May 15, 2012 - At MarketFitz, we spend much of our time helping average performers move toward market leadership. At a recent donor event for the Washington CPA Foundation, University of Washington Accounting Lecturer Bill Wells asked what advice I might have for students to help them identify a market leader during the job search. This blog post outlines the top three questions I would ask, and the responses I would be looking for to pick a winner.

April 9, 2012 - A good value proposition is more than a statement. It's an approach to business that unifies your activities into a single, consistent message to the market. Done consistently, it creates trust and defines the value clients will associate with your brand. This blog post discuses how to turn your value proposition into actionable business strategy.

March 19, 2012 - The feelings of desperation and panic a recession produces can drive organizations into a ready-fire-ready-fire mode. Unfortunately, the results of this failure to aim are generally wasted ammunition and missed opportunities. This blog post addresses the importance of carefully selecting a combat strategy prior to entering the battle.

March 5, 2012 - Many professional service providers are content in thinking that their clients are satisfied. While that may be true in the short-term, satisfaction doesn't necessarily translate to long-term loyalty for a number of reasons. This dangerous assumption can have far-reaching consequences on your bottom line not only because it erodes your service reputation, but because it often leads to wasted marketing expenditures that focus on acquisition instead of retention. This blog post discusses practical ways that professional services organizations can bridge the gap between perception and reality.

February 7, 2012 - Businesses that build strong relationships with stakeholders, including vendors, employees and customers, are more likely to be market leaders. And yet, we often hear from clients that they are uncomfortable building relationships – particularly with people they don't already know. This blog post talks about the key to building a strong client relationship, and provides a new framework for nervous networkers to consider.

January 17, 2012 - Outsourced marketing is typically analyzed in terms of the financial benefits it delivers to an organization's bottom line.  But there are other important benefits to consider from the outsourced employee's perspective, many of which can go a long way towards solving widespread retention problems while providing valuable career development opportunities.  

December 12, 2011 - How do you determine when it is time to invest in research? And, how much you should invest? In this blog post, we discuss how we help our clients answer these questions by starting with the financials and risks involved. Once the comparison of financial risk to research cost is boiled down to the numbers, it becomes simple to make a rational business decision about the value of potential research investments.

November 9, 2011 - If you are in a business that relies on relationships between employees and clients or customers as a key aspect of your business development process, you should be aware of the impact your employees' social media interactions might have on your business. This blog post comments on Seattle Times columnist Danny Westneat's recent observations on the same subject.

October 5, 2011 -- Most organizations use a combination of employees, independent contractors and agencies to address the human resource needs of its marketing efforts. This blog post explores how using shared resources can reduce inefficiencies and potentially improve marketing outcomes for organizations.

September 20, 2011 - Many executives (and their boards) consider growth to be the ultimate business objective – and a barometer of corporate success. However, without careful consideration, growth for growth's sake can harm, rather than help, a company's performance. This blog post provides examples of situations where growth is a bad idea, and some thoughts to consider before establishing growth as your company primary goal.

September 13, 2011 - There are many ways for professional services firms to calculate their return on marketing investments – unfortunately, many of those formulas are inaccurate because they don't take into account the full spectrum of marketing investments that are typically made throughout the business development process.  This blog post examines those marketing activities and how they should be classified in order to accurately assess ROI. 

August 22, 2011 -- MarketFitz' unique approach to improving returns on marketing investments, which blends management consulting, financial consulting and marketing strategy, requires project managers with marketing experience, financial analysis capabilities, and classic business strategy training. To help our team continue to develop these skills, MarketFitz established a book club. In response to the many organizations who have expressed an interest in developing a similar program for their own organizations, this blog outlines the basic approach and recommends a few initial reading selections.

July 8, 2011 - All marketing requires some level of financial investment. However, the myth of free marketing still persists in the business community. This blog post profiles the true cost of one such "free lunch."   

May 25, 2011 -- Our research indicates that market leaders share several behaviors in common. The most important is their dedicated focus on their market and its needs. But what it your organization doesn't have that focus? How do you go about changing it? This blog post looks at the approach taken by Alaska Airlines, a company that has been successfully shifting its culture over the last ten years.

May 3, 2011 - To provide solid business advice, our marketing consultants must have both classic business strategy training and opportunities to practice applying that training – and our methodologies – in real world environments before doing so in a client setting. To help our project managers develop these skills, MarketFitz team members participate in a business Book Club, and then apply what they have learned to a pro-bono client project. We crafted this blog post in response to the inquiries we have received from other organizations asking how to implement similar programs.

April 26, 2011 -- Many marketers in the legal industry advise firms to pursue aggressive brand awareness campaigns in order to dominate their market.  But without giving equal consideration to relationship-building activities, most firms will spend a lot of money generating awareness, yet end up wondering why revenue isn't increasing. This post examines the client decision-making process and how law firms can incorporate those critical factors into their overall marketing efforts. 

Source Sharing panelists, from left to right: Debbi Lewang, Kevin Maifeld, Heather Fitzpatrick and Susie Burdick.

March 31, 2011 -- On March 30, 2011, Seattle-area not-for-profit leaders gathered to engage in a thought-provoking discussion about sharing resources with other organizations in order to improve operational efficiency. Panelists included:

• Susie Burdick, Executive Director of the Hearing, Speech and Deafness Center, as moderator

• Heather Fitzpatrick, President and CEO of MarketFitz, Inc,

• Kevin Maifeld, Founder and Professor in the Master of Fine Arts in Arts Leadership at Seattle University

• Debbi Lewang, former CFO of Pacific Northwest Ballet and now a financial consultant to not-for-profits

The panelists shared their firsthand experiences with several different source sharing arrangements, as well as their recommendations for implementation. To see the executive summary, visit the Library section of our website.

March 29, 2011 -- As our business environment has become more complex, so have the skill sets required to compete. Because having experts, generalists and support staff available to cover all areas of need is expensive and, in many cases, impractical, both not-for-profits and for-profits are looking to innovation solutions to tapping talent – often collaborating with competitors to achieve cost savings or performance improvements. This blog post summarizes some of the examples that will be profiled in the March 30, 2010 Source Sharing event focused on the not-for-profit sector, and also examines some similar models already in use within the for-profit sector.

Necessity is the mother of invention. Given the current economic climate, many not-for-profit organizations are looking at innovative solutions to continue their work. On March 30^th, Jacobson Jarvis and MarketFitz are hosting a discussion of one of the growing trends in not-for-profit operational management:

MarketFitz & Jacobson Jarvis

are proud to present:

Source Sharing

Banding Together to Save Money

When:           Wednesday, March 30, 2011, 7:00 – 9:00 a.m.  (Program begins promptly at 7:30 a.m.)

Where:          The Rainier Club, 820 Fourth Avenue, Seattle, WA 98104

Cost:              $45    Advanced reservations required.

Registration: Advanced registration is required. To register, please send a reservation request to info@jjco.com. Space is limited.

What:             The event will feature a panel discussion focusing on trends in source sharing, and how CEOs and EDs, COOs, and Board Chairs are leveraging this trend to help their organizations run more efficiently.

The Panelists:

The panel will be introduced and facilitated by Susie Burdick, CEO of the Hearing, Speech and Deafness Center ("HSDC"). The HSDC has successfully collaborated with seven other not-for-profits to share operational resources, such as financial management services, with tremendous results. You can learn more about what they are doing here: http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/stories/2009/06/01/story5.html

Other panelists include Debbie Lewang, former CFO of the Pacific Northwest Ballet, who has spent a great deal of time exploring and discussing models to serve arts organizations, looking in particular to the Columbus Association for Performing Arts, to which local arts organization outsource finances, marketing, ticketing and fundraising. You can learn more about the amazing results here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=127039922

Kevin Maifeld, Founder of and Professor in the Master of Fine Arts in Arts Leadership program at Seattle University, will discuss trends in outsourcing and source sharing within the arts and other not-for-profit sectors. For more information about Kevin's background, click here to review his bio and work at Seattle University:  http://www.seattleu.edu/artsci/Inner.aspx?id=6242

Heather Fitzpatrick, President & CEO of MarketFitz, Inc. will discuss her firm's experience as an outsourced solution provider. MarketFitz has assumed management for marketing functions ranging from a single individual to more than a dozen employees within both not-for-profit and for-profit entities. She has spoken nationally on outsourcing as a way to streamline labor costs associated with marketing. For more information about MarketFitz and the solutions it provides, please visit www.marketfitz.com. 

Your Hosts:

Jacobson Jarvisis the largest and most experienced CPA firm focused exclusively on the accounting, tax, information systems and management consulting needs of not-for-profit organizations in the Pacific Northwest.   Leveraging the specialized knowledge of its committed team members and its expertise delivering a wide range of services to the not-for-profit community, Jacobson Jarvis is dedicated to strengthening the not-for-profit community by identifying ways for clients of all sizes and purpose to achieve their missions more expediently.  For more information about event co-host Jacobson Jarvis, please visit www.jjco.com. 

MarketFitz is passionate about improving clients' returns on investments in marketing and development. They have spent the last 12 years researching the secrets of marketing success, developing approaches to help clients improve the returns their marketing investments deliver, and making marketing more measurable and accountable for business and financial outcomes. Improving returns on marketing investments requires an understanding of business strategy and financial management, in addition to expertise in marketing. As a result, their team includes individuals with diverse backgrounds, solid marketing training and strong financial skills.

March 15, 2011 --  Just as most gamblers lose more than they win, most companies lose more than they gain from unstudied marketing investments. The key to success is in knowing how to manage risk.  This post discusses our recommended approach for companies considering costly marketing investments.