metro blog

Metro Show & Tell

2011-03-23T11:06:00.001-04:00

Our new HP Digital Press has just been installed, and we can't wait to show it off and tell you about some the ways it can impact your company.

Please join us Thursday, March 31 for a Lunch and Learn or our Open House.

When you show up we'll make a donation to The V Foundation Show your Spirit campaign, we'll put your name in the hat to win great door prizes, and give you an inspirational V Foundation poster, printed especially  for you.

The new HP 3550 digital press is a state-of-the art press with unmatched quality, speed and efficiency, which means great results at a great price on a fast turnaround. We'll show you Variable Data Printing (VDP), specialty papers, and other great features of the HP

SCHEDULE  :
Open House | 4:30 – 6:30
Check out our press in action, munch on some goodies, andv take home information on new technologies and trends.

Lunch & Learn | 12 – 1 pm 
Join us for a bite to eat, get a look at our HP 3550 press, and find out ways to drive response in your marketing:

What the H@$$  is this Box? 
QR Codes: Why and  how to use them

V+D+P=$ 
How to get better response with Variable Data Printing

Direct Mail That Works
Learn the secrets of a successful direct mail campaign

To register for the lunch & learn, just email  printing@metroproductions.com and let us know you are coming.

The V Foundation's Show Your Spirit Campaign encourages companies to pick a day from March 15 – April 5, 2011 to wear their favorite team's colors in return for a donation to the V Foundation. For more information, visit www.jimmyv.org.

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Video Press Release: The Double-Sided, Sliding Business Card

2011-02-28T21:11:00.001-05:00

An awesome project for an awesome person.

Thanks for the opportunity to help, Oie!

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Mind Games: Is Neuromarketing taking market research to a new level, or is it a new way of subliminal advertising?

2011-02-10T21:29:00.002-05:00

A report on abc.com shows how to measure how your customer reacts to your message by monitoring brain activity. Small cameras and 32 electrosensors measure sight and brain activity while an advertisement is shown. These measurements identify the person’s reaction to the message and what parts of the advertisement that was most , or least, effective. The report says neuromarketing has been used by Campbell to redesign their soup can. Depending on your view point, this is incredible process for for identifying customer preferences, or it’s a way to subconsciously influence unsuspecting consumers.

Click to read the entire story

Find out more about metro productions

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Thanks to the Jimmy V Celebrity Golf Classic Volunteers!

2010-09-07T10:24:00.002-04:00

Metro has been a part of the Jimmy V Celebrity Golf Classic for 16 years. The volunteers that run The Classic are amazing individuals that selflessly and tirelessly donate thousands of hours to make this one of the premiere golf events in the country. One of the ways Metro teams with The Classic is to create a volunteer video — a retrospective video shown at the Volunteer Appreciation Dinner. We videotape volunteer activities the weeks leading up to and during the event, then edit hours of footage to produce a 30-minute video in 2 days. The video highlights the hard work — and the fun — the volunteers put in during the tournament.

Thanks Volunteers for a great tournament (and a great video).

Part 1

part 2

Part 3

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Cable, Cokes and Recovery — Two Stories of how 20 cents turned into thousands of dollars

2010-06-25T13:44:00.003-04:00

First Story.

My morning routine involves getting my toddler out of his crib (usually before 6 am) making coffee, and then checking out the latest scores and news on my laptop. It’s the only time during the day for me to catch up on all the things that are happening in the world. A couple of weeks ago my cable company robbed me of my cherished morning routine through a disruption of their internet service.
If that had been the first time it was down it wouldn’t have bothered me, but our cable and internet service had been anything but reliable leading up to that point. As I drove to work still a little perturbed about my morning, all I could think about was the cable companies total disregard for a high-level of service and I decided to look into changing cable/internet providers. There’s more competition than ever which has led to great incentives for switching companies.

Before I could seriously research an alternative, a letter arrived in the mail from my cable company. The letter started with a description of the problem that occurred and the steps they were taking to keep it from happening again, but how the letter ended is what kept me from switching. The company actually apologized for the interruption, and then offered me a free movie as a “gesture of concern for your inconvenience.” It seems I was wrong, the company does care about their level of service, at least enough to write a letter and offer me a free movie. I’ve been dying to watch “Hangover” again so I was pretty happy, and I never looked into switching companies.

Second Story.
There has been a Coke machine here at Metro for about 15 years. We
drink way too many soft drinks, so it gets a lot of use. Like most vending machines, our Coke machine would eat some change every now and then. Like most people instead of immediately calling for service we beat on the machine then dump more money in, and when that doesn’t work then we call for service.

Recently the machine ate 70 cents. Not a big deal, but we definitely wanted to be able to use it (remember, we drink a lot of soft drinks), so we called the person that owns and services the machine. He comes out, opens the machine, and hands us 50 cents. We ask about the other 20 cents, and he sarcastically said that’s what he was charging us for coming out to fix the machine. Again, a break-down in service got us thinking . . . and calculating. One person here has bought at least one drink a day for the last five and a half years. That adds up to over $1,000. That’s just for one employee, at one drink a day (some of us have been known to buy much more.) When we started calculating just how much we were spending, it started to make sense to pool some money and make a run to the wholesale store once a month and keep drinks in our fridge. It’s less expensive, and we don’t have to worry about losing any more money.

The Moral of the Stories…A little change can go a long way
Every company, no matter how large or small, will have a product or service that does not meet a customer’s expectations at some point in time. How a company handles the unhappy customer will keep the customer and actually strengthen the relationship, or will lose the customer…probably forever. Recovery is the strategy of keeping a customer after not meeting his or her expectations.

In the first story, the cable company was able to “recover” because they accepted responsibility, apologized, and then provided something I valued to compensate for the loss of service. Their cost for recovery was really low. They had to print and mail the letter, but letting me watch a movie cost them nothing. So for 20 cents (the price of the letter) the cable company kept a client that will spend thousands of dollars over the next few years. That’s a strong ROI.

In the second story, there was no accepting responsibility, there was no apology, and there was obviously nothing given to us that we valued. All the Coke machine owner had to do was give us the entire 70 cents back. We would not have started contemplating just how much we had put in that machine over the last few years, which led to our decision to change how we buy soft drinks. By keeping the 20 cents the Coke machine operator lost thousands of dollars in future revenue. That's a negative ROI.

The Coke story is a strong case for Recovery, but let’s take it a step farther. Imagine if the Coke machine operator had given us the entire 70 cents back, apologized, then given us a free Coke. That would not only have compensated us for our loss, but more importantly it would have strengthened our relationship. We would have told that story all day, “Dude, I got a free coke!” He would have showed us he valued us as a customer and our relationship would have been stronger than it was before. His only cost would have been the wholesale cost of a Coke.

It’s definitely easier to keep an existing customer than it is to find a new one, so if you don’t have a Recovery strategy, it may be time to develop one. Look for ways to show your client you value their business when something goes wrong. It could have only cost the Coke Machine operator a 20 cents, but now it’s going to cost him thousands of dollars.

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Why your web site has 10 seconds to make an impression.

2010-06-18T14:28:00.002-04:00

My wife and I have our 10th anniversary this summer, and to celebrate we are going on a trip. Taking the trip was the easy decision, deciding where to go has not been so easy. Our destination has to be far enough away so it’s different and special, but not too far away in case we are called back to parent duty. It has to be a place where my wife can lounge on the beach whenever she wants, but have enough to do that I don’t get bored sitting in a beach chair all day.

To decide where to go, we have burned up bandwith checking out hotels, resorts, and travel sites looking for the perfect location. In our search, I noticed just how fast my wife makes a decision about a place after looking at their site for no more than 10 seconds. Before a site had barely loaded, I would hear “Not Secluded Enough,” “Too Kid-Friendly,” or “Too Expensive.” She was making these decisions without reading one sentence of their well-written copy, or enjoying their soothing slide show of spectacular pictures.

Impulsive, you say? Not really.
In his book “Blink,” Malcom Gladwell discusses how we subconsciously make decisions in “a blink of an eye,” with what he calls thin slicing. Our brain makes incredibly fast decisions based on the infinite number of environmental factors it can assess. Sometimes these decisions are accurate, and sometimes they aren’t, but they do happen. When my wife looks at a web site and makes a decision about the type of place it is in 10 seconds, it’s her brain instantly processing what the page is communicating through layout, design, color, pictures and every other visual element, combined with her life experiences and natural perceptions. Is it fair to judge a place so quickly without going through the details of the site? Probably not. Does it happen? Definitely.

If you use your site to make an impression on current and potential clients (who doesn’t), take a step back from all the content, all the cool links and bells and whistles and try to look at it from the perspective of a first time visitor. What does your site say in 10 seconds?

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The Metro Difference

2010-05-27T17:24:00.009-04:00

Here's a little spot that will run on Yellowpages.com. We explain what drives our customers to keep coming back...

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Here Comes The Judge

2010-05-27T14:17:00.005-04:00

It’s political season again, and as usual we are helping a number of candidates with a variety of projects from web site development to direct mail. “Woofer” Davidian threw his hat in the ring for District Court Judge. Yes, he goes by “Woofer, “ which created a great opportunity to do something special with his logo.
Woofer’s actual name is Vartan Ambar Davidian, III, and as Woofer himself said, can make some potential voters think of him as a terrorist! But he has gone by Woofer since he was a small child, so using the nickname was an easy decision. The challenge came in how to treat the nickname in the logo and subsequent branding. We embraced the nickname idea, and decided to use his actual signature as part of the logo. It adds a great personal connection in the logo. To offset the more casual nature of the signature, we used a traditional serif typeface and navy blue for his base color. The traditional last name treatment and color contrasted well with the signature in a lighter blue to create a memorable logo.

The concept for the logo translated well into Woofer’s web site. The navy background works well, and he had a great picture taken by Val Stone that reinforces the concept of professional/judge contrasted with the personal connection. Facebook is a big part of his campaign, so we designed his facebook page, and tied that into his web site, along with contribution buttons placed conspicuously throughout his site and facebook page. In a little over 2 weeks Woofer had over 300 facebook fans and donations were coming in through paypal.

The branding also worked well in printed pieces. We created a handout piece that garnered a great deal of attention, but the invitation we created and mailed for his Kick-Off event was described as the most impressive invitation one person had ever seen.

Check out Woofer’s site at www.davidianforjudge.com and find him on facebook at Davidian for Judge.

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Byrd is the Word...

2010-04-15T17:19:00.002-04:00

Byrd Tile has been a fixture in North Carolina for over 30 years, but like everyone else in the building industry had seen a decline in business over the past year. To increase their visibility, reach, and ultimately sales, Byrd partnered with Metro to create an updated web site (with SEO), a custom blog and a 30 second television spot (with the assistance of Allison Best of The Marketing Department). Their web site now highlights the large variety of available tile, their impressive showroom and their in-house design consultants. Their SEO has moved them into the top 3 in the most searched keywords, and their blog allows them to keep customers and vendors up to date.

Click here to view the Byrd Tile site

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It’s always about the story – Book Review of Don Miller’s A Million Miles in A Thousand Years

2010-04-07T22:38:00.002-04:00

“Your life is a blank page. You write on it.” A great line, but is it true? In his book “A Million Miles In A Thousand Years.”, Donald Miller skillfully combines a little personal experience, a little theology, and a little humor to create a great blue print for writing your own story. Think it’s too late to write your story? Think again. Your story is being written everyday — you choose to be the author or not.

The book is filled with great lines and points that make you stop and think about how you are living your life versus how you should be living your life. This line really hit home for me, “…a story is based on what people think is important, so when we live a story, we are telling people what we think is important.”

An encouraging part of the book is how Miller addresses the hard parts of our life story. Miller points out that what makes a great story in a movie is seeing a character struggle, then overcome the adversity to be changed in the end. But he adds, “When you are watching a story you can watch a character struggle and enjoy it. But when you are that character, when you ‘re actually living inside the story, it’s not so fun.

I highly recommend the book. Miller’s style may not appeal to everyone, but the “story” certainly will.

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The Definition of Art (by Seth Godin)

2010-01-25T20:06:00.003-05:00

Marketing guru Seth Godin offers this take on "art." We are all artists, we just don't realize it!
_____________________________________________

Making art

My definition of art contains three elements:

Art is made by a human being.
Art is created to have an impact, to change someone else.
Art is a gift. You can sell the souvenir, the canvas, the recording... but the idea itself is free, and the generosity is a critical part of making art.

By my definition, most art has nothing to do with oil paint or marble. Art is what we're doing when we do our best work.

____________________________________________

Click to see more of Seth's posts

Download Seth's collections of ideas from other writers/authors/thinkers, "What Matters Now." It's a great way to start thinking about things in a new light.

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Forget the Resolutions...Write Your Story Instead

2010-01-13T16:25:00.002-05:00

Don Miller, one of my favorite authors, has a great alternative to the tradition of making, then forgetting, your New Years resolution. Instead of a making a resolution, try writing your story. By creating your story for the year, you will really think about where you want to be in a year, and the steps on how to get you there. Here’s the link for the details...

What’s Metro’s story for 2010? Don Miller’s story revolves around climbing Mt. Hood. Metro’s story is based on a climb, too. We’re going to make a commitment to exceeding customer expectations in every project, no matter how big or small. That’s a pretty big mountain, but we’re ready to start writing the story.

(PS- Need an example of “exceptional customer experience”? Check out Seth Godin’s blog post)

So, what's your story going to be?

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Ready for Some Football!

2010-01-13T15:49:00.005-05:00

The University of North Carolina is in the process of a 3-phase renovation to Kenan Stadium. The second phase has been named "The Blue Zone" and metro has created a logo, collateral, web graphics and signage to support the fundraising. The Blue Zone is made up of endzone suites that put you just feet from the action, and is one of the most ambitious and important projects to date for UNC Athletics and The Rams Club. Details of the project can be see at www.newkenan.com. After this project, we are ready for some tailgating!

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Who needs ink?

2010-01-13T15:08:00.006-05:00

Mi-Co, who is transforming the world of data collection by automating paper-based business processes, worked with Metro to create a web site and accompanying video to target specific segments in their industry. The site uses the videos to highlight the highly-visual benefits of Mi-Co’s technology — when you see handwriting magically change into a database you are amazed. The site was built on a content management system to allow Mi-Co to make frequent updates themselves. The videos are also used on youtube, facebook and sales presentations. Check it out for yourself...

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Holy IT!

2010-01-13T14:53:00.008-05:00

When author Scott Witting asked us to create a site for his book named “Holy IT” our response was"With a name like that...of course!” The site leads the visitor through the process of finding and implementing your “IT" —what you were put on this earth to accomplish. A coordinating blog site was created to give Scott a way to keep information updated and fresh. Warning — people have quit their job after reading this book (but they are much happier for it). Check out the site...

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The Montessori School of Raleigh

2008-09-04T19:44:00.007-04:00

Metro just finalized the new web site and view book for The Montessori School of Raleigh. After completing the new logo and corporate identity in the spring, we worked to incorporate the identity into the new marketing executions. The design focuses on positioning the school as a traditional, independent school that has distinct advantages due to its teaching method. View the web site at www.msr.org.

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Strike For Survival

2008-09-01T21:33:00.004-04:00

For the last three years, Metro Productions has been involved with a special "Fun-Raiser" called Strike for Survival. Basically a group of inspired small business owners wanted to create an event that (1) raised money for the fight against cancer, (2) was well-organized, managed and executed (3) was an "inclusive" event that welcomed families, individuals, business, etc and (4) was FUN!!
Being part of Strike for Survival in Raleigh has given Metro a chance to use our graphic design, web design, production and printing capabilities to help in the fight against cancer. Since my dad passed away in April, this year's event has a little more meaning this year.

Please join us in Raleigh, Cary or Durham - visit www.strikeforsurvival.com for details.

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