that has 100 people in a room nodding their heads and saying “Duh!, Of Course!” then they are not doing their jobs properly. But almost all the best advertising campaigns in the past have been based on ideas so obvious, that it’s almost embarrassing for the agency in proposing this type of solution.

Leo Burnett once said that “ if you can’t turn yourselves into a consumer, then you shouldn’t be in the advertising business at all” and that still applies today.

If you understand the very important distinction between the concept of effectiveness, which is broadly defined as “doing the right thing”, and efficiency, which is about “doing something the right way”. The advertising industry too often preaches effectiveness while actually pursing efficiency, transforming “a real world of difficult decisions and uncertain evidence into a comforting simplified one where indices of performance are hard facts and acting on them will reduce risk as much as can be hoped for.” We are not attempting to do things right. We’re merely trying to avoid doing things wrong.

George Orwell once defined advertising as “the rattling of a stick in a swill bucket.”

Arguments aside, advertising can be a very expensive business, so at Davmark we’ve sat down and worked out a way to make it more cost effective to a client base, often new to advertising or promotional design.

It could be said there is a lot of waste in creating any marketing campaign, now most of this pales into total insignificance when spending millions of pounds, but what if you’re not?

What if every penny you spend is critical?

You wouldn’t want to waste any money, or time, would you?

We don’t think so…

Media advertising:

One advert or a series, poster campaign, newspapers or magazines. You have a message, we’ll deliver it creatively and with impact. We’ll look after the whole campaign taking the pressure away from you.

Magazine Ads

Slick and glossy magazine ads can bring a marketing campaign to life when it reinforces the brand identity and advertising campaign that it is in conjunction with.

Other benefits if magazine advertising are the continual effects that it can have for months to come, as magazine have a tradition of having a longer shelf life than other forms of print medium.

Dimensions
Each magazine has different fees and specs that adjust the size and colours available.

Newspaper Ads

Newspapers can be a great resource to get information efficiently and economically, while still having the ability to craft a well designed ad that reinforces your brand identity.

Davmark can design an ad mat that your company or organization can hand off to the local paper to use for recruitment ads, simple notices, and greetings.

The ad mat can be designed to have several different uses, and is an effective way to promote your brand consistently, even with a simple ad.

DIRECT MARKETING

Direct marketing is: any advertising activity which creates and exploits a direct relationship between you and your prospective or customer as an individual”.

What is the purpose of direct marketing? Davmark’s view, it is quite simple:
to isolate your prospects and customers as individuals and build a continuing relationship with them – to their benefit and your greater profit.

If you understand this need for investment, this need to build a continuing relationship, you have an immense advantage over those who don’t. What’s more, by building this relationship, you can study how your customers behave over a period of time: discover which offers which individual respond to. In this way, you can establish the value of an individual to you over the ‘lifetime’ of that individual’s relationship with your company.

This gives you another advantage and that’s the ability to test. To measure the response from particular individuals to particular messages, at particular times in particular media. You can find out what works and what doesn’t. Moreover, having done so you can conduct further tests and constancy improve the effectiveness of your activities. You can spend your money where it does most good.

Controllability benefit

Direct marketing as also the appeal of controllability – First, the content and timing of your selling messages can be controlled. Second, the costs can be controlled, and the results predicted.

Direct marketing you are in control and messages are uniform and go out to predetermined numbers to precisely targeted groups. They produce responses that can be measured.

This leads to the second major benefit: that you can predict future responses and thus how much money you need to achieve a given task. This is rarely the case with some other methods of promotion.

So…

If your remit is awareness, acquisition, retention or loyalty, Davmark undertake to deliver results-driven, cost-effective results through highly successful campaigns and strategy.

Direct mail marketing: Do you need a one-off direct mailshot or a complete campaign?

Ask us how we can help you grab attention.

From designing and producing the mailshot, to distribution and fulfilment, we will see your direct marketing through from start to finish.

What does direct marketing differ from other disciplines like Advertising?

Advertising

Usually speaks to people en mass, not as individuals. Although today the vast majority of ads do allow people to respond, especially by going to a website, advertising does not usually aim above all for an immediate response. It seeks to influence customers so that they choose your brand when they reach the point of decision.

Sales promotion

Is normally designed to get action at the point of sale. Often it is uses the same methods as direct marketing. It can also lists. But rarely is there a continuing effort to build a lasting relationship with respondents by exploiting the full possibilities of a database.

Public relations

Employs media controlled by others to create a favourable climate of opinion. It too can create a database, for instance of replies to editorials, which are usually of very good quality.

Packaging

Packaging protects and draws attention to the product. It can also strengthen peoples belief in your product, reassure them, make offers, and collect names cheaply for the database.

Experiential marketing

This was once a called ‘events’, this certainly creates opportunities for building relationships, although few are doing this with it.

Not many practitioners appreciate its full possibilities.

COLLATERAL MANAGEMENT

Creating, delivering and overseeing the ongoing management of marketing communication assets can place significant demands on resources, tying up time with often repetitive tasks that also often cost more than they have to.

With our collateral management service, it suddenly becomes a refreshingly easy operation. One that’s also hugely efficient and highly cost effective, too.

Manage digital print, collateral and Email & SMS campaigns direct from your desktop
Accessing the system via the web from anywhere in the world, authorised internal customers – such as different departments, branches and franchises – can order exactly what they need, when they need it.

They can do this quickly and easily by changing creative elements and customising offer content on pre–defined and uploaded templates. The prices of individual items are clear to see to enable easy budget management.

With our instant responsiveness to individual customer requests and exceptional turnaround times for digital communication requirements, you can guarantee immediate reaction to and fulfilment of orders. These could be for printed or digital marketing collateral and other essential business communication materials, such as promotional products, banners and even media bookings.

Our collateral management service is ideal for the creation, delivery and management of marketing communication assets, such as:

Direct Mail
Advertisements
Promotional leaflets or posters
Email newsletters
Business stationery
HR Management
POS
Merchandise

PRINT COLLATERAL

Brochures, POS, signage, events: whatever gets your name known in the best and most cost-effective way, we have the expertise and know-how to achieve it.

Davmark understand that every point of contact with the consumer has to be part of, and reinforce, your overall brand message.

A BIT ABOUT COLOUR

Your computer, scanner, digital camera and monitor create images using combinations of just three colours: Red, Green and Blue (RGB).

Printing presses use four different colours to print these images – Cyan (light blue), Magenta (pinky red), Yellow and BlacK (or CMYK – also known as Process Colour). At some stage of production, RGB images must be converted to CMYK. Conversions from RGB to CMYK are best done in packages like Photoshop or Photopaint and you should do this before sending print files to the printer. If you don’t perform the conversion yourself, when printers get your file, this will be process a standard profile RGB to CMYK conversion meaning that colours may look washed out.

Traditional printers often use Pantone® Spot colours when printing work. Spot colours are mixed like paint and printed one at a time. Or more quality printers use Process Colour, all Pantone® Spot colours must be converted to their CMYK equivalent before this file is issued.

Specifying conversion to process colours at the print stage will not comply with the printers with our requirements.

If you don’t convert spot colours to process, then an extra separation printing plate may be produced when the order is processed. This means objects may not appear on your printed job and may result in you incurring unnecessary costs. You can check your document by printing ‘separations’ on your desktop printer – see the help file that came with your application for more details. If anything other than a cyan, magenta, yellow and black separation prints, then you’ve got unwanted colours that you need to convert. This is also a good way of checking knockout/ overprinting settings.

Some RGB and Spot colours do not have a direct CMYK equivalent – the technical term for this is “out of gamut”. If you have chosen a colour that is out of gamut, your software will choose the closest equivalent CMYK colour, which may be very different from the colour you intended. This is something that everyone has to put up with, so for best results, stick with colours from approved colour charts.

You’ll get best reproduction from colours that are made up from one or two inks (i.e.
magenta and cyan etc). When using lighter shades, avoid tints that contain less than 10% of either Cyan, Magenta, Yellow or Black, as they usually print much lighter than they appear on screen and you may be disappointed with the outcome. For best results, use tints containing 10% to 30% where possible.
Try to avoid large areas of the same colour too – that’s where colour variation becomes most noticeable. Best to use textures or images instead. And vignettes, or gradient fills are best avoided – they have a tendency to show ‘banding’ and look unprofessional.

WORKING WITH PHOTOGRAPHS

If you are scanning photographs yourself, save them as either EPS or TIFF files as this will preserve the colour and clarity of your images. If you are scanning a previously printed item, such as a magazine photo, you will need to ‘de-screen’ the image, blurring it slightly to avoid a moiré effect (see your scanning software manual for more details).

GIF or JPEG formats compress the image and actually discard information, causing colour shifts and blurriness. Don’t use either of these file formats – they may actually print in black and white and you won’t like the results.

When you are scanning, consider the final size your image will be used at. Always scan photographs at 300dpi at the size you are going to use them. There’s no point scanning a postage stamp at 300dpi and then blowing it up to a A4 size – use your scanning software to help you calculate the output resolution. Conversely, scanning photographs at more than 300dpi will have little or no effect on the actual printed quality and will unnecessarily increase file size and processing time.

Don’t enlarge or reduce your scanned images in your drawing/vector software (such as Illustrator) – it’s always best to use an image-editing application such as Photoshop for this task.

Be cautious when converting photographs from RGB to CMYK. Davmark can help.

WORKING WITH TEXT

When working with small text, it’s best not to use colours which contain more than one ink. All printing presses have a tiny variation in the positioning of the different colour printing plates. It’s fine to use coloured text in headlines or type above, say, 12 point, but below that the blurring will be noticable and won’t look too hot. The same thing happens when you knock white text out of a coloured background made from more than one ink.

Be careful if you are putting text over a photographic background. You’ll make the text very hard to read. To overcome this, take the photograph into an image-editing package and ‘bleach’ or lighten the image. You will have to lighten the image quite a bit more than you may think is necessary – always think to yourself “is it more important to see the image, or read the text?”

If the text is more important, it may be best not to put it over the photograph at all.
Some Freehand text effects are known to cause problems, so don’t use underline, shadow, strikethrough and any item from “text effects” menu. Also, Quark ‘P’, ‘B’ and ‘I’ styles aren’t reliable. Please don’t use Mac System Fonts either (such as “Times”) as they do not contain printer information and will not print. (Use “Times New Roman” instead).
Printers require you to include all fonts that you have used. Postscript fonts come in two parts – the screen font and the printer font. Some printers need both need both, so please make sure you send both. True Type fonts only come in one part. To comply with the licence agreement, you should remove the fonts from your system whilst we are processing your jobs.

If you are going “cross-platform”, i.e. from PC to Mac, remember that fonts don’t travel well.

Check that Davmark got the same font and provide hard copies. Davmark will need to check a proof carefully since even fonts from the same place can have slight differences resulting in reflow and words disappearing.

It’s fine to convert headlines and large text to curves, paths or outlines (which means that you don’t need to supply the fonts). Just watch your ‘flatness’ settings – set flatness to 1 and device resolution to 2400dpi.

Davmark really advise against setting text in a bitmap application like Photoshop – the text will not be nearly as clear as if it were vector text from Illustrator or Freehand, say.

One final note: Don’t use “Multiple Master/Metric” fonts as they are not compatible with some of our printers process. Such fonts have the letters MM in their title.

Artwork & print:

If you already have a design but need to produce professional artwork ready for print, we have creative artworkers to turn your ideas into high-res, print ready artwork for full colour printing. We also know our print and where to go for the best quality at the best price. Whether digital or litho, we make a point of always being on top of the very latest printing technology.

THINGS TO AVOID

Today’s graphics applications are incredibly sophisticated. So much so, that many contain features not compatible with the latest developments in printing technology. Through our extensive experience, we’ve prepared a list of features that we know don’t work. So please, don’t use any of the items listed below.

ITEM WHY NOT?

Hairlines
Hairlines are ‘device dependent’. This means that they print at different resolutions on different machines. They may print fine on your 300dpi laser printer, but will disappear on our 2500dpi platesetter. Use 0.25pt instead.

Corel Texture Fills
These print erratically (or not at all). Best to select the object with the fill and choose ‘Convert to Bitmap’ from the ‘Bitmaps’ menu. Make sure you choose 300dpi and CMYK though, and don’t make the background transparent.

Postscript Fills
These are erratic. They don’t look good anyway, use something else.

Compression
You can happily use WinZIP or StuffIT to compress your files, but never compress images using LZW compression or JPEG encoding. Doing so will cause lots of problems and may result in your file not printing at all.

Quark Picture Boxes
A ‘feature’ of Quark Xpress is that if you don’t fill a picture box with colour, the TIFF inside may print with a ragged edge. So, make sure your picture box is filled with ‘white’ rather than ‘none’. Cut-out EPSs are OK.

Overprint
Be careful with overprint settings (especially in Quark). If you set objects to overprint, they will not ‘knock-out’ the background, and will look very different to what you see on screen or proof. Black text is generally set as default to overprint. This is usually OK.

OLE objects
Windows applications are happy to copy objects back and forth between themselves. Unfortunately, they don’t print properly. Always convert OLE objects to bitmaps before sending your file. See ‘Corel Texture Fills’ above.

EPSs within EPSs
Not a good idea. Postscript errors are at their greatest when this is done. Certain Illustrator EPSs also cause problems in Quark.

Duotone/RGB images
These will either print in black and white, or with very washed out colours – always convert to CMYK.

Borders
Avoid a pronounced border (especially on Business Cards), since even a half millimetre movement when guillotined will be noticeable.

Why use us to check you printing work

You’d be amazed at the number of great looking designs that we see which simply don’t work on a functional level. Things like tear-off slips that don’t match up between back and front, or greetings cards where the inside is upside down.

As well as your document looking good, consider the practicality of what it will be like when it has been printed, folded and cut down.

Simple things set incorrectly can ruin your document. The following items are famous for mishaps, so make sure your job works.

It is very important to supply a mock-up if you want us to undertake this service. If you are using our Hand Holding service, we will be able to check that your document works the way you think it works. If you aren’t using our Hand Holding service, please check your imposition very, very carefully – we can’t be held responsible if you’ve not been thinking hard enough.

Perforation
Check that both sides have the perforation in the same place.

Landscape Greeting Card
Ensure that you flip the inside so that it’s upside down.

Booklet
Check that all the pages are numbered in the right order. Save in one document as single pages – you don’t need to paste them up, or supply ‘printer’s pairs’.

Mini Brochure
Check that all the pages are in the correct places – the front panel is where your want the front panel to be, and so on.

Roll Fold Mini Brochure
Check that you’ve allowed for the flap that folds in to be trimmed smaller, to prevent buckling.

Cut-out shape
Check that the reverse shape is a mirror image of the front shape.

Credit Card
Check that with a signature strip, the area you want the person to sign is light coloured, so you can see their signature.

Presentation Folder
Check that when the pockets are folded, they don’t obliterate any text you want to be visible.

Common Paper sizes

Booklets

Designing a Booklet requires a lot more experience than Business Cards or Leaflets. Davmark recommend you leave it to professionals.

Brochures & Flyers

Brochures are a great way for your clients or customers to get quick and easy to digest information that they can carry, take with them, or keep handy for when they want to see it again.

It’s very important that you set your page size correctly. If you don’t, parts of your design may be chopped off, look off-centre, or have areas of undesired white space.

Dimensions
The dimensions and construction for brochures can vary depending upon your needs, but the two most common are the two-fold three panel and the one-fold two panel designs:

Posters & Banners

Designing Large Format Posters is slightly different to designing for litho print, partly because of their increased size but also because of the difference in technology. The principles are the same – you still need prepare everything in CMYK and follow the rest of the instructions in this guide, but here are some extra tips…

RESPECT THE ‘QUIET ZONE’ OF 10mm
You should position images and text at least 10mm from the edge of the Poster. For best results, make your background bleed fully to the edge of your artwork if it is within 10mm of the edge.

WATCH THE RESOLUTION
Large Format Posters are designed to be viewed at a distance (usually of at least 30cm). This means that images don’t need to be as high resolution as on litho printed items. We recommend that you provide images for Large Format Posters at a maximum of 150dpi. Any higher won’t make much difference to final print, but will take much longer to process, and may delay the processing of your job.

BE CAREFUL WITH COLOUR
To create a good solid black, use rich black. Don’t use four-colour black and pay attention to the ink coverage limits. It’s best to avoid solid colours of only one ink (i.e. pure cyan, magenta, yellow or black) as these can be susceptible to slight “banding”. Using rich black avoids banding.

PAY ATTENTION TO SMALL TEXT
We’d recommend that you keep your text to a minimum of 14pt. Overlay your text in a vector-based application like Freehand or Quark, rather than a bitmap-based one like Photoshop.

Posters
Posters like all graphic designs, are a delicate balance between images, text, and color, but ultimately must be eye catching and invite the viewer to investigate the information further.

Banners
Banners can be far more simplistic in design and are generally one or two statements reinforced with a logo.

Whether it’s a sports program or guides to a community event, booklets can be a great way for people to be informed and take a souvenir home with them.

All of our booklets are made of the highest quality materials, and can be bound by saddle stitch, coil ring, or glue.

Dimensions
The dimensions and construction for booklets can vary depending upon your needs, but the two most common are:

Booklet: (A4 sized) paper folded in half and saddle stitched in the center.
Magazine/Tabloid: 8.5″w x 11″h (11″x17″) paper folded in half and saddle stitched in the centre.

Newsletters & Reports

Newsletters and reports are a great way for to let members stay connected or let the public know what activities you’ve been up to.

The most important feature of any newsletter or report is accurate information that displayed in a way that both promotes your brand identity and conveys the message that you want.

There are several different construction methods, from a simple one page leaflet, to a glue bound binding for large annual reports.

Depending upon your budget and your needs, we can discuss the best solution for you.

Business Cards

Business cards can be a lasting impression that you leave upon a new contact, and it is important to have a card that represents your company and it’s brand identity.
There are many different ways to effectively create a business card that can leave the impression that you want.

Simplicity in design is always a sign of class and sensibility that shows that you are stable and down to earth.

Many people who choose or design business cards for themselves often try “dazzle” everybody with colors, laser photos, etc, but in the end often look like they are trying too hard.

Time

The number of hours it takes to design a business card depends upon the level of images and content provided.

If we have to create the logo and any images from scratch it can take from four hours upwards, to create a professional design. See our comments on branding!

If all elements are available to us, and it is a matter of playing around with the layout, it can be as quick as one hour. But its best to pay to get it right!

Packaging

The world is changing. Society is increasingly aware that consumption and production need to be more sustainable.

Davmark believes that for some of our clients that packaging both as marketing and a business need, are important especially in the current changing times.

It is now generally recognised that the management of environmental impact must go hand in hand with social and economic considerations to achieve long term sustainability.

‘We need a major shift to deliver new products and services with lower environmental impacts across their life cycle, while at the same time boosting competitiveness. And we need to build on people’s growing awareness of social and environmental concerns, and the importance of their roles as citizens and consumers.’ - Securing the Future, UK Government Sustainable Development Strategy 2005

General terms

Davmark has been previously been asked to list some of the industry terms used to assist in searching business marketing, CSR and environmental considerations to its customers. It seems to work, so…

“composite packaging” means consumer packaging comprising two or more different packaging material types fused or joined together in a single medium so that they cannot be separated by the consumer.

“consumer packaging” means all packaging products made of any material, or combination of materials, for the containment, protection, marketing or handling of retail consumer products. This also includes distribution packaging.

“consumer paper” means all paper and cardboard from domestic premises, other than paper used to publish newspapers or magazines.

“distribution packaging” means packaging that contains multiples of products (the
same or mixed) intended for direct consumer purchase, including:

Secondary : packaging used to secure or unitise multiples of consumer product, eg. cardboard box, shipper, shrink film overwrap.

Tertiary : packaging used to secure or unitise multiples of secondary packaging, e.g. pallet wrapping stretchfilm, shrinkfilm, strapping.

“materials recovery systems” are systems to collect, sort and pre-process materials recovered from the waste stream, including but not limited to domestic kerbside recycling collections, drop-off collection systems, public place collection and industrial and commercial recycling collection systems.

“packaging recovery chain” refers to the companies, organisations and/or Local Governments who provide recyclate collection services, reprocessors, secondary markets and users of recovered, post-consumer and post-industrial packaging materials and paper products.

“packaging supply chain” means each of the organisations that participate in the creation, distribution and sale of consumer packaging and / or products.

These include but are not limited to:

• suppliers of raw materials for consumer packaging
• manufacturers of consumer packaging
• suppliers / distributors of consumer packaging
• manufacturers of consumer products
• fillers of consumer packaging eg. contract packers
• brand owners of consumer products
• wholesalers / distributors of consumer products
• retailers of consumer products

“post consumer recycled content” means material generated by households or by commercial, industrial and institutional facilities in their role as end-users of the product which can no longer be used for its intended purpose. This includes returns of material from the distribution chain.

“product stewardship” means the ethic of shared responsibility through the lifecycle of products including the environmental impact of the product through to and including its ultimate disposal.

“recovered materials” means used packaging materials that have been separated from the waste stream for reprocessing and used in the manufacture of consumer packaging or other products.

“recyclable” packaging for a product means, reasonably able to be recovered in through collection or drop-off systems and able to be reprocessed and used as a raw material for the manufacture of a new product.

“recycle” for a product, means recover the product and use it as a raw material to produce another product.

“recycled content” is the percentage by weight or volume of post-industrial and/or post-consumer recycled material in the raw materials used for the manufacture of a product.

“resource efficiency” means the efficiency with which we use resources and minimize environmental impacts throughout the lifecycle of a product or service (such as packaging).

“re-use” for a product, means use a product for the same or similar purpose as the original purpose without subjecting the product to a manufacturing process which would change its physical appearance.

“re-utilisation” includes re-use, recycling and energy recovery.

“secondary market” means the sale and use of materials recovered through material recovery systems.

“selection on merit” is the principle, based on sound science, that selects a specific material or combinations of materials, for a given application on its ability to meet the various functional criteria over the whole-of-life of the product including: manufacture, supply, use and disposal.

“shared responsibility” refers to the equitable distribution of responsibility for the management of the environmental impacts of consumer packaging to the most appropriate participants within the packaging supply and recovery chains.
Shared responsibility may be achieved through, but is not limited to:

• The adoption of policies and practices by all participants in the packaging supply chain that contribute to the minimisation of the environmental impacts of consumer packaging within their individual spheres of influence.
• The optimization of packaging to balance resource efficiency and maximise resource re-utilisation and where applicable and sustainable, the provision of used packaging and paper recovery systems
• The implementation of the NEPM by relevant jurisdictions as the cornerstone of the co-regulatory framework
• The provision of services for domestic and, where applicable and sustainable, other used packaging and paper recovery systems by local government

“stakeholder” means any individual, group, company or level of government that is involved in the lifecycle management of packaging materials, across its manufacture, use, disposal and recovery.

“waste hierarchy” is a concept that provides a framework of desirable waste management options - prioritising first the avoidance of unnecessary consumption, then its reuse and recycling and lastly the optimisation of its final disposal.

Putting packaging in perspective

Packaging attracts a lot of media attention – disproportionately so given its relatively small environmental impact. For example, packaging uses only a fraction of the energy that is expended in driving a car.

Just 3% of a household’s annual energy use is taken up by packaging.

If you were to drive one less mile a day – or to turn your thermostat down by two degrees - you’d save as much energy as is used to make the packaging for an average household’s whole year’s supply of packaged goods.

Performance Goals

The Goals set out below address specific environmental, social and economic goals.

1.Packaging optimised to integrate considerations about resource efficiency, maximum resource re-utilisation, product protection, safety and hygiene.
2.Efficient resource recovery systems for consumer packaging and paper.
3.Consumers able to make informed decisions about consumption, use and disposal of packaging of products.
4.Supply chain members and other signatories able to demonstrate how their actions contribute to Goals (1) - (3) above.
5.All signatories demonstrate continuous improvement in their management of packaging through their individual Action Plans and Annual Reports.

Common myths
“Manufacturers use excessive packaging as a matter of course.”
Not so. If they did, there would be many fewer packaging companies in existence today – companies have a commercial interest in minimising packaging. As with any industry, there are occasional incidents of bad practice – and INCPEN has campaigned consistently for the introduction of a “packaging watchdog” to address such problems. What’s more, a report by the Institute of European Environmental Policy suggests that under-packaging can be much more of an issue than over-packaging, in terms of wasted energy and resources from ruined goods.

“Packaging is a major contributor to waste.”
It’s not. In fact, packaging waste is on average 20% by weight of the contents of your dustbin and when compressed in landfill packaging from all sources is less than 5% – by weight and volume – of total waste.

“Most litter is packaging.”
The facts don’t bear that out.

While cigarettes and gum account for nearly 85% of litter, all packaging-related items combined make up 4%. Plastic carrier bags make up just 0.06%.

Bio-degradable products / environmentally sustainable papers

With growing concern for the environment clients are becoming increasingly robust in their demands for high quality products whilst lowering adverse impact on the planet. Affinity works with suppliers with FSC accreditation, ensuring that paper and board stocks are from sustainable sources. These suppliers in turn purchase such materials from FSC accredited merchants and have processes in place to ensure only FSC accredited materials are used. Vegetable inks, chemical free platemaking, recycling of metalplates and safe chemical disposal are all commonplace. Affinity keeps abreast of industry advances and guidelines - to ensure our customers are informed of all the options.

More organisations are now aware that in addition to using recycled materials, sourcing of such materials from sustainable sources is a responsible and viable alternative.
Corn, sugar cane & potato based products - the eco-friendly way forward.

Food packaging in particular will be revolutionised by bio-degradable and compostable products - from fast food boxes, cups and packaging to fresh food packaging and carrier bags - Affinity is at the forefront with a key supplier currently setting the government standard. Water based and vegetable inks are ideal for this type of product. This material can be used for many items other than food trays including folders, files, boxes and packing for all kinds of general use too.

KEY FACTS

100% bio-degradable & compostable with addition of 1% polygone
Cost effective - corn flour is a global commodity, translating to lower prices and high volume availability
Greater use will bring economies of scale
Microwavable and freezable

1.Retains many properties of current plastics
2.Supplied as sheets, film and bags - thermo and vacuum formable
3.Same weight properties as plastics
4.Poly flour when littered / put into landfill or composting facilities will disappear in less than 36months
5.100% sustainable
6.Leaves nutrients in the soil as poly flour breaks down into soil matter

PRINT MANAGEMENT

What is print management?

Print management is where the diverse printing needs of an organisation are centralised and placed with a single, outsourced supplier.

No single printer is ever right for a client’s entire print needs.  This could be down to the machinery, the staff expertise, the capacity, the turnaround or the cost.  Because we do not own printing presses we are completely independent.  We are not beholden to either our own manufacturing plant as most traditional printers are, or that of others.
Davmark business alliance partner Affinity Connected’s

Through Davmark business alliance partner Affinity Connected’s production team’s in-depth industry experience and up-to-date knowledge of the latest developments in Print management technology ensure that we source the right suppliers for any task, from our preferred and benchmarked group, negotiating highly competitive prices without compromising quality or creativity. Davmark have flexibility, production control and take complete responsibility.
Davmark message to our customers

Davmark clients, benefit from negotiated reduced prices due to economies of scale.  Working with Davmark on an organisation-wide print management partnership could typically save you up to 15% annually.

As Davmark have a print management partnership, our clients have access to a specialist account manager who takes on the responsibility for planning and delivering the entire process through each of the purchasing, production and fulfilment stages.  Davmark will advise you as to the options available to you, help you to shape the consequent brief, put the work out to tender with carefully chosen suppliers, analyse and negotiate on the ensuing quotes, award the work and manage the project from proofing stage through to final delivery.

As Davmark takes full responsibility of the process, your time is freed up enabling you to focus on your core tasks.  Your account manager will report back to you at each key stage thus ensuring that you are fully aware of the status every step of the way.  Our service is backed up by service level agreements, flexible contracts and regular management reporting which are all tailored to suit your organisation.

SALES PROMOTION

Across a wide range of media, Davmark can assist our clients develop innovative sales promotion campaigns complete with the required portfolio of promotional materials.

Whether it’s traffic-driving campaigns or data-gathering prize draws and competitions, we specialise in relevant, effective and above all, conspicuous sales promotion.

E-COMMERCE STRATEGY

Meeting the needs of online visitors and exceeding their expectations has become more difficult than ever before. Online visitors have become less loyal and more technologically savvy.

They want to shop by convenient sales channels, use the Web as a research tool, transactional platform, or as a vehicle to bridge the in-store experience.

Meeting the needs of this “next generation” of customers will be the driving force behind the success of any e-commerce operation.

Davmark provide a service for Strategic planning, to empower our clients business to be proactive in identifying and improving current weaknesses to increase online market share.

Davmark through it alliance partners, will provide this service:

Developing an Internet marketing strategy plan
Optimising Web performance (including sales, traffic, stickiness, satisfaction, retention/loyalty)
Building an online advertising and promotion plan
Building online brands
Developing virtual brand communities
Implementing customer relationship management
Developing an e-procurement platform for SMEs

Including questions such as:

What processes are hampering the e-commerce business onsite and off?
How are site metrics performing as compared to industry averages?
Where are the initial areas of opportunity?

By addressing these and many other similar issues, Davmark will proved an adviser to take our clients take the first step in improving there e-commerce presence.

E-COMMERCE
Davmark are now in a position to offer e-commerce / digital marketing / website construction.

What is E-commerce
A term that refers to the growing retail, service and business to business industries on the World Wide Web. E-commerce websites facilitate the buying and selling of goods and services over the Internet.

Is E-Commerce for me ?
Host businesses can benefit and profit from an e-commerce website on the Internet, E-commerce can help boost your sales. Businesses likely to profit from e-commerce are those offering unique products or services that are not readily available locally.

Customers wishing to browse and buy immediately will benefit and boost your business. We work with you to build a website that sells while you sleep!

Do I need to buy any software
This will depend on the type of contract you take with Davmark - In general the answer would be “Yes”

Electronic brochures:

Davmark can provide electronic-brochure solutions, where this is an innovative and effective way of communicating. It is a brilliant tool for livening up plain or lengthy documents, for example, training brochures, information documents or induction packs for new staff. The brochure is easily distributable via CD or email and quite literally will make your presentation stand off the page!

Whether you want to turn existing printed literature into an electronic brochure, or create a brand new presentation we will ensure you receive a stunning e-brochure.
Ideal for all types of applications, including sales training, HR departments (for employee inductions), catalogues or as an electronic alternative to your existing brochures, our interactive, page-turning brochures on CD are the perfect medium.

DIGITAL MARKETING

Returns from traditional media are reducing, and it is said that around 85% of all advertising goes unnoticed. Every day, individuals view more marketing messages across more channels than ever before. There was a time when content was king. Now, relevancy rules.

The growth of new technology – specifically the internet, CRM and digital communications – means that pure above the line activity is no longer the most effective route to market.

To cut through the clutter, your communications need to be targeted and highly relevant. New media channels, such as email and SMS, are as personal as it gets.

But having access to new technology is not enough to guarantee success. It’s what you do with it that really counts. And that’s where we come in.

The ability to dovetail traditional communications like digitally printed direct mail with new media channels, such as email, SMS and personalised web pages, is an increasingly important part of an integrated marketing campaign.

Davmark can use innovative solutions, for example, you can create and automatically dispatch a customised email or text message to an individual, which contains a personalised URL. When they click on this link, it directs them to a customised web page, which contains content that is specific to a special campaign and to their particular needs and wants. This also allows individual response rates to be tracked.

Intelligent trigger marketing - send the right message to the right person, at the right time via the best media channel.

Using our trigger marketing service, the submission of an online request for further information could also generate immediate production of a customised brochure, which is digitally printed and dispatched the same day.

Now that’s how to really grab your customers’ attention!

Trigger Marketing

Digital communication technology is playing an increasingly important role in influencing consumer awareness, preference, loyalty and purchase intent. With trigger marketing, you can further enhance your chances of success.

By expertly interrogating customer information that is stored in a dynamic and intelligent database, it is possible to predict products or services that may be of particular relevance to specific individuals.

Intelligent trigger marketing - send the right message to the right person, at the right time via the best media channel.

Powered by our database engine, our trigger marketing services can help you use this information to create sophisticated, customised, event-driven campaigns that really work. These highly relevant marketing communications will help you to connect and communicate with prospects and customers in a more efficient and effective way.
Trigger marketing essentially takes direct marketing one stage further.

Successful marketers know that effective direct mail works. Research has shown that over 50% of a target audience will pay attention to a direct mail piece if the message is relevant to them. But traditional direct marketing only attracts response rates of 1-3%.
With trigger marketing – seamlessly integrated with next-day delivery of digitally printed collateral and email, SMS and personalised web marketing – you can expect response rates to be increased by up to 200%.

In trigger marketing, special prompts are defined and coded into your database. When a pre-determined event occurs, these strips of code ‘trigger’ the automatic creation and dispatch of a relevant marketing communication – be it a digitally printed direct mail piece, an email, an SMS message to a customer’s mobile phone or the creation of a personalised web page.

Events such as a purchase, a visit, anniversary or credit balance enquiry could trigger the dispatch of an appropriate communication promoting a relevant offer, an up-sell opportunity, or perhaps an invitation to increase a credit limit.

The trigger response can be as simple or as sophisticated as you like.

To really impress a prospect, why not use the technology to create and deliver an exclusive brochure, designed especially for them? If a prospective purchaser texts a request for more information to a number published in one of your ads, for example, that could automatically trigger immediate digital printing of a single copy of a personalised brochure – featuring complete customisation in terms of both text and image selection – that will be delivered to their door the very next day!

Whether it generates instant sales or leads to longer-term loyalty, trigger marketing enables you to give your customers what they want, when they want it. So the leads stay hot…

SMS MARKETING

Davmark offers a fast, effective and modern way of communicating with your audience. If you would like to promote a special offer, or perhaps need to remind customers to pay, then text messaging could be the tool for you.

In more depth:

SMS advertising differs from country to country.
However below describes what is possible when unshackled.

As wireless text messaging (SMS) has grown into a mainstream communication tool for consumers, reaching them via SMS marketing has become increasingly important strategy for businesses. Whether between two people planning to meet up or a broadcast message to thousands of users, more and more customers are becoming converts every day, and savvy marketers realize text messaging is a great way to quickly communicate with their audience.

However, thanks to surcharges and restriction imposed by the carriers, such campaigns are often difficult to justify economically and even more difficult to manage. This is especially true when trying to use short codes to allow people to sign up directly from their phones as well as more advanced text messaging features like polls and Call to Action campaigns.

Davmark use SMS alliance partners who allows you take advantage of these mobile marketing strategies by:

Using a short code to generate subscription without having to pay a high monthly fee to own/maintain it.
Enabling people to sign up to your mobile club directly from their cell phone as well as via Web forms.
No longer requiring subscribers to give you their carriers as this is automatically determined by the new Stun! SMS service.
Experiencing improved delivery and much more detailed reports about your SMS marketing campaigns.
Engaging in a 2-way interaction with your subscribers, such as asking them questions or prompting a call to action within the message.

Account Management
Davmark SMS gives you full control of your account from setting up other users to creating automated responses for new subscribers welcoming them to your list(s). Specific features include:
SMS Test Accounts - Add up to 10 cell numbers to test your text messages prior to sending out a major campaign. Test different carriers for character restrictions and display to make sure your message is received correctly.

Autoresponders - Create automatic messages for all notices to subscribers such as confirming their subscription and editing their profile. Autoresponders provide you with another method to keep in touch with your subscribers and help reinforce your branding.

Short Code and Keywords - Use dial short code along with a chosen keyword, like PLAY, to capture subscribers both via text messages as well as off-line branding campaigns, such as radio, TV and print advertisements.

Lease Popular Keywords - If you wish to have a common word like dance or play as your keyword, you may need to lease the word (discounts for contracts and pre-paid options).
This will give you exclusive rights to use the keyword until you cancel the lease.

Campaign Creation
Davmark SMS has a variety of options and features to help maximize your SMS campaigns. Some of the main features include:

Text Message Builder - Create your text message within a couple of minutes with our streamlined SMS creator. Make sure that your message meets the 160 character restriction with our character counter.

Personalization - Add a personal touch to your SMS campaigns by inserting tokens such as First Name, Last Name and City into the body of your text message. This can be especially useful for special offers in order to ensure that only the owner presents the message for validation purposes.

Campaign Management
Once you’ve created your text campaign, Davmark SMS offers many features to help manage your campaign and to ensure maximum delivery:

Direct Carrier Connections - Davmark SMS delivers campaigns via direct carrier connections (SMPP) with all of the major US cell companies, including Verizon, Cingular, Sprint and T-Mobile.

Targeted Sends - Segment your campaigns by implementing targets, such as Males 21-34 or London Females, to narrow your reach and hit only those selected subscribers. Targets can be used to minimize a larger list as well as create a highly specific group of subscribers that meet a number of exact criteria, such as Females 21-34 who live in London and have an income level of £50,000 or more.

View All SMS Replies - The SMS Inbox is a list of all replies that have been received from your campaigns. It shows the Keyword that used, the List attached and if you have tracked your campaign via Track Response, the campaign will show up as well. You can sort by all of these fields as well to better manage the results.
FAX BROADCAST
Long before email was prevalent, companies were using fax machines to get across time sensitive data that couldn’t wait for the normal mailing route. Soon, marketers began utilizing a fax broadcast as a way to tap into the business market. Today, faxing is used by thousands of companies and is still a viable communication method especially for those doing business-to-business marketing.

Davmark does not ignore this for of messaging, but must be used selectively – “fit for purpose”.

Davmark has integrated faxing into our growing suite of messaging options to help our clients take advantage of this market and provide yet another way to think outside of the inbox.

Account Management
Davmark has an alliance business partner which gives you full control of your account from setting up other users to creating test accounts. Specific features include:

Fax Test Accounts - Add up to 10 fax numbers to test your fax messages prior to sending out a major campaign. Since fax machines can vary in terms of print quality, make sure to send out a test campaign to see if your message can be easily read. Save yourself a lot of potential heartache by doing some thorough testing before contacting your subscribers.

Campaign Creation
Davmark can incorporate a variety of options and features to help maximize a fax broadcast campaign from cover sheet generators to multiple file type support. Some of the main features include:

200+ File Types Supported – Through Davmark alliance business partner we have support of over 200 different file types, from PDFs to Word documents to just about everything else in between. Upload the file from your local machine and Davmark will convert it into a digital format that can be read by most fax machines.

Campaign Management
Once you’ve created your fax campaign, Davmark offers many features to help manage your campaign and to ensure maximum delivery:

Delivery Fax Campaigns of Any Size - Through Davmark alliance business partner. There are no restrictions in terms of database size or frequency of delivery since your subscription is based on total fax messages sent per month, like a cell phone company.

Targeted Sends - Through Davmark alliance business partners. We can segment your campaigns by implementing targets, such as Males 21-34 or London Females, to narrow your reach and hit only those selected subscribers. Targets can be used to minimize a larger list as well as create a highly specific group of subscribers that meet a number of exact criteria, such as businesses located in London - City with 30 or more employees.

Campaign Analysis
Now that you’ve delivered your fax campaign, time to find out the results. Through Davmark alliance business partner has numerous reports to dig deeper into how successful your campaign really was. Gain insights such as:

Successful Call Reports - Find out how many people successfully receive the fax campaign and the specific fax numbers that did for further follow up and tracking.
Bounce Reports - Weed out bad or invalid phone numbers and find out just how reliable your fax list is with the Stun! Fax bounce reports. Get information such as number of busy signals, disconnected phone numbers and even machines giving out of toner notices.

Subscriber Management
Keeping track of subscribers can be a real pain. Let Davmark and our alliance business partners, take care of this for you with our wide range of subscriber management features including:

Suppression Lists - Scrub your database against Do Not Fax list as well as our Global Permanent Removal List to prevent unwanted numbers from receiving your campaigns.
Abuse Removals - Subscribers can be removed within the Control Panel, and you can also batch unsubscribe users either via copy/paste as well as uploading a file.

Bounce Removal System - Automatically remove permanently failed numbers (hard bounces) as well as temporary fails like busy signals or out of toner (soft bounce) and technical issues with the receiving fax machine (unknown).
ONLINE MARKETING AND WEB DESIGN

Meeting the needs of online visitors and exceeding their expectations has become more difficult than ever before. Online visitors have become less loyal and more technologically savvy.

They want to shop by convenient sales channels, use the Web as a research tool, transactional platform, or as a vehicle to bridge the in-store experience.

Meeting the needs of this “next generation” of customers will be the driving force behind the success of your online operation.

Davmark service of providing both Strategic planning and e-commerce solutions will empower your business to be proactive in identifying and improving current weaknesses to increase online market share by:-

Developing an Internet marketing strategy plan
Optimising Web performance (including sales, traffic, stickiness, satisfaction, retention / loyalty)
Building an online advertising and promotion plan
Building online brands
Developing virtual brand communities
Implementing customer relationship management
Developing an e-procurement platform for SMEs

Our messages to our clients:

As a website is often the first point of contact with an organisation, it is of great importance that the right message is conveyed.

When you are looking for a company to represent you on the internet to get the best results for web design, web development and SEO you would generally need to contract a specialist for each area. This can stagger your web site and reduce its overall impact.

At Davmark, we have brought strength into the company for all areas to ensure a high level of service.

If you’ve reached this far and had a look at the below sections and you still don’t think we are the web design / development / e-commerce/ internet / extranet / search engine optimisation company for you, we wish you the best of luck on the internet.

Or if you’re interested in getting more information or have already decided that we are the company for you do not hesitate to contact us.

We at Davmark have included this Web site building guide to Web site as preparation and to help define the requirements required to be undertaken.

Construction of a Web Site needs thought through before approaching any designers.

DAVMARK WEB DESIGN

Davmark offer the complete web service at affordable prices combined with high quality professional results. This service includes web site development, domain registration, site optimisation and graphic manipulation.

The company’s portfolio has grown from modest beginnings to the current position whereby it became necessary to expand.

Planning a web site

This the most important aspect to consider, it is also the area where you will save most money. You need to consider the size of the project, what graphics and size of graphics you need, the theme of the project, load speed, quality of the site, the features you want, the audience you want to attract, how the navigation is done, and very importantly the web address or name you wish to use.

A web designer will generally charge for major changes at the construction stage.

Questions you should address are…

WHAT is the intention of the site
WHAT size is the project
WHERE is the content coming from
WHO will provide graphics
WHAT size are my graphics
WHAT theme if any is there
WHAT audience are you aiming at
WHAT speed should the site load at (Large pictures and animations slow the site down)
HOW often will the site need updating
WHAT “build” deadlines do you have.

Designing a web site

This is the adoption of your web theme by use of visual representation colour, graphics, style and font.

Most of your ideas will already be fixed in your thoughts - however look at other similarly themed sites – note the speed of download, note what type of internet connection you are using (Don’t forget the poor 56k modem)

Questions should be:-

WHAT images /pictures do I want to incorporate
WHAT size graphics / pictures
WHAT quality graphics / pictures (the higher the quality - the bigger the file - the slower the load)
DOES the style match the content
WHAT specific features do you want / not want

Building a web site
This is in essence what you pay for - “The finished product”

Web design

Web design is about much more than creating a design that is fresh and appealing. Any web site that is to become successful as a sales and marketing tool needs to be intuitive and easy to use for first-time and repeat visitors.

Web design is usually the first stage of a project. At this point, the project is not a web site at all, but layers of pixels within a graphics package. The first goal to achieve at this stage is to create a design with visual appeal. A recent study by Carleton University in Ottawa revealed that it takes as little as 50 milliseconds for a browser to decide whether they like a site. So if your site doesn’t look good, the chances are it is not reaching its sales potential. For most web designers, once they have produced an appealing design their job is done. At Davmark, once we have created a design our job is only half done. A web site that is truly successful needs to meet all the following:

Clearly shows what your company has to offer
If the company offers a large number of products/services the most important should be prominently displayed
The site’s navigation(s) need to be intuitive (you’d be surprised at some of the navigations we’ve seen)
Points of contact need to be clearly visible
Points of sales need to be simplistic and intuitive
Site should not be cluttered with useless or marginal information
Text should be inviting to read

It might sound simple, but how many sites do you see that encompass the above aspects while looking good at the some time?

However, we do understand that not all web sites need to meet some/all of these aspects - some sites need to be more art than sales.

Many sites suffer from lack of design variation, a lack of imagination and/or development ability. For this reason, we feel it is important to design individual sub-pages for some of our projects. These can help your site from getting stale and we make sure they are not too different from one another, so as not to confuse potential customers.

Effective web sites
Effective web sites combine design elements of speed and style with organized, focused content to grab and hold attention. Davmark Designs web sites use HTML, javascript, flash and other tools in ways to enhance presentation. They are easy to navigate and uncluttered.

In consultation with you the customer Davmark Designs will build the site to your requirements, do any graphic manipulation required, advise, if necessary guide you through Domain registration and purchase, deal with the File Transfer Protocol, Meta-Tag, Submit to search engines, and maintain the site in the future.

Cost will depend on the requirements of you the customer.

Naming a web site
A site name (Domain name) simply put, is an address of a Web site on the internet i.e. what you type in the address bar.

With a properly registered domain name (as opposed to the “free” name tagged onto your internet providers URL) you gain professionalism, adding credibility to your Web site. Certainly the name will be shorter than the prolifera of a name you will be allocated from your Internet Provider.

With a registered domain name you not only have the option of using whatever name you want (*subject to availability), but you can also choose the extension you require (.com, .org etc). If you want to check availability of a domain name use this link (popup window)

We can negotiate additional domains in conjunction with our hosting company

Web development

Web development is a broad term used to describe a wide range of services. At Davmark we are able to cater for everything from advanced intranet applications to eCommerce solutions, flash graphic & animated design to simple HTML & CSS projects.

Davmark are a multi-talented web design and development company that also offers a unique search engine optimisation service. We are based in corporate facilities in London and the Thames valley.

As a company we offer the full web package of:

web design, front-end development, back-end development, on-site search engine optimisation and off-site search engine optimisation.

We have tried to keep technical jargon to a minimum, but as an overview of a technical service it needs to inform you little. If you don’t understand a few points or would like to know more about this service call us.

Web development is broken down into two areas: front-end development and back-end development.

Front-end developers are a mix of a designer and a back-end developer. They are responsible for turning designs into a web site, user interface and JavaScript widgets. Back-end developers generally have no artistic ability and have not seen the light of day since they first turned on a computer. They spend their spare time watching Star Trek and coding Nintendo DS emulators. Back-end developers are responsible for programming into existence all the functions of your web site that it’s users will experience but never
see - XML parsers, elaborate product databases, eCommerce integrations etc.

Front-end Development

The first stage of front-end development is to turn a design or set of designs into HTML and CSS. The majority of web developers will simply use a WYSIWYG editor like Dreamweaver to put your site into HTML. This is little more difficult than using Microsoft Word and results in an unprofessional end product. Web sites that have been constructed in a WYSIWYG editor will suffer from all of the following:

Messy and bulky code, which is difficult to update and maintain
Pages will not be geared for search engine optimisation
Updates to the site will cause degradation to already low quality HTML
HTML will be inflexible and suffer from accessibility issues, reducing your target audience
Contain numerous coding errors, which can cause cross-browser incompatibility and confuse search engines, again reducing your target audience
Only makes use of a fraction of HTML and CSS

At Davmark we use hand-code, where necessary, using scaleable, semantic, keyword-rich HTML. This means:

Our code is clean & minimal, resulting in pages that are easy to manage and update
HTML is constructed in a way to best inform search engines what that page is about
HTML is scaleable, meaning any content can be changed to fit any requirements and the size of the site can be increased infinitely without degradation (for accessibility & gee wizz purposes)
HTML and CSS is provided free of errors and compatible with major web browsers
Web site will be compatible with all screen resolutions

Just to give you an idea, 1% would be a liberal estimate of the number of sites on the internet that have a solid HTML foundation. In our opinion, HTML is the easiest part of making a web site. So, if so many development companies can’t get that right what else are they going to do half-heartedly?

Once your site has been meticulously put into HTML, the next stage is to add features and facilities to the user interface. This consists of constructing light effects, such as the menu at the top of this page and more advanced facilities like the quoting system or the portfolio.

Back-end Development

Once a project has been through front-end development it is handed over to a back-end developer. This is the stage where all the ‘behind the scenes’ work goes on - the front-end of the site is connected to programming functions and databases that will make the web site actually work.

We have knowledge of and can support development using the following:

Markup Languages
HTML & XHTML
SVG
XML
XUL

Stylesheet Languages
CSS
XLST

Programming Languages
C
C++

Davmark web design & hosting

Java
JavaScript
Pascal
PHP 4 & PHP 5
Perl
Python
Visual Basic

Query Languages
MS Access
MS Jet
MySQL
PostgreSQL

Miscellaneous
ADO
AJAX
JSON
mod_rewrite

Protocols
DNS
FTP
IMAP
MIME
POP3
SMTP
SOAP
SSH
TELNET
TLS & SSL

If it is not possible for us to meet your requirements with one of the above languages, we will definitely be able to using a combination of them.

Our approach to programming is modular and object-orientated. All of our programming is created with extensibility in mind. Most of our programming is built on frameworks, which allows us to do more, to a higher standard in less time. We have our own content management framework, which allows us to build any form on content management on strong foundations. We do not create anything that uses systems or pre-built packages; quite simply because they are inflexible, difficult to maintain and we would not insult our client’s confidence in us by giving them something we have just downloaded for free.

You’d be surprised at the number of ‘development companies’ that charge an arm and a leg for lightly modified pre-built packages and a £20 template.

Search Engine Optimisation

Whether you already have a good presence on search engines, have struggled for years to get anywhere or have a brand new site that hasn’t even been indexed we can help.

Pretty much every web development company out there offers search engine optimisation (SEO). But how many of them could get you to page one of Google for anything more competitive than ‘organic plums farm in Chipping Sodbury’. The answer is not many.

At Davmark, we have consistently gained page one rankings for competitive search terms.

If an ‘SEO consultant’ is telling you search engine optimisation is all about META tags, you should quickly put your money away and run for the nearest exit. There was a time when you could stuff META tags full of spam and hey presto you were on page one. Thankfully those days are long gone.

Search engines are constantly evolving with the aim of providing higher quality and more relevant search results.

To put it simply, in the big picture, META tags are about as useful in a search engine optimisation campaign as a punnet of organic plumss.

Our SEO service is broken down in to two areas:

On-site search engine optimisation - this involves making sure your site is easy for search engines to index and each pages tells the search engines what it is about
Off-site search engine optimisation - this involves getting your site known on the internet, so search engines have a reason to think your site is worthy of being on page one.

The service is quite simple and it works like this:

You tell us what keywords you want to appear on page one of Google for
We give you a price for the keywords and may also suggest a few others
You choose the keywords you would like to have optimised

On-site Search Engine Optimisation

On-site search engine optimisation can come in two stages, the first stage being initial optimisation. The aim is to create each page of your web site so that it tells the search engines exactly what it is about through the use of semantic HTML. At this stage we are shooting in the dark, since we don’t know exactly what people are searching for to find your products and services. However, we use a number of tools we have available to us to guess what keywords people are searching for. It also takes a certain amount of common sense, e.g. if your web page is selling organic plumss it would be highly probable that you would like it to be optimised for the keyword ‘organic plumss’. It is possible to increase the amount of keywords a web page is optimised for, which is carried out in the second stage of on-site search engine optimisation.

The second stage of on-site search engine optimisation involves reviewing what people are searching for to find your web site and to try and push your site into other markets that have become apparent are worth targeting. Realistically, you can only optimise a page so much for multiple keywords/phrases without weakening the other search terms and making the page read like a shopping list. However it is possible to optimise a page for a myriad of search terms using off-site optimisation.

Off-site Search Engine Optimisation

Off-site search engine optimisation is the main focus for all good SEO consultants in the modern search engine marketplace. You can make off-site optimisation work without any on-site optimisation, but the results are much better when the two are coupled. If you have been on the internet for a few years, it may be that your site already has some off-site optimisation that has happened naturally. This is a phenomenon which we can harness using a method known as link baiting. It is probably the most effective type of long-term SEO. We have dealt with some companies that have had a surprisingly good off-site optimisation without actually doing anything. Whereas other have been on the internet for years, spent large amounts of money on conventional advertising and were as good as invisible on search engines.

WEB: STREAMING VIDEO

Streaming Video allows you to demonstrate your products or activities to your customers through your web site.

Davmark offer a wide variety of video options including editing raw video, adding special effects, adding sound, and burning the finished product to a CD or DVD, which can be distributed to your customers and clients.

Quicktime Streaming Technology

Through Apples Quicktime Streaming Technology visitors to your site don’t have to wait for the complete video to download, but can start watching as soon as it has downloaded enough to play.

The other benefit that Quicktime provides is security and copyright over content that you do not want to have distributed throughout the Internet, by making it only viewable that one time.

WEB: ONLINE FORMS

Online forms offer you a way to keep track of customers that visit your site. There are many options for creating an online form, including an information gathering, surveys and voting, giving access to private areas of the web site, and getting customer feedback.

Security of online forms is our top issue and we use 128 bit encryption to make sure that every form is secure for each visit.

WEB: MAINTENANCE

Davmark offers competitive preset maintenance that guarantees that you will have a functioning and usable web site, because it is in both of our best interests to design a site that is stable and needs little time to maintain.

Depending upon your needs of updating and complexity of the web site there are various maintenance packages that are available to you.

WEB: DATABASE DESIGN

Flash as a front end is the most dynamic interface for the Internet, and it becomes even more powerful when combined with database technology to make your site and its information change depending upon the requirements of the visitor.

You also have the option of being able to update your information by using a web browser from any location connected to the Internet. You will never have to waste your valuable time trying to describe changes you need made to your site. You can do it with one click of a mouse.

WEB: CONSUMING WEB SERVICES

Web services allow organizations to provide information to the public using the internet. Organizations use them so that they can provide information from their own systems in a controlled way. Web services can provide public data but restrict access to sensitive information. Users make a request, and the web service provides the response in a XML document. The response is a stream of information rather than a physical document. This process is referred to as consuming a web service.

This web service is used to consume many different types of information, including currency exchange rates, weather information, stock quotes, and Google search results. Web flash site applications that search Google or Amazon, or a Flash-based shopping cart that provides up-to-date exchange rates. Provide Flash to display up-to-the-minute information about your company’s stock price or available stock and delivery procurement periods. There are many other applications that this can be used for.

WEB HOSTING

Hosting a Web site
In simple terms this is the provision of web space and the inclusive services necessary to support the site.

You have 2 basic options, either free web space or paid for web space.
Free space is all very well but, you may find yourself tied to a domain name provided by that company (usually of no practical use), you will generally find that their technical support lines are very expensive and mere navigation of their sites requires an engineering degree. In addition there is usually very limited web space, no e-mail integration, and an unreliable server.

Paid space is without doubt your best option especially when considering a site for business purposes.

You will get several e-mail accounts, directly related to your domain name, e-mail auto responders, adequate web space (iro 50-100mb),CGI scripts, reliable, quick e-mail support, unlimited FTP access.

Costing of web hosting is very much refined to “what is needed”.

Introducing Davmark Hosting

Davmark Designs now offers a hosting package.

Submitting a Web site
This is the process of getting your web site listed on search engines. Building a web site is one thing - actually getting it noticed is another. The submission process itself is whereby the web site is presented to a search engine. The preparation for this is a procedure called “Meta-tagging” and “Key wording” your site.

Meta-tags are HTML tags that provide information that describes the content of your web pages. Using tags is important if you want the site to be noticed by search engines. Search engines incorporate reading meta tags as part of their indexing formulas. Whilst meta tagging is important the most important are the description and keywords tags.
Many people will and do pay money to specialist companies to specifically optimise their sites for a high ranking on a search engine. Davmark can do this for you.

At Davmark offer 3 types of submission. This ranges from basic meta-tagging, to optimisation, to paid inclusion. We will, to the best of our ability, provide you with the service you need to enable search engines to locate your site.

Davmark undertake to do the basic and optimised packages and are qualified in Search Engine Marketing. We would recommend anyone with a site involving “sales” to consider optimisation.

COPYWRITING & PROOF WRITING

Making every word count

Memorable, jargon-free content is the focus of Lacey’s copywriting skills. Her passion for language and the written word means that she can help businesses communicate clearly and with conviction.

Bringing objectivity and a keen eye for detail, ensures that your business reaches out to its audience by speaking the same language.

Every piece of copy that your target audience will see has to be perfect. Too often, businesses make the mistake of not proofing documents thoroughly before going to print.

The potential costs for Proofreading symbols rectifying errors post-production will always far outweigh any costs for accurate proofreading and editing in the preparation stages.

Davmark Communications makes it a priority to ensure that all your copy is perfect every time.

Davmark Communications can provide for our client’s an efficient and cost effective proofreading and copy-editing service for publications such as:

Journals
Newsletters
Brochures
Reports
Manuscripts

Yet, the list is endless – With specialist available in texts with French or Russian source languages.

So whatever the document, and whatever your audience, which needs to be 100% confident that it is word perfect.

Not forgetting – even simple advertisements need checking too!

What is proofreading?

This is the final stage of checking copy before it is sent for publication.

A proof-reader will check document proofs for errors in spelling/typing, punctuation, grammar and presentation.

What is copy-editing?

This is the process of preparing copy, already drafted, for publication.

Among many other things, a copy-editor will check for: consistency of style and presentation; clarity or ambiguity; grammar, punctuation/spelling; and flow of language used.

PUBLIC RELATIONS

PR & Newsletters:

Come to us when the going gets tough or when you have something to shout about.

Our PR will make sure the right impression is promoted through the most appropriate channels.

Although no two Davmark campaigns are the same there are certain absolutes:

Davmark research your market thoroughly before making recommendations
Davmark r campaigns are designed against measurable objectives from the start
Those objectives will be aligned to your business objectives
You will always receive high level strategic and tactical advice
Davmark will work within your budget constraints

If Davmark don’t think it can be done, we’ll tell you

Where does PR apply?

Strategic

Campaign design
Communications audit & analysis
Positioning and message development
Corporate communications consulting
Crisis planning
Audience definition

Tactical

Consumer media relations
Business media relations
Trade media relations
Press office
Crisis management
Industry analyst relations
Executive visibility programmes
Product launch and review
Round tables, press tours, seminars
Awards submissions
Trade show support
Speaking platforms
Newsletters / copy writing
International campaign coordination

Other

Media training
Mentoring
Communications audits
Competitor analysis
Stunts
Blog management
Viral campaigns

Ten Commandments of a Press Release

Some of our clients have asked us about Press Releases.

Know your ’shalt nots’ so that you shall get published.

In football, it’s said that you know the referee is top-notch when you never notice his presence.  If he’s doing his job, he won’t call attention to himself in any way.

It’s much the same for the writer of a press release.

When the recipient of a release focuses only on its content — and not on its creation — the writer has succeeded.  With that in mind, here’s The 10Commandments of Press Releases:

1. Thou Shalt Be Professional.
No goofy fonts, rainbow paper or silly gimmicks. Even light-hearted press releases represent a communication between one professional and another.

2. Thou Shalt Not Be Promotional.
If you can’t get enough objective distance from your company to write a press release that’s not filled with hype and puffery, hire someone to write it for you.

3. Thou Shalt Not Be Boring.
Even the driest subject matter allows for some sparks of creativity. Journalists like knowing that there’s a human being communicating with them, not some corporate robot.

4. Thou Shalt Be Brief.
Learn to cut out extraneous words. Keep your sentences short. Include only the points necessary to sell the story. The well-crafted one page press release is a thing of beauty.

5. Thou Shalt Know Thy Recipient.
A features or lifestyle editor is a very different creature from a city desk editor. If you’re promoting the opening of a new winery, the food and wine editor may be interested in all the details about what kind of aging process and wine press you’re using. The city desk editor just wants to know when the grand opening is and what’s going to happen there.

6. Thou Shalt Use The Proper Tense.
When writing a hard news release — a contract signing, a stock split, a major announcement, etc.) use the past tense (Davmark Marketing Ltd has changed its name to Davmark Communications, the company announced today…) When writing a soft news release — a trend story, a personal profile, etc. — use the present tense (David Slade is one of the best engineer over 40 with marketing experience. He’s also dyslexic. Thanks to new technology from Davmark Group, David is able to…).

7. Thou Shalt Think Visually.
A press release is more than words — it’s a visual document that will first be assessed by how it looks. I’m referring to more than font size or letterhead. I’m talking about the actual layout of the words. Whether received by mail, fax or e-mail, a journalist — often unconsciously — will make decisions about whether to read the release based on how the release is laid out. Big blocks of text and long paragraphs are daunting and uninviting. Short paragraphs and sentences make for a much more visually inviting look. When writing a non-hard news release, the general rule is to use a simple formula — the lead paragraph should be one or two sentences at most. The next paragraph should be very, very short. Like this.

8. Thou Shalt Tell A Story.
How to arrange the facts of a hard news release is pretty much cut and dried.  The old “who, what, when, where and how” lead and “inverted pyramid” concepts still hold.

So let’s focus on a soft news release. The trend story, the feel-good company story, the “gee-whiz, I didn’t know anyone was doing that!” release.

The difference between these releases and the hard news release is simply a mirror of the difference between a feature story in, say, the entertainment section of your newspaper and the breaking news report on page one. The hard news story is about cold, hard facts (A mudslide closed portions of Rail lines to London last night, causing massive Virgin Railway delays). A feature article about the guy who spends all day looking at seismograph readouts trying to predict where the next mudslide will occur will be very different. It’s likely to be in present tense, it won’t load all the facts upfront and it will be designed to draw the reader deep into the text.

It is, in short, all about storytelling. Here’s the formula I use for these kinds of releases. I call it the 3S approach — Situation/Surprise/Support. The first paragraph sets up the situation. The second paragraph reveals the surprise. The third paragraph supports the claim made in the second paragraph. One very typical 3S is discussing a common problem in the first paragraph (For centuries, people have accepted energy consumption as an inevitable result of leaving applications switched on.)  The “surprise” paragraph announces the solution to the problem (But one UK manufacture says this is now a thing of the past.)  The “support” paragraph then tells the story. (David Slade, an Davmark Group managing director and entrepreneur, says he’s found the key to this solution. His “Automated buildings” solution is based on readily available products properly configured together as an IIT solution”

9. Thou Shalt Not Bear False Witness.
This may seem an obvious point, but it always bears repeating.

Tell the truth.
Don’t inflate, don’t confabulate, don’t exaggerate.
Don’t twist facts, don’t make up numbers, don’t make unsubstantiated claims.
Any decent journalist will be able to see right through this.
If you’re lucky, you’re release will just get tossed out.
If you’re unlucky, you’ll be exposed.
It’s a chance not at all worth taking.
Make sure every release you write is honest and on the level.

10. Thou Shalt Know Thy Limitations.
Not everyone can write a press release. A good feature release, in particular, isn’t an easy thing to craft. If you just don’t feel like you have the chops to get the job done, hire a professional.

Even if you can you better getting advise before press release. You only get one chance at releasing the same information to the press.

Distributing Your Press Release

Davmark can distributed your press release through our PR business alliance partners.

Davmark can also sent the press release to free press release distribution services.

Additional places to send the press release include:

online industry publications
blogs
newsletters
trade associations
online news sites
the client’s Web site
free press release listing sites

Keep in mind that you often need to submit your press releases to each site separately, sometimes through a cut and paste process or an uploading process.
It can be very time-consuming.
Was the effort successful?
It’s easy to analyse the success of an online press release campaign

Picking the Right Picture for the Media release

If you are not sending pictures out with your press releases, you are missing a vital part of your PR campaign. As any editor will tell you, a release with a photo has a much higher chance of being used and could elevate your story from a few column centimetres on an inside page to a more prominent position and possibly the front page.
Here are a few tips that could help:

As an absolute minimum, ensure you have headshots of all people mentioned in your press releases and spokespeople representing your organization, before you are asked for them by a journalist. Avoid white background studio shots.

Your main spokespeople, CEO, director should have a small selection of images taken which picture them in a natural working setting representing your specific business, both with your company logo and without. Make sure you get landscape and portrait orientated shots.

If you are ‘telling a story’ in your press release, make sure the photo also tells the (same) story. Ensure it has enough impact to immediately grab the attention of firstly the editor and secondly the reader. Supplying a feature picture instead of a simple headshot is the biggest single thing you can do to bring your story to the top of the pile. Sometimes the most mundane story can be published as the lead story on the page thanks to a superb photo. (This is known as a picture led story).

Have some generic shots taken that represent your business and industry sector. Both internal and exterior shots should be produced showing your business at work.

Sometimes having these generic shots available when a picture editor is looking for a photo to go with an existing story can result in your organization being asked to comment. (Make sure you are told what the basis of the story is before making the pictures available).
 Make sure all your photos meet the media photo specs so you they can easily be sent by email and will not overload the mailbox of the journalist you are sending them to. (This wouldn’t help your cause!)

PR and the media
Do you read stories in newspapers and trade magazines about your competitors?

Perhaps you know your company is as successful as they are with just as many positive stories to tell, but none of the articles you have submitted have been published.

The first thing to understand is that journalists are not in the business of providing free publicity. Their role is to produce articles of interest to their readers, so you need to provide relevant information which they genuinely want to publish. Different journalists write in different ways for different audiences and it is essential to develop an understanding of their requirements before submitting any information to them. A newspaper distributed in one city, for example, is unlikely to be interested in your new office in another city — but it may well be if you explain that you’ve had to recruit specialist staff from the city the newspaper is published in, to address local skills shortages.

Be Strategic
Efforts to secure publicity need to form part of a strategy which supports your broader commercial objectives. Hold a meeting with your management team — perhaps with guidance from a PR consultant — to explore the rationale behind the publicity drive. For example, you may have expansion plans which rely on being able to attract and retain high calibre staff. You therefore have two priorities: Firstly, to position yourself as a highly successful employer that looks after its staff, and secondly, to ensure that customers know who you are, what you do, and why you are the best.

Know your Market
It’s important to develop a realistic understanding of your target audiences: Who are the decision-makers? What size companies do they work for or run? Where are these companies based? How are they influenced? What publications do they read? You can only hope to make a meaningful impact on people if you know what makes them tick.

Focus on the Message
Once you’ve established what you want to create ‘noise’ about and you’ve prioritised your target audiences, it’s worth considering how you want to be positioned. Seeing your company’s name in print can be immensely satisfying but if the article does not communicate specific aspects of your service and expertise, it’s unlikely to have the required effect. By consistently describing your company in the same way and communicating three or four unique selling points you are more likely to get your message across.

Spread the Word
Press releases are a useful means of providing journalists with information and a good proportion of business articles begin their life in this way. However, journalists are bombarded with hundreds on a daily basis so it’s essential that yours stands out.
A powerful headline and first paragraph clearly identifying the news angle are fundamental.

Avoid jargon at all costs and remember
KISS: Keep It Short and Simple.

Press releases are by no means the only way. Pick up the telephone and discuss your story with the journalists you want to target.

Don’t lose heart if you get an indifferent response: think of the discussion as an opportunity to gain a better understanding of the type of commentary most likely to impress.

Remember that pro-activity, and perseverance, are essential.

Want More Media Coverage?

Mention the “F-word” in mixed company and you are liable to get a little more than a look. Try to get F-words covered in the media and expect a call from the Advertising Standards Agency or Press Complaints Commission or the legal department at Standards and Practices.

However, we consistently leverage F-words to get our clients television, radio and print coverage. It just depends on what F-word you focus on.

Before setting up a campaign for a client, our agency reviews eight F-words or what we call F factors that can help garner media coverage. While not every F factor is applicable to each client, by finding the best fit, we craft stories that are more attractive to the media. These F-Words can help a PR practitioner design the right message for the right audience, and pitch the right media at the right time.

Face
From the media’s perspective, every story has a face. It could be a celebrity, a CEO, a trusted expert, a government official, a dignitary, an author, a beneficiary, and even a victim, Even a PR rookie knows that “Who” is the first word in the 5 Ws (Who, What, Where, When and Why).

Finding the right “Who” is what an agency needs to address first and foremost and what separates a good agency from a great agency.
Who will tell the story?
Who can we offer for the interview?
Who can best address the client message points? Who will best attract the media?
Before embarking on any communications campaign, first attach the right face to it.

First
The “first” in this sense is not based on which media outlet receives the exclusive story. Rather, it is based on how you position your client’s product, service, situation etc. Positioning is a technique that creates an image or identity in the minds of a target market for our client’s product, brand or organization. One of the major tenets of positioning is to be first to market thereby differentiating the company or organization, product or service, from all other competitors. The media loves firsts. The next two questions serve as an example. Who was the first man on the moon? The second? Of course, we all know that Neil Armstrong uttered the famous words ” One small step.” Buzz Aldrin was the second man to step on the moon. If you got Buzz right you deserve your spot on Jeopardy. However this should prove the point. The first mass-produced car — Ford, the first light beer — Miller, the first online auction platform — eBay. These concepts were firsts in their own right. They created their own category and attracted media attention. Phrases like “best in breed”, “revolutionary” and “next wave” mean nothing to the media. First means first. First means coverage.

Finances
Over-paying at the Pump, The Fleecing of America, Affordable Healthcare — these headlines are very familiar to us because we see them on national, and regional affiliate news stations and in print almost every day. A smart PR agency looks to see if they can craft a story highlighting a client using “pocket book” issues. If you want to get a client on television, radio and in print determine how their product or service affects a consumer’s purse strings.

Front Door
How does this pertain to me? Before even embarking on a story place yourself as the audience. Bring the story home to the front door. Localize it. Find the angle that speaks directly to the client’s audience and furthermore the media’s audience. Is there a local family that best represents the story? Is there a local doctor that can relay this issue? Can the information or data be delivered by state, county, town? If yes, then like a good neighbour, deliver the information with local flavour.

Fear
Unfortunately, the phrase “if it bleeds it leads” is all to often a front page reality. I am not one to purport or debate that the media is in the business of selling fear; however there does seem to be gravitation toward it. In 2005, there were two weeks of national coverage on “When Sharks Attack” and CNN recently featured a complete day of terrorist coverage titled “Target: America” complete with ominous music intros and oversized headline fonts. Fear can play a roll as a backing soundtrack to many health, political, and socio-economic issues to name a few. The key for a PR agency is not to create the fear, but to understand the current media climate and leverage it for the benefit the client.

Fix
What would a Dear Abby column be without her response? While most people will tell you that they look to the media for information, another major reason people turn to the news is for answers to their questions and solutions to their problems — what we call the Fix! When it comes to product launches, “new-and-improved” stories typically go from reporter’s in-box to the trash bin, however, a product launch that showcases a real problem with a real solution can pique a writer’s interest in the story.

Feat
The World’s smallest lighting controller! Call Guinness Book of World Records and let them know we have a special event! The feat should never be the first option a PR agency offers a client. However, a special event of epic proportion can get cameras and reporters out on a slow business day. Make it visual and something a photo editor would want to drive out to see and shoot.

Facts
This F-word would be best placed closer to the top of the list. It seems self-explanatory and self-evident, however, many companies continue to send out a press release or notify the press without having all the information. Corral all the information a reporter will need and keep it within hands reach.

CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY PROGRAMMES FOR CHARITIES

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) isn’t just about being seen to do the right thing. It provides direct business benefits. It can build sales, increase productivity through motivating the workforce, boost enthusiasm and innovation, enhance trust in an organisation and increase a company’s reputation and standing.  In short, undertaking responsible business practices makes companies more competitive.

With the benefit of its expertise in the charitable/not for profit sector, Davmark through it business alliance partners is pleased to offer private sector companies assistance in finding a charity which fits with company ethos, culture and values, by tapping into its charity contacts as well as extensive research within the charity sector.  Once sourced, we can implement, develop, manage and even oversee your charity partnership.

For charities, Davmark are delighted to offer a matching service to charities seeking a corporate partner, drawing initially on its database of clients, to source a corporate organisation whose culture and operating sector fits your charity’s criteria. This with by the use of Davmark Solutions Ltd within the group.

CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY FOR COMPANIES

Davmark can assist with the format of these documents. But some of a clients have asked Davmark Communication to advised on how there CSR are communicate and seen to be discharged. Skip this section if this is of no relevance to you.

Corporate social responsibility is by no means a new concept for directors of companies in the food and drink sector. In fact, it is a concept which many have been grappling with for some time now as part of day-to-day management. However, following the recent codification of directors’ duties, it is no longer a factor they ‘might’ like to consider, it is a factor they ‘must’ consider as part of their duties as a director.

Substantial parts of the Companies Act 2006 (the Act) are now in force, including four of the seven codified directors’ general duties which came into force on 1 October 2007; the other three codified duties are due to come into force later this year. The new set of directors’ duties is the first time that such duties have been recorded in statute codifying a myriad of well-trodden case law. Notably, the Act has now established a clear link between the duties that directors owe to a company and matters of corporate social responsibility, many of which are highly relevant to the food and drink sector, such as ethical trading and environmental best practice.

Something old, something new

For the last 300 years, the law governing directors’ duties has largely been derived from common law rules and equitable principles which have developed through the courts on a case-by-case basis. The law on directors’ duties has therefore not always been readily accessible to those who need it most, directors. It was therefore a key objective of the new legislation to make the law more accessible by codifying the general duties of directors so that they reflect the existing law and provide greater clarity on what is expected of directors. This sentiment is to be applauded and the Act now includes seven general duties that seek to reflect the existing law, as follows:

1.To promote the success of the company
2.To exercise reasonable care, skill and diligence
3.To exercise independent judgement
4.To act within the powers of the company
5.To avoid conflicts of interest
6.Not to accept benefits from third parties
7.To declare any interest in proposed transactions or arrangements with the company

There is of course little that is controversial in the broad formulation of these duties. For example, few could doubt that directors should act within their powers and exercise reasonable care, skill and diligence. However, the simplicity of codification brings its own issues to the table, not least the fact that it is rarely possible to set out in statutory form the detailed principles on which the underlying cases have been decided. The Act provides that the new codified duties are to be based on the ‘existing duties’ and that regard should be had to the ‘corresponding’ existing duties when interpreting the new ones. What this means in practice is that the existing law is almost superseded, but not quite. Effectively, this approach avoids the necessity for detailed codification of complex principles underlying each of the new duties, whilst suggesting that the courts should be reluctant to move away from the existing law underpinning each of the duties.

Until this relationship is tried and tested in the courts, the interaction between existing case law and the new duties will provide scope for uncertainty and judicial development - in particular, it will be interesting to see if the courts decide that the language used in the Act compels them to follow old precedents or affords them with an opportunity to look at issues afresh.

Duty to promote the success of the company

One of the new codified duties is to ‘promote the success of the company’. Lord Goldsmith, the government spokesman, has reportedly said that success for a commercial company will usually mean a ‘long-term increase in value’. The Act provides that a director of a company must act in a way he considers, in good faith, would be most likely to promote the success of the company for the benefit of its members as a whole, and in doing so shall have regard (amongst other matters) to:

The likely consequences of any decision in the long term (e.g. cutting a company’s research and development budget)
The interests of the company’s employees (e.g. moving a manufacturing process abroad, thus leading to redundancies among existing staff)
The need to foster the company’s business relationships with suppliers, customers and others (e.g tightening of supplier terms of trade in order to improve cash flow)
The impact of the company’s operations on the community and the environment (e.g. the impact of new manufacturing processes on a company’s carbon footprint)
The desirability of the company maintaining a reputation for high standards of business conduct (e.g. reputational risk of using private information relating to competitors)
The need to act fairly as between members of the company (e.g. ensuring that private shareholders are not disadvantaged by corporate transactions or share issues).

The introduction of these ‘enlightened shareholder values’ (the CSR Factors) has been criticised for creating an additional burden on directors, although most competent directors have long had regard to these factors. Their statutory formulation will arguably just make directors think harder about them.

This is particularly so in the food and drink sector where directors are likely to have already considered a number of the CSR Factors as a matter of course whilst undertaking risk management exercises - one such example is packaging and waste. Directors no doubt have to weigh up product sales (success) on the one hand (often driven by presentation as much as taste), against the adverse consequences that non-recyclable packaging has on the environment. This is particularly so with landfill space in the UK rapidly declining and the consumer market becoming more and more socially and environmentally-minded.

Although directors now have an overriding duty to promote the success of a company, it is now mandatory that directors also consider the CSR Factors when making decisions. It will not be sufficient for directors simply to ‘pay lip service’ to these factors. Proper consideration will need to be given to each factor and its potential relevance to the matter in hand (the legislation does not dictate what weight should be given to each of them) and directors should maintain a written record of having given regard to the relevant CSR Factors. This is particularly important in an increasingly litigious environment and against the backdrop of an increased risk of claims being brought against directors personally.

Shareholder actions

The changes to directors’ duties, some of which have been described above, are certainly capable of creating uncertainty, at least until the courts have had an opportunity to rule on questions of construction and the interaction of the new laws with the old. While the codification of duties has arguably helped to clarify directors’ legal duties and obligations, this clarification has also served to create clearer grounds upon which directors might be sued personally for breaching such duties. This is all the more significant given the parallel changes in the scope of the shareholder action - otherwise known as a ‘derivative claim’.

If a wrong is done to a company, the correct entity to seek redress is the company itself. However, wrongs committed against a company are sometimes attributable to the directors who will have the power to prevent the company from bringing a claim. This is said to be tantamount to a ‘fraud’ against the minority shareholders with the result that, under the existing law, the minority are allowed to bring an action against the wrongdoers in the name of and for the benefit of the company. Although derivative claims are possible under existing law, they are complex and limited in scope. The Act has made two important changes to the existing law in respect of derivative claims, which are:

it will no longer be possible for a simple majority of shareholders to ratify the conduct of directors, thereby leading to an absolute bar on a derivative claim. The votes of a director and of anyone connected with the director will be disregarded for these purposes. This represents a significant qualification to the general principle of majority control which is a cornerstone for a number of English company law principles; and
it is now clear that any breach of duty, even negligence, can be the subject of a derivative claim - there was some uncertainty about this point under existing law.

One of the consequences of allowing negligence to form the basis of a derivative claim is the likelihood of a disgruntled shareholder being able to present a credible argument that a specific decision was made negligently because the directors failed to have regard for, or placed too much (or too little) weight on certain factors. Arguably, this is more likely than ever now that directors have a specific list of factors (the CSR Factors) to which they must have regard in seeking to promote the success of the company.
The potential for claims to be brought against directors would therefore seem to have been increased and early evidence of this is in circulation. For example, the Corporate Responsibility Coalition (CORE) has produced a guide on how its members can use the Act to bring companies to account for their social and environmental impact as well as financial performance.

The legislators were, however, aware of the sleepless nights these changes may cause a conscientious director to endure. The Act introduces a number of safeguards to limit unwarranted or frivolous claims being brought in abuse of the court process. A shareholder will be required to seek the permission of the court to bring an action in the name of the company and the courts will have a largely unqualified discretion as to whether or not to allow a shareholder action to continue. In particular, one of the grounds to be taken into account by the court is whether the application is being made in ‘good faith’. This is an important protection for directors and it is likely to guard against, for example, a situation where a campaigner or interest group purchases a share solely for the purpose of being able to bring a shareholder action. It is likely that the court will treat such action as a claim brought in bad faith and designed to further a different objective, rather than shareholder protection.

The main concern with the new rules is that they will lead to uncertainty and the prospect that almost every decision could be challenged with greater ease than under the existing rules. With no cast-iron rules, a shareholder will be able to apply to court and attempt to persuade the court to allow a derivative claim to proceed. This will inevitably lead to some cases where this is a positive development leading to greater accountability on the part of directors, but there must be a risk that it creates a climate in which shareholders are encouraged to raise arguments in order to explore an issue publicly or to apply pressure on the directors.

Conclusion

Many companies within the food and drink sector are already publicly demonstrating their ‘regard’ for the CSR Factors by publishing their policies on a wide range of corporate responsibility matters such as responsible drinking, food labelling and marketing to children, local sourcing and supplier relationships, all of which are potentially useful defensive measures to ward off derivative claims. But the reforms are still likely to create an environment in which challenges are made to actions and decisions of directors. In the context of broader shareholder activism and, let’s not forget, the uncertainty currently surrounding the world economy, there is a real prospect of increased litigation. One can only hope that the courts apply a sensible approach so as to minimise the scope for tactical action and other unnecessary claims.

Practical advice

The introduction of the new codified duties and an increased risk of directors’ decisions being challenged, particularly by way of shareholder actions, means some directors may find themselves faced with a new era of decision-making and a few sleepless nights lay ahead; for others, it will be business as usual. In order to acclimatise to this new era, it is recommended that:

If relevant, directors are careful to ensure that each of the six CSR Factors are considered, bearing in mind they are not exhaustive. In many situations it will be necessary to have regard to other factors.
Minutes do not necessarily need to give detail on how each relevant factor was considered if supporting board papers provide the relevant information. (A system of checking by the chairman or secretary before any paper is finally included in the board pack should be introduced, to ensure that all relevant factors are adequately covered).
Directors use independent advisers such as environmental and health service consultancies to help to establish the potential impact of business decisions before they are implemented.
The directors’ obligations in relation to their codified duties, in particular, the CSR Factors, should be brought to the attention of all directors on appointment.

The Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators has recently published a guidance note on directors’ general duties under the Act and it is well worth a read; it may even help to avoid the unwanted attention of a derivative claim

Supervising print requirements can prove to be expensive, time-consuming and technically complex. The solution lies with Affinity print management services. We offer a combination of unrivalled industry experience with specialist knowledge of the latest developments in print technology. From our approved suppliers we select the one most qualified to meet the precise demands of a particular job.

Affinity can provide a fully comprehensive package. By conducting a detailed audit of an organisation’s print needs and expenditure, we can develop a tailored strategy designed to increase efficiency and significantly reduce costs across all departments.

Alternatively, we are able to work on an ad-hoc basis to manage individuals print jobs as and when required.
Benefits of Affinity print management include:

1)savings of up to 15% achieved through consolidation and economies of scale
2)integrity of brand identity maintained
3)consistency of superior print quality and paper stocks
4)more effectively integrated print campaigns
5)improved return on investment
6)customers’ expectations fulfilled and surpassed
7)less effort, greater peace of mind
8)valuable time freed up to focus more on core business
9)reporting systems make job status available at any time

Everything you print should excite the senses. That’s why we’re passionate. About quality, about service, and about achieving results for our customers. We can’t claim to make the earth move. But we know you’ll fall in love with what we can do for you

EXISTING SYSTEMS IMPLEMENTED

MESSAGE TO OUR CUSTOMERS

You have a vision and a goal, but maybe not the time or the marketing resource to fully realise it. Let us help you by giving you room to breathe so you can focus on your core product or service while we maximise the marketing effort.

Great companies are built on a BIG IDEA – the perfect product, the perfect service; gaps in the market that you have identified and believe you can meet.

However, not all companies are able to seek out every opportunity to grow their business. Not everyone manages to shout about their successes and get their message across to the people who will benefit from their BIG IDEA.

After the BIG IDEA, sometimes you just need a little support to take the next step to make the idea a reality.

Davmark want to help make your business a success.

Davmark is here to tell your story; to the media, to your customers, to suppliers.

Davmark provide independent and flexible marketing support for companies, regardless of size and length of project. A hands-on approach means that we handle not just the strategic issues but actually get the job done. We are your virtual marketing department. We work on our premises or yours - whichever suits you best.

Davmark Group provides business & creative support in making the complex issues simple – It’s what we do…

Tick box that applies:

The “BIG” IDEA ……………Done

The business plan support
Raising the finance
Product packaging
Marketing plan
Single message to market
Contacting you customer
Corporate branding & Identity
PR & product awareness
Marketing & sales support
Advertising – What media? How?

Just tick the box and give us a call.

Finding a team that work so well together across so many mediums is rare.

The Davmark Group possess complimentary skills that really do create that ‘third person’ all who are there best in their own individual creative excellence.

The perfect team for the 21st Century - visually led, making them perfect for the internet, yet both highly proficient at writing compelling words too, for both off-line and on-line communications.

Davmark Group can provide all of the above business & creative support and more…
Davmark Limited
Advertising & marketing creative support
Business and sales Support
Technical and engineering Support

Davmark Group preserves its entrepreneurial energy by engaging with managers across the separate Davmark companies, managing and steering keeping it on ‘message’ in all its products and enterprise’s, without micromanaging, giving plenty of autonomy to its individual companies and managers, so that we stay nimble, committed to building on new successes and business objectives, retaining a creative edge, moving quickly to implementing new ideas that can help the company broaden its reach and attract and retain more customers in different markets …

It’s a win-win scenario…

It’s the Davmark way.

MARKETING AND YOU

Davmark Group provides a comprehensive yet flexible, single-point management consultancy and planning service to clients, offering support from initial project and policy definition through to feasibility planning and implementation.

‘It’s essential for every business to target their audience accurately and Davmark Group has the experience, skills and energy to help our clients achieve this objective.’

Everything we do or say communicates a message. In business it is vital that this message reaches its target audience in the most effective way, with creativity, integrity and impact.

There are a lot of companies out there who need help to market themselves effectively. Yet often, they don’t have the in-house resources or the time to get the job done properly.

We understand that each client’s requirements are unique to its own business and therefore, we provide a service that is unique to you. Our flexible approach to every project enables you to meet your objectives as smoothly as possible providing a professional and flexible service that not only fits in with their way of working, but also brings a creative and fresh approach to the way in which they communicate.

At Davmark, we offer a range of services that gives our clients the opportunity to communicate with its audience in the way it wants to.

Our leadership in this area stems from our unique ability to provide the multi-disciplinary input that is required to successfully meet the demands of large-scale strategic projects as well as from our experience and knowledge of policy and how this is formed and reformed.

Customer oriented culture

Any of the above indicatives can be used, there all of the same basic philosophy – they represent part of the virtuous circle which planners seek to implement. The only debate is where best to start – quality or marketing?

The marketing background

Any plan needs to be prepared so that it stands alone, can be read by someone outside the business on in years to come, and has a clear rationale. It is not possible to judge the quality of the marketing plan without knowledge of the starting point (audit) and the corporate scenario against which it has been produced.

Being Specific

The planning process works best when the start point is with the big picture (the business plan), with a sense of the scale and shape of things, and then gradually work down the planning hierarchy adding more detail.

! Davmark advice

Do not try to produce a single marketing plan for a single business plan. If you have more than one strategy you will need more than one plan.

The more specific the focus of the marketing plan the more effective it will be.

Marketing objectives

Marketing objectives might be expressed as revenue, sales, customer numbers, occupancy or market share, but always in some form which is relevant to the team.

We would give a word of caution when using market share estimates, which can be difficult objective to work with:-

as they can be unreliable and/or difficult to get.
They depend on definitions of the market
The market my be growing or declining, so will your share may not be a good reflection of performance.

Remember the reason for planning is to match demand and available supply; fudging the numbers achieves little.

There is no single strategy that works for everybody. Different companies need different strategies depending on the marketing and business goals they want (or need) to achieve; the strength and weaknesses of the company; the competitiveness of the industry; and general industry and market trends.

Yet, a clear understanding of these issues will lead to strategies that are focused and can be implemented. Hence, these strategies guide you in achieving your short- and long-term goals.

Your organisation’s performance is closely linked to its marketing strategies.
Your strategy must be unique in order to address the needs specific to your customers, channel partners, competitors and the company itself.

Davmark delivers persuasive strategic marketing services including specific marketing action plans and strategic guides to address a variety of marketing challenges including:

increasing revenues and protect revenue streams
increasing customer and channel satisfaction and loyalty
improving positioning
creating or increasing brand value
improving marketing communications
deepening market penetration
developing new markets
optimising product development
defining web strategies
obtaining buy-in for your projects
helping business, marketing, sales, and product planning and decisions
seizing new product opportunities
guiding company start-up
answering competitive threats
improving or optimising customer base

Davmark as a service through being employed to undertaking a marketing strategy review can deliver a detailed independent analysis of the current position and future outlook for your business, clarification of key objectives and an assessment of successful and unsuccessful strategies. The review normally also assess the implementation process itself for our clients.

This service is critical if a business is to ensure that it is following a pre-determined direction.

Marketing Strategy

Marketers must mirror the steps of the corporate plan, identifying which segments of the market might be targeted to achieve the marketing objective, selecting the most appropriate and determining how best to position their offering to satisfy the needs of this group. Once segmentation and positioning are agreed then the marketing strategy is in place.

Marketing tactics

Details for implementation of this strategy are required, with plans for all elements of the marketing mix to ensure each reinforces the agreed positioning. The positioning map acts as the blueprint which ensures integration of the mix elements.

Controls
Budget

A budget based on the resources required to implement the above strategy and tactics must be set. This will then require the marketing plan to demonstrate back and obtain the buy-in of those who will take responsibility for the implementation.

! Davmark advice

Budgets cannot be decided isolation from the plans and neither should plans be shopping lists of how to spend this year’s allocation budget.
Customer-oriented planning requires that resources are allocated on an ‘objective and task’ basis. I.e. this is what we want to achieve, this is what we must do to achieve it and these are the resources required to complete those tasks.

Timetable

A timetable will promote action from the plan, again providing a useful bridge between planning process and implementation. Written down and reviewed regularly, an action plan

Reduces the wastage of resources because of poor sequencing of actions
Provides a measure against which progress can be readily assessed.

Feedback

Feedback is the third element of control process. Managers must plan control and feedback from the beginning. Measures against which performance of both the planning and the planning process can be assessed are critical to:

Provide advance warning of plans not working
Help managers learn from their own planning activities
Increase understanding of buyer behaviour in the market.

! Davmark advice

Do not make the mistake of assuming that because a plan is written down it will inevitably work. These are not tablets of stone.
Plans are most unlikely to work out without adaptation and modification, because they have to be developed with incomplete information based on forecasts of the future that will almost certainly prove to be wrong. You made decisions based upon assumptions and forecasts. These need monitoring.
The further head you are planning the more likely it is that your plans will require modification – but Davmark like good managers are alert, flexible and prepared for contingencies.

The problem with plans and planning

The problem with planning is the time spent in preparation hours of time which are invested in the process but do not show up in the finished product, i.e. the plan. It just like decorating a room. All the shopping, choosing and selecting of a colour scheme, the sanding down and stripping off that goes on behind the scenes and at the end it seems no one is aware of the effort that went into the finished room. But of course that is not the true picture. The quality of the preparation is reflected in the quality and success of the end product. The same is true of business planning. As much of 80% of your time and effort can go into the process of planning. Producing the final plan is just the tip of the iceberg, but the quality of your preparation will show in the effectiveness and success of the plans implemented.

It is certainly not possible to write an effective marketing plan unless the business plan has established clear objectives and strategic direction for the business. Similarly the public relations plan must be derived from a marketing plan which spells out the market segments being targeted and the overall objectives for each.

Plans are intended to integrate the efforts of the organization and cannot be produced effectively in water-tight units. Information and decisions must flow freely back and forth, and up and down the business throughout the planning sequence.

Solid plans are based on detailed understanding of the three Cs – capabilities, customers and competitors.

As a rule of thumb planning time should be allocated in the following proportions:

Internal situational analysis – 20 per cent
External environmental audit – 20 per cent
Strategy identification, evaluation and selection – 30 per cent
Production and communication of plan – 30 per cent

What is the plan for?

Corporate or business
Marketing
Promotion
Objectives are expressed in terms of:
Profit or stakeholder benefits
Customer, revenue or market share
Awareness, attitude or action
Strategy confirms:
Which products and which markets are to be targeted
Which segments of customers and what positioning is to be adopted
Whether a sales push or advertising pull approach is to be used
Tactics provide details summarised from:
The functional plans, including the marketing plan
Plans for each element of the marketing mix
The individual plans for each element of communication activity
Controls exposed in terms of:
costs and control
Market growth, average spend and cross sell
Conversion and enquiry ratios

Total product concept

The total bundle of benefits offered to the customer is described by “Philip Kutler” as the total product concept.

This concept identifies some benefits which are core or expected by the customer and others which augment or differentiate one companies offering from another.

To have any impact on customer behaviour the benefits offered must be valued by the customer.

If all organizations offer the same benefits, purchase decisions will be based on price and the market will commoditize.

Successful operators offer the necessary core and expected benefits but the differentiate their offer with augmented important to the customer

Faster delivery
Longer operational hours
More attractive packaging
Free trade products
ECO green credentials
CO2 emission reductions
Friendlily customer service
Branding perceived image and messaging

Any elements of the marketing mix can be employed to differentiate and avoid customer buying on price alone.

What is you customer worth? (To you!)

It is ………