New Brand Life

In its fifty years of business, Roberts Sand Company catered to the needs of contractors by providing rock, soil, sand and gravel for a variety of applications. Faced with a dramatic shift in their customer base because of the decline in construction projects, ALCOM was hired to create a marketing campaign that redefined the company's brand and focused on homeowners, especially older women. This TV ad presents the personal benefit of the products and demonstrates the involvement of the brand in their lifestyle.

We create opportunities for our clients to connect with an audience with whom we can confirm the value being offered and then convert their interest into further engagement. Our video production division is a great example. Video that provides viewers with credible content is supported by a relaxed production style. Overly-produced video loses that level of concern. Here is a recent production we did for Truck N Car Concepts.

Connect, Confirm, Convert

Texting For Dollars

Truth is, there are more text transmissions sent daily than there are people on the planet. While this continues to add billions of dollars to the profits of telephone companies, what can it do for a local business wanting to tap into the flow. As in every case when it comes to marketing, it is always about balancing the effectiveness of the message with the efficiency of delivery. So, can text advertising, for all of its efficiency, be effective in motivating people to buy?

The strongest argument to be made is based upon the idea that the population of consumers likes the less-intrusive and less time-consuming aspects of text. On some imaginary scale showing the "degree of engagement", text messaging might be on one end of that scale while a lunch meeting would be on the other. In between these two would be, email, e-letters , written letters, and phone conversations.

A text message that can get the point across without requiring more of the recipient than a glance at their cell phone might be ideal if the content of the message is instrumental in nature. For example, one of our clients uses our TextMarket service to regularly send texts to his restaurant customers informing them of daily specials. "99 cent tacos, 4p to 11p dine-in only" might be the entire message. He has declared repeatedly how effective this strategy has been for his sales. "We get 30 per cent response rates, when our old printed coupons might bring 1 or 2 per cent for the same offer." And why does this work so well?

Think about the fact that this simple text message is being sent to an individual who has chosen to opt in to this special group of customers. They are a fan and this message reinforces that fact while rewarding them for their loyalty. And more so, it is immediate, simple, (and perhaps this is the most significant point) it fits into the time-flow of a person's daily activity without requiring unwanted engagement. No web site to visit, no print out required, no coupon to clip, and no response required other than showing up at the right time and showing the text message to the server. Pretty simple. Very effective. Brilliantly efficient.   

The Intrigue Of Vulnerability

We live in a time and a society that suffers from massive paranoia at a meta-cultural level. It has infected the post-modern world. The root of this epidemic fear is in the loss of connection to self-awareness. We are afraid to look inward, and more so, afraid of others seeing who we are.

Morgan Sorne explores this tragic dilema in his art and music. Here is an example.

Golden Death Chant from Morgan Sorne on Vimeo.