Companies are recognizing the benefits of achieving diversity and inclusion in the workplace. Research suggests approaching this issue holistically will help businesses grow in the long run. Often, institutions handle gender, ethnic diversity, and sexual orientation as a mandate and not something that could help toward lasting success.

Unfortunately, some companies view this issue disingenuously and tackle it as “good for business.” When companies approach diversity in this way, it falls short, and quickly.   In a matter of time, a cultural misstep ensues. A flagrant incident emerges and caught on video is an unhappy customer sharing their story vitriol on social media for the online trolls to weigh in.

Another example is a company produces a polarizing product and campaign that some may find offensive. After a public outcry, the business is forced to pull the product off store shelves, leaving many to wonder, were there any people of color a part of the decision-making process and did they have a voice in the matter. The company is befallen to public humiliation and scrutiny, which ultimately warrants a costly PR clean-up.

Being open-minded and demonstrating a level of commitment toward diversity and inclusion fosters a greater social coherence.  Allen Marketing Communications, Inc, a boutique travel and lifestyle PR agency based in New York City, celebrates diversity with a talented multicultural team to mirror the general population in the United States.  Our diverse teams provide the diversity of thought and experiences to help travel, food and beverage and wine and spirit companies capture their share of market and share of wealth in their respective industries.
 
As Verna Myers, VP of Inclusion Strategy at Netflix and Founder of The Verna Myers Company perfectly stated: “Diversity is being invited to the dance and inclusion is being asked to dance.” Corporations cultivating a work environment that is conducive to other perspectives and diverse backgrounds are one step closer to making a meaningful change. Employees should feel empowered to unlock their true authentic selves, whether it’s ignited by their gender, race, disability, religion, cultural or sexual persuasion, and not be made to feel like some sort of outcast or experiment. Those unique qualities should not only be embraced but welcomed in a most endearing way.

Their opinions should matter, be heard loud and clear, and not stifled for subjective assessment. It’s well within one’s right not to fully understand, but an individual can certainly be tactful about it, open-minded and accepting. This also means a person should not be barraged with statements and questions charged by unconscious biases that can be easily interpreted as an egregious form of pandering and an implicit typecast. Resources and diversity-friendly support mechanisms should be in place and made readily available to initiate cross-functional learning experiences among staff and leadership. Most of all, everyone should be treated as dignified human beings hired for the skills sets they bring forth to the organization.

Promoting a diverse workforce is a smart business practice:  it brings tremendous value to any company. It allows for a global perspective and drives innovation and matters that can elevate a company and its competitive edge. Solutions can be dealt with seemingly through the lens of people from completely different views and backgrounds for a common goal. Most importantly, diversity and inclusion raise employees’ morale and increase productivity. Bottom line, it’s a win-win for everyone.

​Our multicultural team of travel and lifestyle public relations professionals are here to help.  Give us a call.
 
By Olivia Almagro, consultant, Allen Marketing Communications, Inc.

Branding distinguishes your company, product or service from competitors.  In today’s competitive market, small business and Fortune 500 companies often undergo a branding campaign to create a one of a kind brand that will resonate with customers and ultimately inspire them to choose your product or service.
 
Allen Marketing Communications, Inc., a boutique NYC travel and lifestyle public relations agency, undertakes a holistic approach to develop a company’s brand DNA from the new logos and taglines to brand guidelines, to the brand vision and to recommendations on how employees should conduct business on your company’s behalf.
 
Here are tips for developing an effective brand strategy.
 
Research – Our talented team of brand marketing specialists work closely with an independent market research company to conduct competitive analysis, quantitative and qualitative research. 

Our quantitative research initiatives range from surveys and polls to one on one interview to gather invaluable insights about perceptions about our clients’ business and our clients’ competitors. 
 
These research findings serve the foundation for developing our branding campaign.
 
Our qualitative research activities range from targeted surveys to focus groups in priority market(s) to ensure the new visual identity, slogans and taglines resonates with our clients’ potential customers.
 
Stand Apart From the Crowd – Develop a tagline to create an emotional connection with your audience and to engage the brand.  Test the tagline with potential audience to ensure the messages are creating the desired effect for your product or service.  Enlist support from a graphic designer to create a one-of-a-kind visual identity to create a memorable impression and to set your client apart from its competitors. 

Copyright and Trademark – It is important to work with an intellectual property law firm to copyright and to trademark logos, slogans and taglines so clients own full rights for these creative works. 

Brand Position – It is vital to develop unique attributes to differentiate your company, product, service from competitors.  It is important to maintain an open line of communication with clients, secure feedback and adjust the creatives. 

Brand Guidelines – It is important to have a toolkit to ensure graphic designers, web developers, and marketers communicate the same message, have a uniformed look in all forms of communications.  The style guide should include everything from the color palette, font, and editorial guidelines to ensure consistency with the brand. 

Create Your Company Culture – The new brand DNA will transcend to your company culture. All new employees should receive the brand guidelines during the orientation session.
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A strong brand could be extremely helpful in creating positive and lasting reputation in overall. Everyone prefers to work with those who are people oriented or driven and actually show their concern for customers. Try to be one of those companies embodying people first attitude in everything that you and your employees do. 
 
Our boutique NYC travel and lifestyle public relations agency is here to help. Give us a call.

​By Joanna Allen, chief executive officer, Allen Marketing Communications, Inc.
 
   
                    
 

​Are you looking to increase your digital presence, drive more traffic to your website and ultimately boost sales?  Allen Marketing Communications, Inc., a boutique travel and lifestyle public relations agency, understands the importance of developing an effective SEO strategy to drive traffic to the website and stimulate sales.

Here are our services at a glance to enhance company’s online visibility.

Website Development
A website is an important marketing tool to inspire first-time and repeat customers to learn all about a company’s wonderful services and products.  An eye-catching, easy to navigate website accessed on desktops and mobile devices will encourage consumers to spend more time surfing a company’s website.

If a client needs to custom design a new website, our website developers conduct a deep dive to understand our clients’ goals and objectives.   Our talented team can custom build an ecommerce or non-ecommerce website from scratch or tailor one using a template to help clients achieve their marketing objectives   

Our web developers use several technologies – front end development (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, JQuery, React Js), back end (PHP Development and Js), Frameworks (Bootstrap, Codeigniter) and Databases (MySol, MongoDB, Firebase, Redis, PostgreSQL).
Throughout the website development process, we maintain an open line of communication to adjust and fine tune the website.

SEO Optimization
Prior to conducting an SEO keyword research, it is important to conduct an SEO audit, gather information about your online presence and make recommendations for improvement.

SEO (search engine optimization) keyword research identifies the words and phrases to increase searches on Google, Bing and Yahoo.  The SEO Keywords will drive traffic to clients’ website through free, organic and natural searches when consumers are researching information for a particular product or service.

If you custom build a new website, we have a skilled travel and lifestyle writers who can weave your SEO keywords into the website copy.  We can also work with our website developers to also include the SEO keywords in the title tags for the individual pages on your website.

To ensure synergy for SEO optimization, our travel and lifestyle public relations professionals also integrate these SEO keywords into all press releases and backgrounds with direct hyperlinks to specific pages on clients’ website.

It is also important to secure links to other high performing websites to drive traffic to clients’ website.

Blogs
Blogs are a low cost marketing tool to help increase companies online presence online.  It is really important to integrate clients’ branded SEO keywords into the blog and to post two or three times a week to increase organizations visibility with online searches and stimulate sales.

It is also very important to post blogs to other websites with hyperlinks to specific pages on website.  It will help to drive more traffic to your website and help increase your profile in online searches and rankings in google searches.

Digital Display Advertising
Digital display advertising, also known as a pay per click advertising, is also another effective way to drive traffic to companies’ website. To be truly effective, it is important to integrate the SEO keywords into the actual digital ad.

Organizations set the budget and determine the target markets.  Companies can increase or decrease the budget spend.

Our boutique travel and lifestyle public relations agency is here to help organizations increase their digital presence online.  Give us a call.
 
By Joanna Allen, chief executive officer, Allen Marketing Communications, Inc