Marketing The Magic

I’ve mentioned several times throughout this season on inbound marketing that inbound is not right for every business, and that’s true. Except that it isn’t! Let’s wrap up our discussion of inbound marketing and season 2 of the Marketing the Magic Show.

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but marketing seems to be getting more and more complicated these days. For most of us, throwing up a Facebook ad or a billboard or sending an email that just says, “Buy this!” just doesn’t work anymore. Instead, we see the emergence of ideas like inbound marketing, built on great content offers and funnels and often complex campaigns, and they work, but they’re not easy. That’s why we need to follow Mickey’s 7th Commandment, to tell one story at a time. Stay tuned!

We’ve talked for a number of episodes now about the theory behind inbound marketing and hypothetical examples of blog posts, content offers, and so on. But how do we actually deliver an inbound marketing strategy and all of this content? That’s what I’ll be talking about for the Jungle Navigation Company - and your company - today on the Marketing the Magic Show. Stay tuned!

It’s our job as business owners or marketers to know everything we can know about our products, the problems they solve, and who we solve them for. It’s tempting to blast our marketing audience with way too much of that information. But, as the classic Disney attraction Peter Pan’s Flight illustrates, we can get this right. Stay tuned!

Any fan of the Disney theme parks’ history is well aware of some the… inconsistencies… in the stories behind the various Haunted Mansions. What does this have to do with our marketing? Stay tuned!

Should you compete with Disney directly for big keywords? Of course not, but what if the Google Keyword Planner is providing misleading data? That’s the subject for this week’s episode. Stay tuned!

The Disney Imagineers are the best in the world at communicating with “visual literacy,” but what is that, exactly, and how can we incorporate it in our marketing? Stay tuned!

Everyone knows we should set goals in business, in life, or in virtually anything we pursue. In business - and in marketing especially - goals are a critical tool in our arsenals to help us systematically grow. But for goals to be as effective as they can be, there are 5 components - making up the acronym “SMART” - that we must use. Let’s talk about how we - and the Jungle Navigation Company, of course - can create and use “smart” marketing goals!

Your business - in fact, every business in history - is just like Disney. How is this possible, and what does it mean for you? Stay tuned!

If there is a better example than Disney of a company that focuses on delighting its customers, I’d be stunned. Delight is a critical part of inbound marketing and, more importantly, business in general. Let’s talk about delight and how the Jungle Navigation Company can create some! Read the show notes at: mtm.show/24

Perhaps the most important part of your next marketing campaign is the wienie. Alright, when you’ve finished giggling, let me explain myself. Stay tuned!

Inbound marketing is all about relationships, and the close phase of the methodology is no different. Let’s talk about how to move to the close the inbound way.

Today I’m going to tell you - in my infinite wisdom as a global digital marketing expert (a demi-marketer, if you will) - exactly how not to do marketing. You’re welcome!

Organizing the flow of people and ideas is Mickey’s 3rd Commandment, originally written by Marty Sklar for the Imagineers. This principle can be applied across the board in marketing, too, and today we’re going to talk about 3 specific ways you can incorporate it into your marketing. Stay tuned!

We’re six episodes into Season 2 covering inbound marketing, so I figured I’d take a break and share with you some of the things going through my head on the project.

Keyword research is one of the most important steps in building a successful blog designed to attract organic search traffic. There are lots of ways to do this research, but today I’m going to show you one very easy, very effective, and very free such method.

From calls to action to content offers, I'm covering the convert phase of the inbound methodology for the Jungle Navigation Company on this week's show.

In the hustle and bustle of getting our marketing work done and published, it can be extremely easy - and extremely costly - to forget about Mickey’s 2nd Commandment as applied to marketing: to wear your guest’s shoes. Let’s talk about it!

As we wrap up our discussion of the Attract phase of the inbound methodology, there's a big piece to mention, and that's how we use social media for promoting all of this great blog content and more. That's what I'll be talking about - as well as wrapping things up with a neat bow and a few specific examples of the kinds of content we'll want to create - in today's episode of the Marketing the Magic Show and Blog!

How do you know if your company should be pursuing inbound marketing? The answer is that it should, but there’s obviously more to it than that. Let’s discuss!

The inbound marketing process starts with a very simple and important concept - attracting the right people to your brand. That’s what we’re going to talk about doing for the Jungle Navigation Company - our guinea pig for this discussion on inbound marketing - on today’s show.

On this season of the show, we’re exploring the inbound marketing paradigm. But this is a Disney-inspired brand, so we need a story to help give these ideas context. Let’s meet the Jungle Navigation Company, operators of exotic jungle river cruise adventures throughout the world and talk about their current marketing troubles and the inbound solution!

Inbound marketing is one of the best strategies for creating long-lasting, fantastic relationships with your customers, but what does an inbound marketing campaign actually look like? Let’s meet Travel Agent Tina and her buyer persona Disney Dining Dana and find out.

The beauty of any strategy is that it prescribes an approach that has been proven time and time again, and the inbound marketing strategy or philosophy is no different. There is a very specific process we follow in inbound, and there’s also a process our buyer’s will follow that we must understand.

Disney is the undisputed champion of telling great stories, whether they’re movies, cartoon shorts, theme park attractions or - yes - marketing campaigns. Here are 3 reasons that you need to understand marketing like Disney understands storytelling.

Have you heard about this thing called “inbound marketing,” but you’re not really sure what it is or whether it’s worth looking into? How about the ultra-Disney fans who take part in this thing called “Disney Bounding?” What’s the connection between the two, I hear you thinking? That’s what we’ll be talking about today on this episode called “Disney (In)Bounding: Inbound Marketing Defined!”

Everybody seems to be talking about the amazing and magical and must-have Facebook Pixel these days (and they’re right), but what IS a Facebook Pixel, and why should you care? That's what I'll be telling you about (in under 3 minutes) in this week's Magical Marketing Minute!

The Disney Store has gotten pretty good at using a few tried-and-true marketing tactics, and I’m about to tell you how to steal them.

It can be arduous trying to come up with blog posts to write each and every week. So, to help you keep the creative flow flowing, here are 6 amazing blog post ideas in just 60 seconds. Anndd go.

Let's talk about my favorite new content promotion tool called "Quuu Promote"

In this week’s Magical Marketing Minute, we’re going to talk about the differences among marketing gimmicks, trends, and human psychology. Let's get to it!

I've got two big thoughts on the brain about storytelling and marketing this week. Let's discuss!

In the Magical Marketing Minute episode a few weeks ago, I talked very briefly about why small business owners need to understand marketing strategy. Today, I want to focus on why I think it’s so important for marketing professionals to focus on strategy. Seems obvious, but let’s talk about it.

There are three big things I’m excited about in marketing as of May of 2017, and I think you should be excited, too. From messenger bots to “the new” video marketing, there’s a lot to talk about, so let’s get into it!

It's been a terribly fun first season for the Marketing the Magic show. For this last episode of season 1, we'll recap the last 11 shows. But I'm PARTICULARY excited to share a PREVIEW of season 2 of Marketing the Magic. Let's dive in!

Disney uses - has always used - video for its marketing purposes. Clearly they have plenty of budget and tech and content to film and put online, but they're Disney. So... should YOUR small business be using video marketing? Let's discuss it!

Donald Duck's 50th was a masterpiece of marketing and promotions put on by the entire Disney company back in the 80s. From an honorable discharge from the Army to a parade of REAL ducks at the Magic Kingdom, there's a lot of inspiration we can draw for our own marketing strategies. Let's discuss Donald's 50th Birthday and the lessons we can learn!

One fantastic use of a survey question is to determine your company's Net Promoter Score. In this Magical Marketing Minute (or so), you'll learn what that is and how to calculate it.

Building a customer base that is excited to promote our brands for us to their family, friends, and networks is the best kind of marketing we can do, and it all starts with a simple concept: delight. Disney is the prime example of a company focused on delighting customers. Today we’re going to focus on delight as a marketing tool, how to use it, and how to make sure it’s working.

Especially in the day and age of having a marketing agency to serve virtually any industry and niche, it’s more important than ever for small business owners to understand their marketing strategy. Let's talk about why in this week's Magical Marketing Minute (or So).

The majority of Disney theme parks around the world are designed using a common layout, known as the "hub and spoke" model. It is incredibly useful to apply this same layout to our marketing strategy design. Let's talk about Hub and Spoke Marketing!

An important part of getting our campaigns right is message match in marketing. This is a critically important issue to get right in any marketing campaign, but especially in our ads. Get it right, ROI goes up. Get it wrong, you could be harming your brand. Let's learn what it is with a lesson inspired by Pirates of the Caribbean.

"I'm going to Disney World!" We've all seen the ad spots featuring the MVP of the Super Bowl or the World Cup announcing his or her intention to leave for Disney World (if you're viewing from the east coast) or Disneyland (if you're on the west) after the big win immediately and forthwith. The "What's Next?" marketing campaign has been running for more than 30 years BECAUSE IT WORKS! Let's talk about this campaign and three big lessons we can learn from it.

Dory can teach us a lot about what it takes to succeed in marketing: persistence. Just keep swimming! That's what we'll cover in just ONE MINUTE (or so) in this (very first) Magical Marketing Minute!

We must understand our company's role in its marketing story in order for our marketing to be effective, and that starts with understanding the kind of hero we play. Are we a Prince Philip (arriving at the last moment to save the day), or a Wall-E (working hard and solving problems all along), somewhere in between, or just a bit of both?

From last-minute Prince Philip to always-there Wall-E, there are a range of hero archetypes used in Disney stories. Likewise, we need to understand what kind of hero our companies play in their marketing stories to be able to develop the right marketing strategies.

There are many lessons to learn from Disney legend Jack Lindquist and his long career in marketing for the Disney theme parks. Today, we'll focus on how to create robust, diverse, "synergistic" marketing campaigns in a way that I hope would make Jack Lindquist proud.

Jack Lindquist is one of the Disney marketing legends. From Disney Dollars to Mickey in the Cornfield to a second inauguration for President Ronald Reagan, Mr. Lindquist was a visionary in marketing. What lessons can we learn from his tenure at Disney? Let’s talk about it!

It's vital to understand who our ideal customers are and to craft our marketing to those kinds of potential new customers. We do so using buyer personas. In this week's MTM Live, we continue the discussion around how to use buyer personas in our own marketing.

Walt Disney sat on a park bench, watching his daughters play at Griffith Park in Los Angeles, when the idea for Disneyland began to form. More importantly, his ideal customer for such an amusement park became very clear to him - families who want to play together. Just as Walt knew exactly who he was serving in building Disneyland, we need to study our ideal customers carefully. Let’s talk about how.

Mickey’s 10 Commandments for Imagineers, written originally by Marty Sklar himself, are amazing guidelines for creating the Disney magic we know and love so much. They also apply perfectly to creating amazing marketing. In this episode, we’re going to talk about numbers 6 through 10 of Mickey’s 10 Commandments.