I am a marketer, communicator and social media nut living in Southeastern Wisconsin.
For more than 10 years, I’ve helped companies (large and small) improve their marketing by integrating their past efforts with new tools while directing their attention to stay focused on the customer and their needs/desires. Be it strategic planning or execution of branding efforts, digital marketing campaigns, social media or PR, I have helped companies of 10 to 1000 people with their communicatino efforts.
In my current role, I am responsible for digital marketing at a niche insurance comapny, Markel American Insurance. While at Markel and elsewhere, I have:
- Designed and launched multiple websites
- Completed SEO and improved rankings for multiple websites
- Managed paid search campaigns with budgets of $100,000
- Managed and promoted national sweepstakes
- Managed / executed numerous tradeshow exhibitions
- Launched marketing efforts from the ground level for a small company – both on and offline
- Managed web analytics with both Google Analytics and WebTrends
- Created content – articles, photos, videos, audio for use throughout the web
- Completed email marketing campaigns
- Secured mentions/articles in print via PR efforts
But, why Flyover Marketing?
There are many definitions of marketing.
One of the best I have ever heard is from Christopher S. Penn.
“Marketing is the sharing of ideas.”
Isn’t that great?
Yes, ultimately you want a sale/action out of it, but that’s not the first step. You must first share your idea in order to coinvince someone that what you are offering is what they want/need and that you are trustworthy to supply it for them.
To me, that is the essence of marketing.
With the advent of so many new tools (blogs, podcasts, social networks, etc) to share our ideas, something has gotten lost along the way – having ideas worth sharing.
Too many people say, “We need a blog” or “Let’s start a podcast” without a single thought as to WHY they are starting or whether they have something worth saying. Then, when it doesn’t work, they blame the tool. Seems backwards to me.
That’s why I called this blog “Flyover Marketing.”
Not just because I live in “flyover country” (Whitewater, WI – doesn’t get much more flyover than that!), but because I think that in order to market properly and successfully you need a “flyover” view of your business and its offering. You need to understand what you offer that’s worth hearing about.
Then you can pick your tools.
It’s who you know
It’s been said that you can know a person by the company they keep. That said, here is a short list of some of the brilliant people who have influnced my thinking about marketing and business.
- C.C. Chapman
- Mitch Joel
- Joseph Jaffe
- Chris Brogan
- Christoper Penn
- Jen Keller and
- Seth Godin (wouldn’t be much of a marketer if I didn’t include him, would I?)
Let’s get personal
Just so I don’t come off as a complete marketing robot, here’s a bit about me from a personl angle.
- I love Jesus Christ
- I have been happily married to my wife, Lacy since 2002.
- I am the proud father of Noah.
- I’m an amateur photographer
- I’m a coffee nut (to the extent that I roast, grind and brew my own)
- I’m a bookworm (ok, so marketing may work its way back in a little bit here…)
Contact me
If you like what you see and think we could work together, I’d love to talk. Or, if you just want to talk about marketing, business or anything else here, feel free to contact me.
kevinbehringer at gmail.com
Twitter (@kevinbehringer)
Facebook
LinkedIn
Flickr
Fly-Over Marketing 
Thank You
Interesting blog. Am adding your feed to my aggregator. Look forward to some great posts.
i just read something you posted on Armano’s site, and it resonated with me, and I quote,
“How many of the “A-List” bloggers out there are huge because of their brand or where they work? I think it’s much more common that they become highly-regarded because of their content OUTSIDE of the brand…sometimes in spite of it.”
You could not be more dead on with that statment, in fact in some cases these people that are great bloggers might not be the best people to hire to roll out a new product, to consult, or to roll up their sleeves- IN other words they can talk it but they might not be able to walk it.
But…that does not mean that what they say isn’t viable or applicable and for that I implore them to keep writing and to keep us thinking..
Good job and way to add to the conversation
Marc Meyer
“Interesting article. It is rather unfortunate that over the last several years, the travel industry has already been able to to tackle terrorism, SARS, tsunamis, bird flu, swine flu, and also the first ever true global tough economy. Through all of it the industry has proven to be effective, resilient and also dynamic, acquiring new approaches to deal with hardship. There are always fresh issues and opportunities to which the field must yet again adapt and act in response.”
“One thing I’d really like to say is before purchasing more computer memory, consider the machine within which it would be installed. If the machine is definitely running Windows XP, for instance, a memory limit is 3.25GB. Putting in a lot more than this would just constitute any waste. Be sure that one’s motherboard can handle the particular upgrade quantity, as well. Thanks for your blog post.”
“Hey! Good stuff, do tell us when you post something like that!”
Write more, thats all I have to say. Literally, it seems as
though you relied on the video to make your point.
You definitely know what youre talking about, why throw away your intelligence on
just posting videos to your site when you could be giving us something enlightening to read?