. . . preferably over lunch or a beverage (you invite and you buy), but definitely face to face. Choose a person you like, like an old friend or favorite colleague from the present or past.

Have no agenda. Let the conversation wander into, out of and through any subject. At best, it will be a stimulating experience, a strengthened relationship and you may even learn something new and significant. At the very least it should provide a pleasant interlude, and a refreshing break from the routine. With just the slightest effort on your part, it should hardly be disappointing.

Very seasoned greetings to you.

The week between Christmas and New Year’s is traditionally a slow business week. It’s a great time to chill out, but it can also be more than marginally constructive. Use your “quiet time” to devise one important new marketing initiative for 2010. Then, be sure to put it into action next year. Come January 4, you’ll not only feel challenged by the year that lies ahead, you’ll feel better for having done something constructive during this break (you may even be able to take the results to the bank).

We don’t accept every potential client that comes our way.

Honestly, we don’t.

We not only must feel we can help them in a material way, we must be enthused at the prospect of doing so. This positive feeling is based upon our grasp of – and appreciation for – their mission and business model.

Then we take a leap of faith, which should be at the foundation of any good relationship, business or personal. At this point, we focus on doing everything we can to assist them in achieving their marketing objectives while, hopefully, making them glad they chose to partner with us.

As we trust any client-centric marketing consultants will appreciate and identify with, this feeling is something like falling in love . . . without having to remember birthday and anniversary dates.

How does your strategic plan look for 2013? If you haven’t drafted it yet, that perhaps is forgivable, what with the distractions of the mid-term election and that pesky recession with which you may have been preoccupied.

But the time to plan for next year is now . . . as in immediately. It can be as simple – for starters – as listing these items:
• Your objectives
• Strategy
• Tactics
• Timelines
• Budget
• Benchmarks (for measuring progress)

Mark your calendar for April 15 to “take the temperature” of your marketing efforts and progress to date. Then, make any adjustments that may be necessary at that time. Following this little plan will pay dividends in terms of real progress. To ignore such advanced planning is to invite, at best, mediocre progress and, at worst (need we say?).

It’s not so amazing to those of us in strategy development and marketing communication that, once again, the Presidential election turned, not so much on ideas, but how those ideas were positioned by the respective campaigns . . . and – not so coincidentally – how frequently those ideas were repeated to well-targeted consumers.

I have attempted to buy a product and a service recently (from two different vendors, both of whom I know and like). In each case, they did not respond to my e-mail request, even with a simple, “we’re too busy,” etc. (which I doubt) or, an “I’ll get back to you.” I neither owe these vendors money, nor have we had any difficulties in the past. What am I to think? Moral: Always take the time and effort to at least answer every request for your product or services, even if the answer is “no thanks.”

If you want to know what NOT to do in public relations, all you have to do is make a list of the boo-boos each Presidential and veep candidate makes on a daily basis during this final week of campaigning. By the way, can any word beat-out “gaffe” as the Word of the Year for 2012?

The marketing world has been abuzz about every possible digital marketing tactic in the book, including mobile couponing, augmented reality, and real-time bidding by digital media exchanges. Many marketers become entranced by these bright and shiny digital marketing options. However, the smartest understand that tactics come and go, and will be leading the movement back to strategy.

Focus on the right strategy, and you’ll develop a winning marketing formula. Look at successful companies such as Apple, Procter & Gamble, and Nordstrom. Their clear strategies get real business results—regardless of the tactics they employ at any given moment.

Consistent communication is the key to productive, lasting relationships.

This is particularly true with client or customer relationships, where shining brightly for awhile only to fade away, then suddenly to reappear may be only a bit better than never shining brightly at all.

If a client or customer is made to guess at what you are thinking, or are up to, this void can make them think negatively, or worse, forget about you entirely. Keep in touch, but do so with a purpose, like a new idea or a pertinent question.

“Out of site, out of mind” is not a characteristic to be emulated by marketers.

With many businesses spending upward of 10 percent of their total revenue on marketing and corporate branding, it can be heartbreaking to have all your hard work and big spending undone by language errors. If you want to get your message out there, you have to get it right; it’s not worth tainting your reputation with an overlooked language error.

Make sure you have someone in house – or out house* – whose grammar usage is up to snuff. A good rule: check and re-check all marketing communication.

* Just kidding