Impact Media Design Blog

Issue 2 of our company newsletter the Caffeine Times is available now. Those of you are not subscribed to our free email newsletter have a bonus opportunity of winning a free Nescafe Dolce Gusto machine, just by signing up! Valid until August 31st 2008.

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So what's included in our newsletter?

We see ourselves as different, our newsletter actually includes ... not a lot of news. It actually has more interesting info inside, who really wants to read pages of information on what we have been up to?

We do include a little; but it mostly contains quizzes, sudokus, word-searches, dingbats to play on your coffee break, and also brand tips to help improve your business.

So don't miss out, it's free sign up now.

We have been creating a new identity and some creative advertising material for OK Homebuyers along with their new company website.

OK Homebuyers assist in helping out customers with financial difficulties; mainly outstanding mortgage repayments and massive debt. OK can purchase clients properties from them within days, helping them to clear their debts and move on with their lives.

We have built the new website for OK and are looking at building a close relationship with the team, as they are looking for ongoing online and offline marketing which we will be controlling.

A full detailed brief will be available soon.

Please check out their website www.okhomebuyers.co.uk

We have all read the papers and listened to the news and lately all we seem to hear is all doom and gloom. Whichever way you look at it, true or not, the bad media is beginning to scare people into holding back their spending which is affecting everyone.

Our view on the so called ‘Credit Crunch’ is that your product or service will still be in demand, although people will be less cautious on how much they spend and who they spent it with.

So whether your business is online or offline here are a few tips to help beat the credit crunch.

1. Build & Develop Trust – As people are becoming more wary about using new businesses, try to introduce trust to your business. A key way of doing this is to make your business more approachable, being more open with prospects about your business. Also try adding testimonials to any marketing. People trust other client’s opinions; this will go a long way.

2. Keep Communicating! – You need to keep your brand under your client’s noses at all times, if your competitor is thinking like you, they will be doing the same, keeping on top of your marketing and email communications is vital. Try sending out regular updates on your products and services via email or direct marketing.

3. Build Customer Loyalty – If your business has a large client base, or even a small client base; why not reward their loyalty. Provide discount vouchers and promotional codes for just being a customer, surely this will build loyalty and it is always better to receive something rather than nothing.

4. Special Offers – If possible try to introduce special offers to entice in new customers. Everyone loves a deal. Keep these deals fresh and rotate them to keep interest. If people are looking for the best deal, you are sure to be able to provide it.

5. Fantastic Customer Service – In these so called hard times, aim to offer your customers with the best advice and service. Sometimes you might have to go out your way to win that client. But it will worth the while in the end.

6. Don’t follow your competition – If your competition begins holding back on their marketing spend – this is your opportunity to take their enquiries.

7. Be Consistent – Do not begin pulling advertisements and marketing spend, if you withdraw your marketing how is anyone going to notice your business? And on the other hand your competitors might begin stealing the enquiries you should have received.

8. Don’t Be Static – Try not to be complacent, keep your marketing fresh and rotate adverts to entice your prospects.

This should assist in killing some of those bad vibes, however nobody knows your business like you do, and I’m sure with your knowledge of your market, you should be able to battle through the hype, like you didn’t even notice there was a little economic slowdown!

So here we go again, another quiz and another chance to answer questions and potentially receive a 10% discount voucher off your next order with Impact Media Design, whether that be design or print work.

So moving swiftly on, let's here the questions.

Send your answers in an email to quiz@impactbranding.co.uk. Good Luck

Same again the first 10 questions are taken from TV adverts,

Question 1

Question 2

Question 3

Question 4

Question 5

Question 6

Question 7

Question 8

Question 9

Question 10

Question 11 - Name That Brand!

The next 10 questions takes you through guessing the brand's logo

The next 10 Questions are based around TV and Films

Question 21
Who was Britain`s first black news reader?

Question 22
What is the name of the second James Bond film?

Question 23
In the film `Breakfast at Tiffanys`, what is the name of Audrey Hepburn`s character`s cat ?

Question 24
Which video game and film takes place in Racoon City?

Question 25
Which series of horror films take place in the fictional town of Springwood, Ohio?

Question 26
What is the name of Dr Evil`s cat in the `Austin Powers` films?

Question 27
Which 1970s musical film starred Angela Lansbury as a trainee witch?

Question 28
In which film did Roy Scheider play a sheriff and Richard Dreyfus a marine biologist?

Question 29
What is the name of the Orang-utan King in the 1967 film `The Jungle Book`?

Question 30
Which actress played the love interest opposite Tobey Maguire in the Spiderman films?

The next 5 questions are sport related.

Question 31
What was Mohammad Ali`s birth name?

Question 32
Which sport can`t you play left handed?

Question 33
Which sport uses a piece of equipment that is 5 foot wide and 9 foot long?

Question 34
With which sport would you most associate the commentator Ted Lowe?

Question 35
What sport has 4 letters and begins with a `T`?

The last 5 questions are general knowledge.

Question 36
What were lost by King John, melted down by Oliver Cromwell and almost stolen by Thomas Blood?

Question 37
Which country`s national flag has the most colours?

Question 38
In which year did Pablo Picasso die?

Question 39
In which year was the pirate radio Radio Caroline launched?

Question 40
In what year was the Great Train Robbery?

Once again send your answers in an email just writing Q1 and the answer (e.g. Q1 Sheep) and send it through to quiz@impactbranding.co.uk. We’ll send you a 10% discount voucher to use on your next order - providing you get at least 50% right!!!! Good Luck

Please click here to download July's Sudoku Puzzle

Click here to download July's Dingbats

Click here to download July's Brand Wordsearch

Just recently we have been monitoring our search engine rankings on a few keywords which we have been receiving quite a high quantity of enquiries through. Searching on “Company Brand Design” will bring up 52,000,000 search results, and we were proud to see ourselves ranked 3rd! That to us is an impressive performance.

We are also acheiving high rankings using many other keywords such as "Advert Design" which we are ranked 11th out of 382,000 - not quite page one but we're working on it.

On more localised searches we are acheiving fantastic results for searches on "brand design essex" we are appearing position 1 out of 3,090,000 search results. That's a nice position to be in!

And lastly on the search term "Advert Design Essex" we also appear position number 1 out of 252,000.

But we understand that even acheiving these goals one day and being knocked down position can happen; staying on top of your optimisation programmes is a must.

If you need assistance on your web marketing or would like to review your online marketing options, then please feel free to call us, and we can talk through your options.

One of our clients Football For Fans are organising a charity event at Corcorde Rangers football club in Canvey Island. The event hosts some big ex-England international names playing local team Concorde Rangers.

The general public will be able to gain access to the players after the buffet and there will then follow an auction, organised by Clare Brooking, where the proceeds will go to Arsenal and Scotland keeper Bob Wilson's "Willow" Foundation (charity dedicated to bringing special days for seriously ill adults aged 16-40)

There are sponsorship opportunities available for businesses who want to assist in the fun raising and enjoy and afternoon of entertainment.
If you interested in helping out with advertising please contact Jeff via email on jeff@footballforfans.co.uk

The Date is the Sunday 7th September at Concorde Rangers Football Club. Kick off is at 2pm.

Tickets for spectators are priced at £7.50 for adults and £2.50 for children under 16.

Confirmed players lining up for the England 11 are
Peter Bonetti, Paul Parker, Nigel Winterburn, Graham Roberts, Paul Allen, Peter Taylor, Paul Walsh, Clive Allen, Kerry Dixon & Tony Cottee, with a few others still to be announced.

For more information please visit www.footballforfans.co.uk

Today we launched the New Hanningfield Process Systems website. The pharmaceutical company have been slowly rebranding their products and company over the last year, and Impact Media have been proudly assisting with the rebrand.

One of the most vital changes for their brand was in fact their website. Hanningfield were looking at at complete new interface for the company and the new site certainly stands unique in their industry.

A full case study will be updated shortly, in the mean time please visit their new website. Your comments would always be appreciated.

www.hanningfield.com

We have recently completed promotional sales material for inventory specialists Homecare. Homecare were looking at producing various marketing incentives to target letting agents around Essex.

We produced a range of incentives including coasters, mouse mats, rulers, pens, note pads and carrier bags to present the items in.

Amazingly enough we reported this morning that our client Jet Tyres had just launched their new website; we are happy to inform that within 20 minutes of the site being live - Jet Tyres had made their first sale using our new order management system.

This is always great news to hear from a web designers point of view, knowing that Jet's website visitors have found our design easy to navigate and easy to purchase. We are very proud of this accomplishment.

Once again here is the link to the Jet Tyres website www.jettyres.co.uk

The long awaited revamp of national tyre suppliers Jet Tyres website has finally gone live today. It has taken many weeks to create the website but has been well worth the wait.

Jet Tyres approached Impact to re-design their existing system which was enabling their customers to order tyres online, however their existing system left much physical admin, as they still had to call the customer and take payment. The original system was also very confusing and hard to maintain.

Jet were looking to achieve a new branded website, which could process payments online and was very user friendly.

A full case study will be available on this website shortly, until then please check out their website. Your comments would be much appreciated.

www.jettyres.co.uk

The other day I went through a retro stage and wanted to play the Original Nintendo system, remember Super Mario Brothers?

Well I still have the system in it's original packaging stored in the loft, when I got it down it struck me how important packaging really was as a 20 year old box would still be seen, read and used even after all this time.

So when you are thinking of packaging for your product, think of the long time factor and the investment, I don't even think Ninendo thought that their product's box would be kept for 20 plus years - that's a lot of promotion for the brand!

Do you think your packaging will be kept for 20 years? If you are having packaging designed, think differently and keep it simple, you never know 20 years down the line your brand's packaging could be kept in someones loft. People may keep the product but what about the packaging?

Oh and by the way Mario is still so easy to complete!!!!!