9/11 Emergency Responder Packages

What happens when one of your amazing customers calls you and says “we have this special project and we need about 50,000 promotional items produced and ready for shipment in a week and a half, can you help?” Well, if you’re the Ad Specialties department at Heritage Solutions you say, “sure – no problem!!” (Then you proceed to ask all your employees to dig in their heels for the next week and a half! They love a good challenge!)

Our great partners over in Community Relations & Corporate Events at Chesapeake Energy Corporation recently had a need arise. They wanted to send 250 packages to emergency responders in their Marcellus Shale operating area to show their gratitude for all they do on a daily basis, but also to remember the 10^th Anniversary of September 11^th.

They wanted each box to be stuffed with goodies such as baseball hats, koozies, footballs, playing cards, frisbees, dominoes and flashlights that the responders would enjoy! The kit included the following thank you note:

“You put others first. We call when we need your help, and you’re the first to respond. Today, we want to put you first. On this day we remember the sacrifices made 10 years ago and the commitment you continue to make to keep our loved ones safe and our communities secure. Thank you for everything you do.”

Our ASI team got busy (when I say busy, I mean busy) they got on the phone with vendors, made calls, sent emails, got product proofs, made more calls….and a week and a half later all the product was delivered to Chesapeake for the kitting process. (Yes, we do kitting here at Heritage, but the customer wanted to be all hands on and assist in this project, it was close to their hearts…which we thought was pretty cool!)

Denise, our ASI manager, went to the clients to ensure everything was received properly and then rolled up her sleeves and stayed around to help with the kitting. It was a great team effort.

Now I’m picturing the guy from the A Team saying “I love it when a plan comes together!” The plan did come together, which makes our customer very happy…and us too!

Online Virtual Mini-Catalog

We’ve told you before that we manage the warehousing & fulfillment for ecommerce websites, like the OU Alumni Store for instance, but even though we’ve told you that it’s inevitable that someone will say “You manage websites? I didn’t know you did that!” Well, we do. Promise. (If you don’t believe us you should come hang out some day and take a tour of our warehouse, it’s pretty amazing complete with giant tater-tots. HA, now you want to come out just to see what I mean by giant tater-tots! Well, you’re just gonna have to come out and see for yourself!)

As we roll out new merchandise on our websites we like to try to find new ways to get the word out about what we’ve got! We do things like eblasts, direct mail, fliers, online advertising, and facebook advertising…. pretty much anything we can do to notify people of the specials and new merchandise on our sites.

Last week this bad boy was emailed out to 90,000 OU alums & their closest friends!

It’s working well…

CLICK HERE to view the mini-catalog!


Oh and please feel free to shop…that’s what it’s there for!

Everyday Creativity

Yesterday several of us from our sales team at Heritage headed over to the Moore Chamber of Commerce to attend a workshop titled Everyday Creativity by DeWitt Jones, presented by Jan Astani. We had a great time looking at things in a new perspective, and thinking outside the box!



Curtis even made a friend.



(This picture is more disturbing than I realized. Sorry, and somehow me saying “you had to be there” doesn’t help much either. Oh well, you had to be there.)

Dewitt Jones is one of Americas top professional photographers. Twenty years with National Geographic, photographing stories all over the globe, has earned him the reputation as a world-class photojournalist. As a motion picture director, two of Dewitt’s films were nominated for Academy Awards.

His definition of creative is “the ability to look at the ordinary and see the extraordinary.”

Jan did a wonderful job walking our group through the 9 Steps of Creativity…
• Looking at the ordinary and seeing the extraordinary
• Every act can be a creative one
• Creativity is a matter of perspective
• There’s always more than one right answer
• Reframe problems into opportunities
• Don’t be afraid to make mistakes
• Break the pattern
• Train your technique
• You’ve got to really care

Since I don’t have the rights to use Dewitt’s material I better stop there with the descriptions and definitions…I’m sure he’d prefer you go to your own workshop and hear it for yourself. (That was my creative response, my real response here is I don’t wanna get my rear-end sued for using his stuff without permission!)


If you find a fabulous presenter (like Jan Astani) offering Everyday Creativity, I highly recommend you attend. It was very eye opening.

I will leave you with one thought that I gleaned from the presentation. The quote “put yourself in the place of most potential” really got me thinking. Are you putting yourself and your business in the place of most potential? Are you reaching out to your clients in a way to gain the most potential? Often we do things “just because” or “because that’s the way we’ve always done it” BUT in doing that “thing”, are we putting ourselves and our business in the place of most potential. I can’t stop thinking about it…and I encourage you to think about it too.

Now I’m off to be creative! Okay, first I’ll get some coffee, THEN I’ll be creative.

Firsts.

When you do something FIRST you want it to count. You want it to be special, amazing, wonderful, and you want people to be wowed! Our friends over at STAPLEGUN got that chance. Their task: create the inaugural invitation for the First female Governor in the State of Oklahoma, Mrs. Mary Fallin. (This invitation will likely be on display at the Oklahoma History Center until, oh…probably the end of time….no pressure there.) Obviously pressure doesn’t get to those guys, because they literally knocked this project out of the park!



They created a classy and timeless invitation that wowed many as they arrived in mailboxes. (I never actually got one in the mail, it must have gotten lost. Surely, I was on the list….I waived at her when she was in the Edmond Liberty Fest Parade in 2009…we bonded.)

The invitation packet consisted of a booklet , an official invite, the response card, and an embossed envelope. It’s really quite impressive. After we delivered the finished product we then entered the piece into print competitions where we said things like “110# Classic Crest Solar White Cover, 4 color + PMS + Flood varnish, wet trap 2 side, 1 silver flat foil, 1 silver foil emboss.” (If you know what all that means, the FIRST step for you is admitting you have a problem.)


The piece won a local award and 3 National awards that we thought we should mention…
2011 Bronze Addy
Best of Category - 2011 Graphic Excellence Awards
Award of Recognition – 2011 Premier Print Awards
Neenah Paper – Silver Award 2011 Text & Cover Competition

We’d like to thank STAPLEGUN for allowing us the honor to be a part of this FIRST for the State of Oklahoma!

Personalized Direct Mail + PURLS = Marketing Strategy

We tell our customers all the time how personalized direct mail combined with PURLS can greatly increase their response rates. But, each time we get more data that backs up that statement, we like to share it! People like proof.

Recently this article was posted at PrintJunkie.net. (YES, there is a website for those addicted to print. The first step is admitting you have a problem.)

When you're done reading it, you'll say to yourself, "Can Heritage help me do all that? " The answer is, YES! Yes we can!

A recent article highlighted a prominent Midwest university who successfully deployed direct mail with a PURL to appeal to honors students as part of an admissions campaign. An A/B split test was conducted to research the affect of utilizing variable data printing in a marketing campaign.

Variable data printing tailored the direct mail postcard to the individual student’s interest in major, gender and whether or not they had visited the campus. Images and text were aligned to reflect the individual’s data. The PURL directed the students to a personalized landing page. For the other students, the Midwest university sent a more general mailing.

The university reported a 32% increase in student enrollment in 2010 over the prior year. 91% of those who registered were recipients of the PURL campaign. The use of a more focused mailer resulted in a 29% savings in printing costs.

“It’s all about making it relevant versus having high volume.”

At the same time, a non-profit organization used a personalized postcard and PURL to appeal to donors as part of their annual giving campaign. It reported that their normal donation rate is 2% to 3%. This campaign returned a 14% donation rate. “This is a bit more expensive, but it drove more conversions.”

“The trend is toward more efficiency and figuring out a multichannel approach with a much more layered cadence of communications.”

As online marketing becomes more saturated, innovations in printing and production are driving more marketers to use traditional channels to drive multichannel efforts.

How are you using direct mail in your multichannel marketing mix?

True or False

True or False:
Every promotional product ever made is already created – it’s just sitting on a shelf somewhere.

FALSE!


We’ve got proof!

The communications team at Oklahoma State University – Undergraduate Admissions were looking for a promotional product that would stand out to students and allow them to correlate Oklahoma State University with cutting edge promotional products. (Hence the reason why they couldn’t just buy any-ol’-thing.)


They knew that silly bands were beginning to become very popular and decided to have orange and black Pistol Pete’s created to put in campus tour and event bags.

We sent an image of Pistol Pete to our vendor and had these custom silly bands created just for them!
When students stepped on campus and received their goody bags, the silly bands were an instant hit!

Go Pokes!

Target Practice

We schmooze twice a year at the OKC Chamber of Commerce event SchmoozaPalooza! (I can now spell it without having to look it up.) It’s a fun event and we always have a great time. This time around Groupon sponsored a vendor lounge and we were treated to free appetizers and drinks – that was nice, REALLY nice! (Thanks Groupon!) We always go to Schmooza with a new theme, something fun and different. This year it was…

Nerf Dart Tag – Fury Fire! (Have I told you lately that I love my job?) It was so fun.

But we weren’t just playing tag- there was a method to our madness. We were talking about hitting your target with One-to-One Marketing. We printed a nifty handout that talked all about One-to-One Marketing (which is a communication of individualized, relevant messages to a large number of recipients.) One of the key points was Proper Targeting + Proper Personalization = Better Response! At Heritage we can help set your company apart and get your message noticed with the use of…

Variable Data Printing – Using customer test and images to speak directly and personally to each of your customers instead of sending everyone the same message/offer.

Cross Media Marketing – Using more than one medium to connect with your audience.

The channels we have available to integrate your company’s marketing efforts are: Direct mail, Email Marketing, Personalized URL’s/Landing Pages, Text Messaging Campaigns, and Social Media. It was a hit! People obviously loved playing Dart Tag with their friends and we even had some customers come by and ask to shoot at us, so we played along and let them. (We think they enjoyed that part a little TOO much!)

We handed out these fun slinky note pads with targets on them (hmmm…I bet I know where you can get some of those if you like them! Hint hint.)

Overall the event was a huge success – I definitely think we hit the TARGET!