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Today is World Sight Day, an annual day of awareness to focus attention on blindness, visual impairment and rehabilitation of the visually impaired and is held on the second Thursday of October.

Maybe its time to put yourself in the shoes of your customers and look at how they view your company, what would you expect from your company if you were a customer? What would you do to improve the user experience?

As marketing professionals, we understand what customers what from a business, so why not have a chat with us and see for yourself, with our help, what your customers want.

Tags: Marketing professionals | World Sight Day | marketing

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This is a previous blog which has now been updated with images and text

The one thing that marketing as a profession provides is an opportunity to develop into new markets and new opportunities.  Over my 30 years in marketing I have been lucky enough to experience many cultures across the world, but I have never worked in Russia, until now.

I arrived on Wednesday night in Volzhski, a city about 30km from Volgograd (the former Stalingrad), having flown on Aeroflot to Moscow from Heathrow and then onto Volgograd.  The brand new Airbus planes were superb, lovely, very comfortable - this would not be the first of my Russian perceptions to be proven to be misguided.

Moscow airport was heaving as people in the domestic departures sought to get home after their commute to Moscow and our flight to Volgograd was full.

Thursday and Friday, saw me in the offices of Real Russia.  The team there work so hard and pride themselves on delivering excellent customer service – we could learn a few things in the UK from their commitment to ensuring customer satisfaction.  The travel operators are so knowledgeable they can answer any questions related to tours on the Trans-Siberian express, the best routes to take, what you need if you go to places like Mongolia or Belarus, it was fascinating.  The visa team were equally knowledgeable on how to obtain visas and what you need when traveling around Russia.

The offices of Real Russia are situated in an old children’s nursery and the building houses a sauna, steam room, swimming pool an a lovely café/restaurant.  I did enjoy some traditional Russian food for lunch, but did not have time to relax in the leisure facilities.

I have experience many restaurants (the food is excellent) and have taken in the local sites of the impressive Russian Orthodox churches, the statute of Lenin.   I cannot get over how wide and spread out everything is here.  The city is similar in size to Leicester, but you hardly notice people as the roads and pavements are so wide. Many buildings are typical Soviet block and not the most attractive in the world, although practical, not too tall and broken up by trees and shrubs.

Yesterday, I visited the impressive Mamayev Kurgan momument and the memorial in Volgograd from the battle of Stalingrad, where I felt truly humbled.  People in this city were under siege for 18 months and 2Million people died in the battle.

The river Volga is a truly impressive site with sand banks and sandy shores, not what you would expect from Russia’s longest river.  Children were diving in and the water looked so clean and inviting in the temperatures of low thirties centigrade – wait until summer fully arrives.

The real Russia I have experienced is not all about Vodka and Moscow – it is about a different way of life, we are 100 miles from Asia and on the edge of the Steppes.  It has helpful people, fantastic food, great scenery and some interesting history – and yes some good beer and vodka.

My time here in Volzhski has been tremendous and I look forward to working with the office to develop the marketing further.  Yes there are challenges for a Western European visiting Russia – you can’t read all the menus, you don’t always have a clue which is the ladies and men’s toilets and life is different – but that is what adds to the charm of visiting a destination and widening our horizons as people.  Even I have managed to learn the odd word here to make life a little easier and make me feel a little less stupid.

I strongly recommend anyone interested in European history to visit Volgograd and for the independent traveller to take time and visit the Real Russia.

I left Volgograd on an 18 hour train journey to Moscow.  After discussing with the travel staff at Real Russia, I decided on booking a women's only cabin in business class.  This 2 person cabin had two beds, a TV and electrical points for my computer and iPad to recharge.  As I went into the cabin I was delighted to see some complimentary refreshments.  This included a miniature bottle of vodka, but this was not the size you get on a plane, it was twice as big!  I later shared the bottle with my client, as it is very bad form to drink alone in Russia.

The train journey was fascinating - we went through miles of open countryside, disused factories, villages and large towns.  Every few hours we stopped at stations and had the opportunity to stretch our legs.  One stop was for about 20 minutes and the station had small shops selling souvenirs.  The station buildings were beautiful - not like the modern shelters we see in many European towns.

During the evening, I made my way to the resturant and enjoyed a meal of local food - which I cannot pronounce, but included tongue.  Well, when you are in Rome . . .

The train ride was smooth for most of the journey and not quite the same roller coster that one experiences on the Midland Main Line, Leicester to St Pancras journey.  Sometimes on those journeys, you struggle to drink a cup of coffee without spilling it due to the train movement.

After dinner, I settled down to bed in my comfortable cabin, watching a film on my iPad, knowing that in the morning we would be approaching Moscow.

I had an excellent night's sleep and after a wash and breakfast was looking out on the suburbs of Moscow.  At 9am and in bright sunshine, we arrived into Moscow station, I was impressed at the art deco sign highlighting Mockba - it seemed to provide a presence amongst the crowds.

We made our way to the hotel, showered, changed and were in the office for late morning - what a pleasant way to travel.  During my two days in the office, I met the staff and many of the customers who were travellers from all over the globe.  They had fascinating stories to tell about their experiences in Russia and most of them were collecting tickets for the Trans-Siberian Tour - something which I now would love to do.

Unfortunately, my time in Moscow was spent mainly in the office, but I did manage a quick tour of Red Square, Lenin's memorial  and some of the city's fabulous architecture.

If anyone is interested in visiting Russia, I would recommend giving Real Russia a call, they can help you with train tickets, tourist information and visa support, I found them very helpful and supportive, and, as I said in my comments above, determined to give great customer service and to help as much as possible. They also speak perfect English, which I found a big help!

Visit the Real Russia website for any travel or visa needs in or around Russia

Ann

Tags: moscow | customer service | marketing | Russia

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Jo:

Jo has been pretty busy over the past few weeks as she took control of the fort whilst Ann jetted off to New Zealand for the Rugby World Cup. 

Tags: web design | marketing | Win Marketing | pr | Rugby World Cup | social media | restoration uk | online marketing strategy

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Some updates from this week:

Jo came back from a week off to lots of client work waiting for her, needless to say, she got back in the swing of things quickly!

George has been designing graphics for a clients' van and for our own rebranding for our marketing materials.

Nad has been busy getting our latest website uploaded, Med-Innova, and has been working away on development of our latest e-commerce website, Restoration UK.

Ann has had a busy week, working on strategic marketing for Real Russia and Hegarty Solicitors, along with some online marketing research for UWC.

We have picked up a website for a telecomms company, and will be starting the process for this soon. Also this week, we had a lovely comment from a client, Sharpaclean, who we recently developed a new website for. They said that since the website went live (3 weeks ago), they have had a number of enquiries and have even picked up a new contract, worth £100,000! We are really glad we were able to help on this project, and are really pleased for Sharpaclean!

During the rioting, you may have seen on Twitter, the trending topic #operationcupoftea , where people up and down England, and the UK, all took photos of themselves having their anti-riot cup of tea, well, as a treat, here is Jo in the office with her anti riot cup of tea on Wednesday :)

So its a short one this week, but do check out our Twitter and Facebook for more regular updates until next time!

Tags: marketing | restoration uk | med-innova | sharpaclean | #operationcupoftea | facebook | twitter | website

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So, the first week of July proved to be hectic for all of the team here at Win Marketing with Jo trekking around London, George editing lots of graduation video footage, Nad perfecting and launching the new Shapaclean website and Ann mixing work with pleasure in Spain!
 
And with everyone so busy, it’s time for me, otherwise know as temporary team member Jen to fill you in on all the goings on this week!
 
Ann was in the sunny Costa Del Sol having a working holiday, taking a bit of time to relax but also sorting out marketing audits and strategies left, right and centre, while also making sure she was up to date with all the news in the office and keeping us all on our toes. She managed to fit a bit of time in with her friend San though. San Miguel that is...
 
Nad turned his talents to more websites this week, including Med-Innova, Sharpaclean and our very own shiny, new Win Marketing website, working hard to get the Sharpaclean site up and running, seeing it go live on Friday afternoon. Make sure you check it out to sort out all your cleaning needs.
He also gave a bit of market research a go, calling businesses on behalf of East West Link and helped out with technical issues from helping Audrey, our accounts lady with her computer, to supporting me with a binding machine with a mind of its own!
 
George was up to his elbows in NEBOSH videos, editing footage of a graduation ceremony at Warwick University, filmed the week before. He also collected data from clients for a big power point presentation, and developed a new logo for Real Russia, which was swiftly printed onto new hats for the company! He also prepared several website templates to go onto Nad to bring his designs to life!
 
Jo was London bound at the end of the week, heading to the capital to meet with the team in the offices of Real Russia, and working with Real Russia’s Brigitte to do a bit of mystery shopping.
Earlier in the week saw Jo and George put their heads together to work on the NEBOSH video, as well as her doing market research for Hegarty solicitors and taking the reigns and becoming Ann mark 2 to keep everything running smoothly with Ann by the pool in España!
 
Jen. The week saw me getting a nick name (Jaydot 2!) and helping everyone as much as possible in this very busy week, carrying out market research for both Real Russia and Hegarty, following up on a press release we sent out for Air Fuel Synthesis which has been published in both the Australian and US media and working on blogs and social media updates for companies all across the board! 

Keep an eye out on Facebook and Twitter for all the news from us here at Win Marketing and all of the companies we are working with!
 
See you next week!

Until then, here is a great photo of George modelling his latest logo development on ont of the caps for Real Russia, what do we think, can he pull it off?

Tags: website | sharpaclean | marketing | NESBOSH | warwick university | designs | market research | air fuel synthesis | facebook | twitter | video editing

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Don't you hate it when you write a load of stuff down and then technology decides not to save it?

So I just wrote out a really great blog for you guys to read, and pressed 'save' and for some reason it didn't update to the blog!

It was an update of what the Win team have been upto this week. In summary:

Ann (AKA A-dot)

Busy with lots of meetings and sales calls, writing presentations and proposals. Off to have lunch today with Loughborough MP Nicky Morgan and our client, Tony Marmont from Air Fuel Synthesis. Professor Tony Marmont has spent the last 30 years dedicating his life to finding technologies which can provide us with alternatives to burning oil and coal, visit his pages on the Air Fuel Synthesis website here: about Tony Marmont

Ann, the driving force behind Win, will be having a weekend of relaxing after last weekends hectic work filled weekend, and we do not blame her!

Jo (AKA Jaydot)

I have had a really interesting week, been on a few meetings and sales calls with Ann, and have been supporting her on that.

What I really want to mention is that I completed a 3 week course about online marketing and improving your website on Wednesday. This was a Leicestershire Chamber of Commerce course, held at De Montford University, run by Jonny Green, check out the courses page on his website here Jonny Green

I learned a lot on this course, both to put into practice from a strategic point or view, and small tactical 'quick wins' both for Win and for our clients. Can't wait to get started!

Nad (AKA Snakbar)

Busy working away on several websites this week, including Sharpaclean, a cleaning company based in Leicester - all very black and pink and smart looking, Med - Innova, who deal with medical equipment for various medical sectors, Nad has been working on fancy animations for images for this site, which we are hoping to get live in the next couple of weeks.  A new site we have picked up this week is Restoration UK, who sell products online for restoring and protecting buildings. Our development guru (or 'geek' as we call him in the office) will be working on getting these sites live next week for these clients before starting on our next web projects.

George (AKA G-Dog)

What hasn't G-Dog been upto this week? e-shots, business cards, video editing, web design, George has been a man of many talents this week and has created some fab designs for clients, and for Win as well. Our resident graphics design extrodinaire and Nad have both receieved shiny new monitors this week, and they have been loving it all week!

Jen (no nickname as yet...we will get there soon though, only a matter of time...)

So Jen has joined the team as a temporary pillar of support with our pr and online media. She has been working closely with Jo on various projects, including pulling together information and contacts in various industries, including environmental, transport, travel and tourism and health and safety. Jen has also been doing some blogs and press releases for clients this week, as well as looking at website content for some clients too.

So, with that I will get on with social media for a few clients and preparing for a filming day for NEBOSH at Warwick University on Monday. Should be fun!

We will be uploading Anns Russia trip part 2 soon, and might even have a slide show of images for you, just for something a little different...

Have a great weekend all, we will be here all next week!

Jo and the team out!

Tags: video editing | website design | chamber of commerce | jonny green | hegarty | real russia | shapaclean | air fuel synthesis | nicky morgan | website | twitter | facebook | NEBOSH | marketing | online media | social media | pr

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There are a number of ways which require a bit of effort including:

• Get to know the committee locally and nationally
• Offer to write an article or speak at a national conference or local branch event
• Run a workshop alongside their conference
• Sponsor an element of an event, e.g., menus at a conference dinner, where you could put an advert about your organisation on the back
• Help them to develop a new revenue stream - affiliate marketing programme, a new training course, etc
• Ask to get involved in any strategy issues they might be working on at the moment
• Offer to sit on a committee

Tags: professional organisation | marketing | workshops | commitee

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