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"You have to perform at a consistently higher level than others. That's the mark of a true professional." Joe Patterno, American football coach (with more than 50 years of coaching). |
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The evolution of Business-to-business communication
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| In 25 years of B2B communication, marketing exchanges between companies have changed a lot. Remember the time that only postal mail and fairs / trade-shows were the main means of communication. Remember the time, not that long ago, that you were able to send the same e-mail to hundreds of thousands of people, without a big risk of being labeled as spam. Remember also the time that it sufficed to have your own website online, without any search engine optimization…
Today, communicating has become more complex but at the same time more interesting. More notably, it helped spawn completely new professions: E-mail marketer, Search engine optimizer, Web analyst, Community manager and I could keep going.
All of the available means of communication are useful on a B2C level as well as B2B. However, the approach and the objectives differ depending on your target audience.
In the case of your karting, you have to be aware that if you want to talk to individuals and businesses, you'll need to adjust your communication accordingly.
At SMS-Timing, we direct our communication exclusively to professionals. We followed the evolution of communication. A short overview:
- 2001 : trade shows, simple brochures
- 2003 : basic website
- 2005 : mass e-mailing
- 2006 : new brochures
- 2007 : new website with more informative contents
- 2007 : first videos on YouTube
- 2007 : new brochures
- 2008 : first magazine
- 2009 : new website with reference optimization
- 2009 : first monthly newsletter
- 2010 : targeted e-mails
- 2010 : new brochures
- 2011 : Facebook page (yet to come in March/April)
As you can see, we're not only working on being innovative in the development of our software. Our wish is that our clients and potential clients know for sure that they are working with a professional, transparent company that offers means of communication adapted to everyone individually.
Don't forget to become a Fan of SMS-Timing on Facebook! The page will be available soon! |
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Interview with Wout Standaert, Interactive designer in the SMS-Timing team
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1- Wout, what is your background?
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I studied Communication & Multimediadesign, which enables me to create high quality (multi)media to reach audiences in the best way possible. As a young teenager I was always interested in computers and design, how to design for the web, how to make and integrate animations, why certain things are attractive… and this still fuels my passion to design each day.
I applied for a job at SMS-Timing about one year ago after seeing what awesome stuff they were doing. Their marketing services are getting better every day and I'm proud to be a part of the team that makes this possible.
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2- Can you describe your work at SMS-Timing B&MI?
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My official title is "interactive designer", basically this means that I do graphical, video, and webdesign, with lately a focus on video. I also work together with the IT team on screens and interfaces for our various software packages.
Together with Katrien I form "the design team" and together we tackle everything from sponsor files, banners, housestyles to e-mailings and video design.
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3- Can you explain how you see communication for karting centers?
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It's already good that most karting centers have their own logo and (most of the time) a website, but no-one will see those websites without proper communication. Their sites for instance can be improved for search engines like Google, to make them come up for search terms like "karting in village X". Regularly update the website with reports, videos, special events and it will score even better in the search results and in the eyes of the customers.
Consistency in style and communication is the key to making a professional impression. Also people should watch out with the amount of e-mails they send; too much and the effectiveness of your e-mailing campaigns will go way down.
For me, those two channels, e-mail and search engines, are the most important.
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4- SMS-Timing is developing its communication on modern platforms (YouTube, Facebook). What will be your role?
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Together with Benjamin, our marketer, we will be pushing regularly new content to the SMS-Timing YouTube channel and Facebook official page (coming soon), to strengthen the connection between our customers and us. This way, people can see who the faces are behind this company. We will also post about the latest news and tips for improving a karting center's communication.
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5- Your work requires a high level of creativity. Obviously, creativity does not work from 8am to 6pm. How do you manage to deliver such high-quality work?
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How do you manage to deliver such high-quality work?
It's all about being inspired. Sometimes when I'm stuck on a design or animation, I take a couple of minutes to visit some design related blogs that feature great design on a daily basis. When you get in this certain "flow" all of the sudden, the ideas just come by themselves.
Practice makes perfect though, I'm convinced that creativity can be learnt, and once you've got a good idea in your head, the only thing that comes between you and your end result is your own capabilities. Which is why in our sector, everyone is constantly learning.
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6- As part of the marketing department, you work closely to the sales. What is your view on the karting business?
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I really believe (without exaggerating) that the basic solution we're offering nowadays (Kiosk-Point of sale-Timing) is THE way to go for karting centers. There is so much potential that is unexploited by just going for a timing solution alone.
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7- The SMS-Timing team has got different profiles (foreigners, experts in their domains). How do you explain that it works so smoothly?
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I think because everyone that works here is really motivated. It just gives an awesome feeling when we can shift a customer into the next gear, that he's happy and doing good business. As we live on long-term relationships with our customers, helping them is our number one goal.
The team is also really close, there's a great atmosphere all around and everyone has got the feeling that the sky is the limit!
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8- Wout, can you explain how to pronounce your name? Seriously, people often have difficulties to say it!
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It's like the words "WOW" and "OUT" got married and had a baby. Just start saying WO- and transition seamlessly into –OUT.
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Discover our magazine with all of the new features of SMS-Timing !
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Like each year around the same time, we release a magazine (made exclusively by us) to accompany our main brochure, with all of the novelties (software, hardware and services) that we have developed.
For instance, the magazine of February 2010 focused amongst others on our HDTV software. The one of August of the same year focused on the iNet Social Networks with Facebook compatibility. The latest version features the automatic e-mails of the iNet Silver, very effective in terms of automatic one-to-one marketing!
Discover the presentation video of this magazine:
Don't hesitate to ask us to send you your copy of the magazine!
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Kind regards,
Benjamin
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