In marketing and in your general life, appearance means everything!

People typically base their first impressions of you, right away, off of appearance. That usually will determine if they want to hear what you have to say. If you go into an interview with wrinkled slacks or scuffed shoes, you may lose your interviewers attention, and no matter how intelligent you are, their focus will remain on something other than your ‘content’ (like the huge coffee stain down the front of your shirt or the hot pink streak in your hair).

When interviewing, like marketing, you must always impress with your presence and your articulation. You must be confident, engaging, clean, and easy to understand. Here are 3 interview ‘musts’ that you can apply to your email marketing efforts.

1. Clean nails and face: is your database clean? Make sure you have current emails to avoid high bounce rates. Is the html in your template clean? This also is important so that the template is viewable in all browsers. As with a clean face, make sure your template’s appearance matches your branding standards. If blue hues are your company’s colors, keep it consistent. You wouldn’t show up to a formal interview in clown makeup would you?

2. Basic suit and minimal jewelry: Like a basic suit your template should also be basic. With a basic suit, you are assured that they are paying more attention to the ‘content’ you speak as opposed to the bright orange suit jacket you decided to wear. Jewelry should be basic and kept to a minimum, similar to your images. A basic call to action button, logo, and image may suffice depending on the type of email being sent. Your audience will lose sight of the content if your images (like the 30 bangles on your wrist) are too flashy.

3. Confidence and knowledge: Like practicing for an interview you should ‘practice’ for an email send. Send tests to different email URL’s to make sure the template looks the same in all of them.  And like researching the company you are interviewing for, you should also know your audience and cater your content to that demographic.

These are just a few of the many ways you can relate an interview to an email piece. Do you have any interesting ones you’d like to share? Post them below!

Rosa Luciano is the Marketing Coordinator and blogger extraordinaire for Interactive Financial Marketing Group. Follow her on Twitter @RozaLuciano

In the marketing profession you have to be fierce, aggressive, assured, witty at times, confident all the time, and whatever other adjective symbolizes strength or creativity. There is no room for pessimism, doubt, or egos.

In a small company this especially holds true when you have a small team that must work together and be held individually accountable for their actions and contributions. Here is a list of 5 personality types that you probably wouldn’t want working on your marketing team- or any team for that matter!

The ‘Debbie downer’: Need I say more?! This guy is depressing to say the least. Your team can acquire a huge account and instead of celebrating he is complaining about how much more time the project will consume and whether or not he can get it done. He complains about everything and anything. Get rid of this poison ASAP as he will bring the office morale down to an extreme low. Misery loves company!

The’ scaredy cat‘: This worker is afraid to take any chances that aren’t backed by facts and data. Doing things on a whim or without researching does not appeal to this worker. He would rather play it safe and do it ‘how it’s always worked’ than take a chance and make history. Boring! Put him in the finance department, he might fit in better.

The ‘hoverer’: This one likes to hover… all the time… over everyone’s shoulder… and add his two cents although it wasn’t asked for. They can be extremely frustrating and definitely a ‘space invader’ for sure. Get them in check fast or they may tick a lot of people off! Or supply your team with privacy screens, he may than get the hint!

The ‘idea stealer’: This employee likes to pick your brain for information and ideas and than turn around and present them as their own! Very sneaky and not trustworthy, you may even be concerned that they would throw you under a bus any chance they got. Watch out for this one, not only are they stealing ideas, they may also take your lunch!

The ‘worry wart’: This guy worries about everything! Will it work? Will they like it? Will they open it? Will they apply? What if they don’t? Will they hate it?… WILL YOU RELAX? This personality definitely doesn’t belong on a marketing team. While having normal worries is normal, it becomes bad business when it starts affecting your campaigns and choices.

So can you think of any other personalities that you have encountered in your ‘work life’? Share them below!

Rosa Luciano is the Marketing Coordinator and blogger extraordinaire for Interactive Financial Marketing Group. Follow her on Twitter @RozaLuciano

This past week we lost a great visionary and thought leader in Steve Jobs, co-founder and CEO of Apple. Below are some great blog posts about Mr. Jobs and how he changed the industry. Enjoy and have a great weekend!

Steve Jobs’ influence over mobile marketing and advertising: “Steve Jobs’ biggest influence on mobile marketing and advertising is in the way the iPhone and iPad changed behavior.”

4 Marketing lessons from Steve Jobs: “And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it.”

Steve Jobs influence on Hubspot: “The genius behind the iPod was not just that the device was simpler, but it was also how the device worked with the application (iTunes) and the content (music).”

What the world can learn from Steve Jobs: “They are a part of what Steve Jobs called “The Crazy Ones” who think differently, who are trouble makers, who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world… and quite frankly, they do.”

RIP Mr. Jobs

How has Steve Jobs changed your view on technology or your companies outlook on marketing? Share your stories below.

Rosa Luciano is the Marketing Coordinator and blogger extraordinaire for Interactive Financial Marketing Group. Follow her on Twitter @RozaLuciano

Yep. It’s true. We are all very different but work well together. Just a quick meet and greet of some of the members of our Marketing team here at IFMG (from my perspective anyways):

Albano aka ‘The Bano’ – SEO Analyst. This guy gets the job done. His willingness to learn new things and take on new projects is constant. You can catch him here late quite often coming up with ways to improve our online presence.

Caitlyn aka ‘The Perfectionist’ – Graphic Designer. A little shy at first Caitlyn is starting to come out of her shell! You can credit her for a lot of the awesome designs you may see in our marketing collateral, banner ads, and websites.

Rosa aka ‘The Feisty One’ – Marketing Coordinator. This chica needs her morning coffee before starting her day! Always looking for ways to improve social media and email best practices, you can find her Tweeting and interacting on Facebook most days.

Amy aka ‘Taggart.’ – Marketing Manager. Habitual ‘fuzzy bunny’ chaser, we can always count on Amy to bring in ideas and the numbers to back them up. Increasing brand awareness amongst our b2b clients is Amy’s specialty.

Ok so enough about the awesomeness that is the IFMG Marketing Team! Do you have awesome coworkers? Tell us about them!

Rosa Luciano is the Marketing Coordinator and blogger extraordinaire for Interactive Financial Marketing Group. Follow her on Twitter @RozaLuciano

In the past couple of weeks I have seen some new signs popping up on just about every corner in Richmond VA, and the one that makes me cringe the most is the Wells Fargo logos. The colors, the font, and that stagecoach… I shudder just thinking of it!

While I thank Wells Fargo for not using Old English Text in their branding, I wonder why they never felt the need to change the “look” of their branding. According to their website:

“Our Stagecoach symbolizes our strength and stability. It says to our customers: We’ve been here for almost 160 years and we’ll be here for you in the future, too. We’re one of only about a dozen U.S. public companies of that vintage that’s still in its founding business under its founding name.”

I don’t know if I can agree with this… Maybe it says that to your older customers. Maybe as a marketer I am being overly critical because that is what I do.  Or maybe as a 20 something I don’t “get” the message it conveys… Stagecoaches, to me, symbolize 5 mph and a bumpy ride, not strength and stability. I want flying cars in my future because it symbolizes growth and moving forward- not a stagecoach.

Change is good sometimes and companies that have been around 100+ years go through many branding phases/logo changes and still remain successful. Examples of that are Amtrak and Yuengling, both companies who have around since 1829, and both who have gone through re-branding to modernize their looks. So with that being said, I think it’s time to retire the stagecoach Wells Fargo!

What are your thoughts on Wells Fargo’s branding?

Rosa Luciano is the Marketing Coordinator and blogger extraordinaire for Interactive Financial Marketing Group. Follow her on Twitter @RozaLuciano