Howard Letch<howard.letch@
Business Name: Brand Inter Activation
Website URL: http://www.
Email Address: howard.letch@
Year Founded: 2011
Number of Employees: 9
What does your company do?: We supply temporary inflatable structures for both hire and sales to both agencies and brands a like. Our structures are used at Live Events, Festivals ( music and film) Exhibitions and sporting events. Agencies and brands also take our structures on road shows for launches and as part of their experiential brand activation activities.
Was there a specific turning point when you realized your business was moving to the next level?: Having undertaken extensive marketing awareness campaigns across a variety of social media platforms it became immediately obvious that people loved what we could do. Feed back and comments were a real driver to push the business forward.
What challenges have you faced and how have you overcome them?: Starting any new business is always a challenge. The secret is to have a clear strategy for your marketing communications, remain focussed and above keep on plan. ‘fail to plan, plan to fail’ is a worthwhile expression to any business owner. Never underestimate the competition and always keep a firm eye on what they do.Look at their marketing strategies and insure you have not missed a trick. Try and see if you could do things better than they are doing. Competition is not only at the sharp end of your business but it is there all the way through your processes. We have pushed hard into the United Arab Emirates this year with the intention of opening an office in Dubai. This has been a hard ground to break as most of the business that is done in this region tends to be won by ‘local’ suppliers. We have built a great contact database for this region and through dogged determination and ‘gentle’ constant contact we are winning work and creating quoting opportunities daily.
If you were starting over today, what would you do differently?: I think we should have opened an office in Dubai first and then pushed hard with our marketing strategy for that region. I am sure we would have won much more business there if we could have popped in to see potential clients when they asked us. Selling into a foreign territory without a ‘local’ presence is very tough. However we are still winning business so it just goes to reiterate my comments earlier about keeping focussed and keep on plan.
What advice do you have for other business owners?: Always try to insure that when you communicate a product or service to your intended audience, you wrap it as a value added proposition.
It should be the bedrock of all of your marketing messages and will provide the reference point that ensures consistency across all of your sales and marketing messages.
There are four key elements to building a strong Value Proposition:
1. Describe the challenge / issue that your prospective customer is facing.
2. Explain what your solution to this challenge is.
3. Detail the tangible benefits that your product/service delivers.
4. Use examples where you have already done this – this provides the credibility.
A very good friend and top level interim director David Smith wrote a great paper on this which I am happy to share with everyone.
Running a business can be tough and you are often subjected to distraction. Do not get distracted nor despondent. Often the things we do today appear to have no effect but in reality this spade work can build the foundations for tomorrow and you will reap the benefits down the line. There are very few instant successes in business.
Please list any favorite books, tools or resources (software, website, etc.) you would recommend for others: So often web site maintenance gets forgotten in the daily activities. Keeping your site fresh is tough and always comes with an invoice after you updated it. Use Social media platforms to drive content which anyone (without any web authoring knowledge) can upload to daily. Pinterest is much underused by businesses and should be reviewed straight way. Using I-Frame you can actually delver all your Pinterest boards directly into your Facebook page. Take a look at our Facebook page and hit the Our Products Button: https://www.facebook.com/
Use LinkedIn! I cannot understate the usefulness of this B2B networking site.
What is something that people might be surprised to learn about you?: Being successful can be very frightening.
