Arvest River Market on Ice

It’s hard to believe, but Thanksgiving is over and the Christmas tree is up at the agency! Are you looking for a fun activity to kick off your holiday season? Look no further than Arvest’s River Market on Ice taking place now in downtown Little Rock. As a community-focused bank, Arvest is excited to bring this winter activity to the community along with the Little Rock Advertising and Promotion Commission, Downtown Little Rock Partnership and Little Rock Parks and Recreation.

Our creative department enjoyed working with Arvest to design and create a tree-topper for the Christmas tree located at the rink.

The ice rink, located in one of the open-air pavilions overlooking Riverfront Park and the Arkansas River, is open now through January 8th. For a complete list of hours visit http://www.holidaysinlittlerock.com/river_market_on_ice/.

Our Second Wind

We recently sent a couple of our account executives to the Windy City for “Certified Account Executive College” offered by Second Wind.

The two-day seminar for smaller to mid-size agencies was comprised of industry-specific courses in account service and account management skills; account planning and strategic planning; and proposal writing and presentation skills.

Account executive Allison Drennon said the most valuable thing she learned in Chicago was training in the latest strategic planning best practices… and that the best view of Chicago is from the ladies room on the 96^th floor of the John Hancock building, not the 95^th.

They came back with more ideas than we can deploy at once, so we are taking one step at a time to help our clients and our agency get a second wind. One easy change we have been trying to make is to structure our days. If we schedule meetings in the mornings or late afternoons, the creative has an uninterrupted mid-day to really groove and our account service team can get quality time with our clients.

Second Wind is a partner and advertising resource to more than 800 small to mid-sized agencies. Find out more about Second Wind at www.secondwindonline.com.

Starting a New Path with Edafio Technology Partners

As we approach the holiday season and 2011 begins to wind down, we can’t say that things are slowing down around the agency. At Sells, we are excited to announce our newest client, Edafio Technology Partners.

Founded in 1999, Edafio, a Greek word meaning “passage” or “pathway,” has itself taken an interesting path to success in the IT industry. When local information technology providers couldn’t meet the needs of the Little Rock-based JPMS Cox accounting firm and many of its clients, the firm decided to create its own solution – Edafio Technology Partners. The newly established business was so successful in producing results for JPMS that it quickly developed into a full-service IT provider and began taking on clients of its own.

Over the years, Edafio has grown to a successful company, but had recently begun experiencing some pains in the sales and marketing area – primarily in closing new business prospects. That’s when they came to us.

As we always do, we started with research to understand as much about the company and its competitors, customers and prospects as possible. We analyzed their sales cycle and identified some key barriers to converting more prospects into customers. We are beginning to focus on the lead generation part of the sales cycle, which, if you’re a business owner or IT manager in Central Arkansas, you’ll be seeing soon. We’ll keep you updated as we work with Edafio to communicate their brand and allow them to effectively sell their core services to prospects.

Where will the Edafio/Sells Agency path lead? Stay tuned to find out.

Sells Agency honored as 2011 Safe Places Magic of Vision award recipients

Recently, the Sells Agency was presented with the ‘Magic of Vision Award’ by local non-profit, Safe Places, at their annual Cinderella Ball. The award recognized work the agency did to help bring awareness to Safe Places and its mission.

Our work included updating the Safe Places website, www.safeplaceslr.org, as well as producing marketing materials and executing PR tactics. The video we produced as part of that work is included below. But, the work we did for the organization pales in comparison to the work they do each day for children in violent and abusive situations. They are the only resource in central Arkansas that provides long-term help and counseling to victims of family violence and abuse, and we want nothing more than to see their good work continue.

However, Safe Places survives on grants and donations, and is always in need of support and funding. We encourage you to visit their website, read their story and help this much needed organization in any way you can.

We are so glad we got to be associated with such a wonderful organization like Safe Places.

"Teamwork" isn't just a bunch of hot air.

Recently Jon Hodges, one of our “co-rockers” (as we like to say around here), was on a relaxing, week-long vacation. So what were we doing while Jon was enjoying his trip to Yellowstone? Obviously plotting a little prank.

More than 600 balloons later, this is what Jon returned to find stuffed in his office on Monday morning.

For those wondering, the clean up from this stunt was also a team effort and went surprisingly quick! Just another day at the office!

So what exactly does it mean to be tactically agnostic?

Right there on the home page of our new website we call ourselves agnostics. Are we making some comment on our faith? Not at all, actually. What it means to us is that we don’t place our faith in one or two specific marketing tactics.

Perhaps the best way to explain a tactically agnostic agency is to explain what it isn’t.

For instance, much is being written and discussed lately about how great social media is as a marketing channel. There are literally hundreds of social media agencies popping up all over to help companies market through this new channel, which promises great returns for small investments and the ability to really “connect” with customers.

How about digital agencies? Hire a digital agency and they promise to bring your marketing into the 21^st century with robust websites, mobile apps, promotional microsites and more.

Then you have the traditional agencies that are stubbornly clinging to the mantra that every client needs to be on network TV. True story: in two different meetings with potential new clients recently, both started the meeting by saying, “don’t come back and just tell us we need to run a bunch of TV.”

Add to these direct marketing firms, PR firms, design firms, telemarketing, CRM, email marketing, etc., etc., etc.! We could go on and on with what being tactically agnostic isn’t…but here’s the main point.

The Sells Agency is a marketing firm. We solve marketing issues and help clients get a return on the investment they make with their marketing budgets. We employ a specific and precise process to arrive at a marketing approach that will help our clients achieve business and marketing goals – and we do not predetermine what marketing tactics the client should employ. Not until we have an understanding of their industry, business, competition, marketplace, products, culture, customers and prospects can we arrive at marketing goals, objectives, strategies and tactics.

It’s called our Marketing Clarity process, and it’s why we say that we are tactically agnostic. When you truly believe in the marketing process you cannot put your faith in one specific tactic.

Arvest Continues Commitment to Free Checking

When it comes to free checking, free debit cards and debit card rewards, most of the news hasn’t been good lately. Contrary to what banks around the country are doing, our client and the largest Arkansas-based bank, Arvest, announced this week that it will keep checking and debit cards free. Additionally, Arvest will continue to provide free online banking, free mobile banking and a debit card rewards program to its customers, while also lowering their overdraft fees. For thousands of Arvest customers and Arkansans in general, that’s some good news!

Our PR department has been working with Arvest on a public relations plan in order to announce this information, which bucks the national trends and influences other Arkansas-based banks to follow suit. Along with the plan we conducted research, created a release and comparative charts that highlight the trends in free checking and debit card fees, produced a fact sheet and talking points for Arvest associates, and worked with the media and bank executives to execute coverage in a four-state footprint.

To see one example of the coverage generated from this exciting Arvest announcement, click here to read the Arkansas Democrat Gazette’s coverage in central Arkansas.