-    SUBJECT LINES: Keep subject lines short and ambiguous. When you give away the entire message, people sometimes do not read the entire lengthy line of text, plus mobile phones do not always list a long subject line. Front loading the main message in a journalistic “top to bottom” of message importance also works well with subject lines. Also, if you give it all away in the subject line, what’s left for them to discover when opening up the email? (That is not to say that you shouldn’t leave out vital details – just better to leave them wanting more)

-    CLEAR CALLS TO ACTION: After they decide to pay attention to an email and actually open up your message, people need to know exactly what to click on in your email message to obtain what they seek. The CTA’s should link out to revenue driving content; side note – categories and landing pages need to be created or cleaned up before driving people to these areas!

-    EMAIL FREQUENCY AND SCHEDULING: Certain times of the day elicit a better response than others for particular audiences. Also, sending emails daily creates a flood of content for your audience to sort through and may hurt your marketing intentions, much less give you a “bad rep” with ISP’s. A safe number is once or twice a week max; on the other end of the spectrum monthly, bi-monthly, or quarterly depending on your marketing initiatives. Also Tuesdays are no longer the “best” day to send (thanks to everyone int he industry burning everyone out over the past few years with Tuesday emails).

Interactive marketing channels present an opportunity like never before. While it’s important to still set realistic expectations to your creative, you also need to measure your creative against any limitations or obstacles. Each traditional media vehicle has limitations such as printed dimensions, placement, etc. The Internet has it’s own set of restrictions such as timing, placement, audience target, and design dimensions or message character count. These highly effective ways to deliver a message or story can now be measured more effectively than ever before.

Some channels are more risky, innovative, new channels that cannot be measured as easily, but are still important avenues that marketers should try. There are so many valuable new ways to deliver a message through display ads, email marketing, online video and various social channels – some may not drive direct revenue, which makes measuring success challenging. Many companies make the mistake to disregard things that cannot easily affect “the bottom line” or be measured in dollars or ad spending affecting sales. In my experience, using social channels to have the conversation with your customer target base is crucial. They are the ones who know what they want, and the avenues that allow them to have a voice should never be ignored or disregarded. Companies can use these channels to develop content and new products. They can avoid the guessing game creating new products that are a shot in the dark or are just motivated by some internal force, neglecting what consumers truly need. Social channels have the power to drive the business inadvertently and the more we educate the client or company we work for, the more the bottom line WILL be affected.

I can only hope that with the help of agencies like Creative Energy and other professionals in the field, the new way of thought will be embraced by those with the ultimate decision making power. I am proud to be a part of the web-olution and enjoy being a part of the community that is leading the charge!

Great work begins with a vision that still remains. To be a nationally recognized advertising, marketing an public relations firm within the markets we choose to enter. We have achieved our vision and still pursue it based on exceptional creative and the energy to help our clients achieve their marketing objectives. The vitality that makes us who we are is driven by the people who choose to be part of our organization. In the beginning, it was just a handful of people and one client. Today, there are about 20 of us with more than 60 active accounts.

In 1992, we were in the back rooms of a building that had been converted from a Western Sizzlin steakhouse into a training center for a one-of-a-kind nuclear plant. Our organization was the public relations department of a company that produced uranium fuel for submarines and aircraft carriers for a nuclear naval force pledged to control the Soviet Union in the midst of something called the Cold War. When the Soviets buckled and the Berlin Wall came down, no one knew that the results would include the formation of an advertising agency.

As the U.S. no longer had an ‘evil empire’ to contain, the U.S. Navy ramped down uranium fuel production. That meant that the company we worked for would reduce its workforce from 1,500 to 300 people almost overnight. I was told that my staff would be laid off and our team dissolved. I countered that with a small investment of cash, I could turn my team into an independent ad agency. With a big gulp and a lot of faith in our capabilities, Creative Energy was born.

Teresa Treadway, my wife and our vice-president of media, and I are the remaining members of our original crew. Our company has launched or continued the careers of more than 100 people. We’ve renovated three great buildings from cobwebs and years of disuse into beautiful and vibrant facilities that still remain. Our brand strategies and creative communications have grown the businesses of scores of extraordinary clients. The fire in our bellies to serve more clients with even better plans and creative has never been stronger. Today, we are living our vision and I could not be happier in knowing were we have been and where we are headed.

To every employee and every client that have been part of our history, I say thank you. For today’s employees and new clients (some that we picked up just yesterday), I say welcome aboard and enjoy the ride. We offer you what we have offered all along…Creative Energy.

Creative Energy is a full-service advertising, marketing, PR and digital firm with 20 years of experience in an endless pursuit of delivering measurable results for our clients. Beyond brand awareness, our expertise is to move customers down the sales funnel efficiently to purchase and foster long-term loyalty.

The key point of difference in today’s market is digital and that is where Creative Energy is scoring big for both food manufacturers and restaurant chains. From our award-winning new web site for Pal’s Sudden Service, to online TV channels that deliver important news from a food manufacturer to high-value chain targets, Creative Energy is there. Our proprietary e-mail list of foodservice operators and chains is now creating accountability in e-blast marketing and our traditional print advertising consistently ranks as some of the most powerful in the food trade.

If you are looking for an agency that understands the food business and how important today’s digital platform can finally deliver accountability to your advertising and marketing investment, Creative Energy offers the power of extraordinary thinking.

With Word Of Mouth (WOM) being the most powerful of all communications in an age of social media, understanding the ‘hooks’ of true consumer engagement and delivering the content that sparks conversation is why Karen knows how to turn up the volume to any marketing plan.

A former TV news reporter and anchor, Karen learned her craft as a working journalist. The best PR people are former journalists who understand how the filters of news, working journalists, process what will be published. Yet, Karen is an expert at sparking conversation directly with consumers via social media through content that sparks conversation.

Our new age of the Internet means brands must connect directly to create two-way communications that involves discussion that is relevant, credible, constant and with a level of emotion that creates a sense of closeness with the consumer. That is at the heart of today’s PR and Karen’s tool kit includes the insight to make the connection.

Karen’s talents as a news anchor also provides a unique capability for Creative Energy to create online newscasts, webisodes and other visual content that is on trend with the growing use of online video to deliver stronger relationships via social media and YouTube to laptops, tablets and smartphones.

If you are interested in what today’s PR is really about, get to know Karen Jenkins.

A new Pew Research Center report asked stakeholders and technology experts to predict the impact on constant connection to the Internet. The result was nearly an even split on positive and negative impacts by 2020. Here are some of the findings:

- Millennials’ brains are being rewired to adapt to the new information-processing skills they will need to survive in this environment.
- Memories are becoming hyperlinks to information triggered by keywords and URLs. We are becoming ‘persistent paleontologists’ of our own external memories, as our brains are storing the keywords to get back to those memories and not the full memories themselves.

- Young people accustomed to a diet of quick-fix information nuggets will be less likely to undertake deep, critical analysis of issues and challenging information. Shallow choices, an expectation of instant gratification, and a lack of patience are likely to be common results, especially for those who do not have the motivation or training that will help them master this new environment. One possible outcome is stagnation in innovation.

- Another possibility, though, is that evolving social structures will create a new “division of labor” that rewards those who make swift, correct decisions as they exploit new information streams and rewards the specialists who retain the skills of focused, deep thinking. New winners and losers will emerge in this reconfigured environment; the left-behind will be mired in the shallow diversions offered by technology.

These are Darwinian predictions of the survival of the fittest for the technology surge that has shocked and awed many already. For some of us, Darwin-like challenges have faced us long before the Internet. My vote is for smart multi-taskers that can separate the inane from the valuable – then do something with it.

1. Understanding that it is a crisis. Typically, we define crisis communications as one that could potentially have dramatic negative impact on the business. The most recent crisis could have destroyed the client’s credibility, closed the business and, could have created class action lawsuits. Overcoming denial, is key. If the matter can put you out of business, it is a crisis.

2. Don’t overlook that your first objective is to communicate with your employees. Employees can destroy your public relations effort if they are not on board. Create an all employees memo that gives them the facts that you can ascertain at the time and can still ring true at the end of the crisis and share it with them. Tell them what there response should be with clients and with friends and family. Tell them you have a communications professional on board and give them their telephone number if the media comes calling. This gives them a level of serenity in facing the crisis.

3. Lastly, understand that you must communicate to the media based on your agenda and not the media’s. The news media loves speculation and want to tie the story into a neat bow. Most issues are more complex. Your best opportunity is in the first communications with the media and try to resolve as many questions as possible on the first round or questions. You should understand that. most times, you cannot end the questions on Day 1. You must stay atop the issues and anticipate the next round of questions ahead of the media phone call.

It is the most delicate of PR challenges and never rely on rookies for this type of work. It is too important to overlook.

If your current online strategy does not include tablet owners, you should consider the fact that tablet ownership is now over 35% for those with annual incomes of more than $75,000. Thus, it’s time to ditch your old site that is built with Flash and perform a web site makeover in 2012.

I recently spoke to a new business prospect… who didn’t even know that his company’s beautiful web site didn’t work on a tablet. Steve Jobs’ hate of Adobe’s Flash instantly eliminated any Flash site hoping to reach iPad owners. While there are apps that can display Flash web sites on an iPad, do you want to count on the user to go to the trouble of finding and downloading the apps just so they can view your site?

You should develop a mobile strategy that assures that both tablets and smartphone users can access your brand. A greatly simplified site design for smartphones is a must for retailers with bricks and mortar outlets that incorporates GPS for customers to find your nearest location. We recently built a new web site for Pal’s Sudden Service (a 23-unit burger chain) that not only uses GPS for finding the nearest Pal’s restaurant for a smartphone user, but also enables them to find out what is playing at their local movie theater and buy a movie ticket. This makes the mobile site more valuable to the user and drives more brand exposure. Early analysis is showing 30% of the traffic to the Pal’s site is either via a tablet or smartphone.

Grab your tablet and make an assessment of how your web site works on the platform. Better yet, grab your smartphone. This is the year that you get your mobile act together and take care of the fastest growing technologies your customers are adopting.

Each year, Graphis invites professionals in the photography, illustration and graphic design communities to be considered for the awards. The Graphis panel selects the most compelling work of the year in each category and the winning entries are featured in a hardback annual.  The journal receives thousands of submissions from around the world for the awards. The Texas Pete® ad, targeting the U.S. military, was one of six print ads selected for the top honor⎯the Platinum Award.

The ad depicts a very serious looking drill sergeant being unfazed by the fact that his moustache has been singed by a new hotter flavor of the famous hot sauce. The ad appeared in Government Foodservice magazine, a trade publication for decision-makers in foodservice operations of the federal government, including military bases and government facilities.

“The selection proves again that our talent can compete with any advertising agency when it comes to creativity,” said Tony Treadway, president of Creative Energy. “I am thrilled for Jason Headrick whose insight and understanding of the Texas Pete® brand has been setting this hot sauce apart from the other brands for years. T.W. Garner Food Company, the manufacturer of Texas Pete®, has been a client of Creative Energy since 2001. Other advertising winners in the competition were for clients such as Ford, Nike, Jeep and other multi-billion dollar brands.

“Texas Pete® has emerged as the leading brand of hot sauce within the military, and we are proud to have played a role in their success,” Treadway said.

The ad also was given an ADDY award at the Northeast Tennessee American Advertising Federation awards. This is the second time Headrick has received recognition from Graphis for his work with Texas Pete®.

“It’s awesome to be honored for a second time by Graphis for our work with Texas Pete®,” says Headrick. “I appreciate their confidence in Creative Energy and me to design ads that build the brand through fun and exciting creative work.” Creative Energy has previously earned top advertising award honors from Graphis for two other print ads developed by the agency for the Texas Pete® brand.

First, we helped the client perform market research which found that consumer felt there was a higher level of service in a restaurant when they were presented with a free buttermint at the end of their meal. In the restaurant business, this was a breakthrough since a 2¢ buttermint could positively impact one of the three ways a restaurant chain can improve its sales (menu, atmosphere and service). Creative Energy was tasked with telling major restaurant chains about the news on a limited budget. This meant that the few ads we would be able to purchase had to be highly impactful…

Fast forward to a creative team meeting on the task and a Sunday School discussion on how acts of hospitality are no longer the norm (did I mention that the name of the buttermint company is Hospitality Mints?). Gone are the days of a restaurant offering to take your coat and hat upon entry. There are no more cigarette girls stopping by your table to offer a fresh pack… DING the light comes on. The launch of new MAD MEN TV episodes and a corresponding launch of a new line of 60s era colors and clothing by Banana Republic will reignite America’s nostalgic love of the era where an extra level of service (or hospitality) once lived. The new clothing line would include retro style dresses for women along with the classic blacks and greys worn by Don Draper on TV.

Kristen Lawson, our Digital Media Manager, and Art Director Dale Atkinson quickly created a 60s era cartoon character adorned with pearls and tight dress Jackie Kennedy would have loved. Her name? Miss Mints – and her message to restaurant chain executives was to return to an added level of hospitality that would enhance their customer service perception with wrapped buttermints including the chain’s branding and personal message.

Add a social media component, sharable e-blasts, print ads in two leading foodservice publications, banner ads on the magazine’s websites, box mailers offering samples of the buttermints and a microsite where Miss Mints can actually tell you why buttermints can make you more money… and what you have is a multi-channel campaign that can generate big money leads on a small budget.

Congrats to our creative team on a concept that can really offer a breakthrough in sales for the client – all sparked by some polite, southern ladies in a Sunday school class.