Retargeting – How to Research and Launch a Retargeting Campaign
GUEST POST:
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How to Research and Launch a Retargeting Campaign
Retargeting is an online advertising practice that serves your ads to users after they leave your website. Your ads appear all over the web, allowing you to stay in front of your audience even when they’re browsing other sites. The average American is exposed to over 3,000 advertising messages daily, but most can only specifically recall 2 ads that they’ve ever seen. Retargeting is a great way to combat so-called “banner blindness,” people’s tendency not to recall online ads, and help you launch a successful branding campaign and remind users of your products and services even if they aren’t on your site.
Here are some important considerations prior to launching a retargeting campaign:
Determine Your Objectives
Take a moment to think about your marketing goals. What, specifically, are you trying to accomplish?
Do you have only a few website visitors? If your goal is to drive initial web traffic, retargeting is not the right solution. You should work on improving your organic search rankings with SEO, and should implement a mix of paid search and display advertising campaigns to get people to your site.
Do you have some traffic coming to your site, but want to improve your conversion rates? In this case, retargeting is a great solution. Even if your web traffic isn’t quite as high as you would like it to be, it still could be a good idea to add retargeting into your marketing mix. Adding retargeting to existing search or display campaigns is a great way to court new site visitors without forgetting about your previous visitors.
If you’ve decided that retargeting is the right (or one of the right) solutions for you, follow the steps outlined below to get started.
Segment your audience
Divide audience into segments based on purchase intent and show them ads accordingly. Site visitors who only go to your site’s homepage may not yet know much about you, so you should target them with branding ads to get them more familiar with you and your product or service. However, if a user goes to a specific product page, they may be closer to buying. In this instance, you may have better results showing ads with specific deals or incentives tailored to the product they looked at. The most successful retargeting campaign will not treat all site visitors alike.
Set a Frequency Cap
It’s highly recommended to set a frequency cap for your retargeting campaign. You want your brand to be remembered, but you don’t want your users to feel overwhelmed. Setting a strict limit on the number of times any given user can see your ads will prevent them from feeling like they’re being followed around the web, as overexposure can lead to negative associations with your brand.
In addition to negative brand associations, you don’t want to run the risk of “banner blindness,” the very problem retargeting sets out to defeat. If you expose your users to your ads constantly, they will begin to ignore them, diminishing the effectiveness of the retargeting campaign.
Set Conversion and Burn Pixels
A conversion pixel is a snippet of code which tracks when the user converts (for example, makes a purchase or fills out a lead form). The burn pixel is another snippet which tells your retargeting provider to stop serving ads to the converted user.
This is particularly important if you’re targeting ads related to a specific product or service. If you’ve been showing a user an ad for a particular suitcase, and then the user purchases is it, there is no constructive purpose to continuing to show them the ad. If anything, it is likely to have a negative effect on the user who could easily get annoyed seeing ads for a suitcase they already own!
Test!
Retargeting can improve conversion rates by up to 300%. But don’t take my word for it. If you implement a retargeting campaign, test the results yourself by comparing your traditional display ads’ performance with your retargeting ads’ performance.
And don’t forget to constantly A/B test the copy and creative for your retargeting ads to make sure you’re always putting your best foot forward.
About the Author:
Caroline Watts is a marketing associate at ReTargeter, an online ad platform specializing in retargeting.
Can I Buy Your Business?
I have the attention span of a two year old. Going
Glenn Livingston Arrested for Drinking
It’s 100% true…
Glenn Livingston was arrested for drinking on January 4th, 2012, and you can see his mugshot here.
It’s pretty scary what you can learn using Google Alerts!
Like most marketers, I have routine alerts out on my name, and for just a moment when I saw this come through I wondered if perhaps I’d been out on a bender I’d forgotten last week (even though I haven’t had a drink in 20+ years… not ’cause I’m an alcoholic–I detest that term–just because I find life more interesting and satisfactory without screwing with my mental state)
I also learned, of course, about the myriad of people stealing my products (we pursue them legally now), and a few things about yet ANOTHER Glenn Livingston who’s a pastor in Illinois up to some interesting things from time to time.
But none of these rather mundane results from Google Alerts come anywhere close to the REAL power of this FREE utility…
(Even though tracking your namesakes’ activities can from time to time generate an attention getting headline)
Because most marketers have absolutely NO idea how to use it…
The REAL way to leverage Google Alerts is to first know with crystal clarity EXACTLY what keyword defines your ideal prospect, plus a very small set of related keywords which surround it. Taken together these become your “archery target”… the small space which defines EXACTLY WHO YOU WANT TO BE on the internet, and allows you to more or less ignore everything else.
Once you’ve done that, you can combine Google Alerts with Google Reader Feeds (and some anti-RSS-spam code) to automatically collect pretty much EVERYTHING that happens on the internet that’s relevant to you…
And stop getting distracted by everything else…
Which is the ONLY way to build a hyper-responsive marketing system in my humble opinion.
Have any of you found effective-yet-novel uses for Google Alerts we should know about?
Tell me, I’d like to know!
Dr. G 
PS – I’m considering organizing my network and resources to build a “performance-pay-based-conversion boosting-done-for-you” service. Curious if that’s of interest to any of my readers today
The Worst Way to Start a New Year
What’s the absolute worst way you could imagine starting the new year?
I’ve never really formally thought it through, but you’d have to rank “getting food poisoning” among the top three, don’t you think?
Here’s what happened.
After going through years of crushing debt (most of you know our story – lost $2M that we didn’t have) Sharon and I finally have a few bucks to look after. Not that we’re rich by any stretch of the imagination, just that we both felt it was time (in part at my bookkeeper’s urging!) to meet with a respected financial planner in the community.
Mary was someone Sharon knew for years through her professional network, and we both thought the Friday before New Years would be the best time to get started with her. So we made a 4:30 pm appointment (her last of the year!) and were eagerly looking forward to our time with her…
Except life got in the way…
I decided to stop at the supermarket to have a little seafood salad after my workout that morning. It didn’t taste just right, but I ate it anyway because (1) I was fricking hungry; (2) I tend to have an iron stomach; and (3) my vegan days are over… hand over the fricking meat and nobody gets hurt! (Actually I still eat mostly fruit and vegetables, but that’s a separate story)
Anyway, I had a few pangs in my stomach right afterwards but I just thought I ate too quickly.
By the time I was on my way to the financial planner’s (Mary’s) office I was feeling downright green.
And so when Sharon and I walked in, both dressed in our Sunday best (I was wearing my best white shirt and suit-tie to impress), I promptly shook Mary’s hand and asked where her bathroom was.
It was unfortunately right next to her office…
So I’m sure she heard every last LOUD groan and a myriad of other entirely disgusting noises as the “fun began” (Fun which eventually took four days and five pounds out of my life!)
And when I walked back into her office trying to compose myself I literally said this:
“Mary, tell me this, is it a good sign or a bad sign if a new client immediately starts projectile vomiting as soon as they meet you?”
Now here’s the thing…
She was incredibly sweet.
She dropped everything, called her friend the nurse, ran around the office looking for things I could take in the car for my drive home, got me water, and generally turned into a “Total Mom” instead of a sophisticated financial planner.
Truth is, she probably bonded me to her for life…
And I left there feeling MUCH more willing to risk my money with her.
Of course I’ll keep evaluating things intellectually because that’s what I do, but I can’t tell you how POWERFULLY PRIMITIVE THE FEELING OF TRUST that’s come over me since this event really is!
I actually think the meeting went BETTER for all concerned because of the “PV” (projectile vomiting) incident.
And now that I can actually stand up again (oh my god was this ever the certifiably most disgusting weekend of my life), I can’t shake the two marketing lessons inherent in the story…
First, this major new project (getting started with a financial planner) went about as far from my plans as it could possibly go, yet the direction it DID go in laid the groundwork for an even more successful relationship.
How many of us start projects only to see things go wrong… so very very wrong, and feel incredibly demoralized, ill, and almost unable to continue? Yet precious few of us look at these wrong turns as opportunities. Even fewer LEVERAGE those opportunities.
How many of you have projects you started on January 1st which are already turning out differently than you planned? (Keep this in mind as the month progresses!)
The second marketing inspiration from this odd story is in observing the connection Mary made with her prospect (me) by “stepping out of the role”…
You see we all set up a defined set of rules, expectations, responsibilities and behaviors associated with our business dealings…
I was expecting Mary to intellectually analyze our finances, tell us where to put our money, and help us put more controls in place to monitor budgets, etc. I thought we’d have a perfectly rational conversation as two mature, adult intellectuals solving an intriguing financial puzzle…
Instead I puked and made a friend.
And as I thought of this paradox, I recalled how many patients I could only finally connect with when I “stepped out of role”…
Everything from the 400 pound Hell’s Angel member who told me “I like to hurt people with my head” (as he pulled back his hair and showed me a ridiculous number of scars I rather quickly moved BEHIND my desk)…
To the policeman who couldn’t stop obsessing about “going to hell” (he was very religious) until I told him in all seriousness that I’d be happy to be his doctor in hell if he’d have me…
To the executive who I finally told in exasperation to just go pee on his cigarettes if he really wanted to quit because all this talking wasn’t doing anyone any good…
To the 13 year old boy I earnestly told to do his best to get “D’s” in school because F’s were too easy and A’s were for nerdy losers (he got straight A’s after that)…
And I thought of all the clients who, despite their respect for my intellectual-spreadsheet-ways, light up and remind me of all the crazy stories they read on my blog, ask me if my wife ever let me have a cat (she did!), or ask me for a hug saying “cockroach” at a seminar (I’ll make you search my blog for that one)
And so how can we TEMPLATE these lessons so you can leverage them in your own marketing?…
1) Expect things to go wrong with your plans this year. BIG things. Count on it. Nothing’s easy any more… but the marketers who succeed are the ones who can shift on a dime and see the opportunity in the crises.
2) Ask yourself what the “rules” are in the way you do business. Then ask yourself where it might behoove you to BREAK your own rules with your more important clients.
Fair enough?
OK, so this is the part where if I was totally over my food poisoning I’d say “food for thought”…
But today I think I’d better just say
“Onwards and Upwards”
Dr. G
www.HyperResponsiveMarketingSecrets.com
PS – Big things planned this year. I’m sure some big mistakes too.
PPS – I have one coaching slot open if anyone wants it. (Grab it today if you’re interested please as it’s usually taken within 24 hours when I open it. Press refresh on the page after clicking the link to be sure you’re seeing the most current status)
Weird Psychological Marketing Fact #1
I thought I’d end 2011 with a series of contrarian psychological marketing insights. After all, what good’s being a marketing shrink if you don’t get to talk about it, right?
Seriously though, there are a few things I think marketers casually banty about as if they were psychological fact which really bother me… And there are others which tell only HALF the story.
So let’s start there with…
UNUSUAL PSYCHOLOGICAL MARKETING FACT #1: “Impulse Isn’t Everything”
Impulse isn’t everything.
Yes, it’s true you’ve gotta appeal to the Lizard Brain with greed, lust, envy, jealousy, etc in order to induce action on your offer. (Which is one of the reasons I’m fond of saying “try to appeal to the lizard brain without seeming like a lizard”)
But the other half of the story is, this only produces TRIAL BUT NOT NECESSARILY REPEAT…
Satisfying the lizard brain is only PART of what we need in this world…
As sappy as it sounds, the other half is help mastering our environments, our relationships, our place in society, and life as a whole.
Don’t get me wrong, you won’t get ANYWHERE trying to sell people self-actualization, self-improvement, or simple self-mastery solutions unless you can link them to the lizard brain…
It’s just that lizard brain satisfaction is a necessary but not sufficient condition for REPEAT purchase and customer loyalty.
So it’s not enough to sell luster and shine if you’re selling shampoo…
Or even to sell the emotional end benefit (I feel attractive)…
To really take the market you need to sell the aspirational character… how your product is going to MAKE YOUR PROSPECT INTO THE PERSON THEY WANT TO BE…
Think L’Oreal “Because You’re Worth It”: when a woman buys L’Oreal, she’s not just trying to look sexy, she’s supporting a character trait which translates to self-care across a wide variety of life areas… she’ll also more likely invest in vitamins, a gym membership, life insurance, a spa, etc
Or think Gillette “The Best a Man Can Get”: a guy’s not just buying Gillette razors to get the cleanest shave possible, or to attract a desired mate… he’s partaking of the best the world has to offer alpha males, and this informs WHO he wants to be across market categories
Or Intel “Intel Inside”: when you buy Intel, you’re not just getting a high speed processor, you’re committing (whether you know it or not) to recognizing, developing, and leveraging the value of intelligence across many areas of your life…
Or Kodak “Share the Moments, Share the Life”: when you buy Kodak, you’re not just getting sharp pictures, or even crystallizing memories… you’re committing to family and community as a value you want to demonstrate as a person… it enhances your sense of participation in life with others, and re-affirms your desire to build more of these relationships as part of WHO YOU ARE AS A PERSON…
See what I mean?
These brands engender MASSIVE REPEAT PURCHASE and loyalty because they’ve managed to integrate themselves with the user’s aspirational self image!
What you should be asking yourself now is, WHAT KIND OF PERSON DOES YOUR PROSPECT BECOME when they purchase your product or service? Is your advertising set up to support this message?
Onward and Upward in 2012,
Dr. G
PS – When you join Hyper Responsive Marketing Secrets you affirm yourself as a person who gets enormous leverage for their time and consistently “organizes and executes around priorities” because you know HALF your profits are driven by only ONE in 2,000 visitors. This radical paradigm shift not only transforms your business, but syncs with your commitment to apply the 80/20 rule throughout your life to achieve maximum results with minimum time. Join now
PPS – Keep your eyes glued to your inbox for “weird psychological marketing fact #2″, coming soon.
The 18 Minute Focus Secret
Peter Bregman is the author of “18 Minutes: Find Your Focus, Master Distraction, and Get the Right Things Done”
Friend of Howie Jacobson.
Previously interviewed by Perry Marshall.
Here’s my take on his stuff…
Worth listening to TWICE… enjoy!
Successful European Business Opportunities in the USA
Today’s interview is with Joe Kennedy, owner of the CreaLern company in Germany.
CreaLern promotes and administers an amazingly effective method for helping children with learning difficulties jump several grade levels in record time. More exciting is that this is so well documented, Joe guarantees the RESULTS to his clients (not just satisfaction).
Joe does approximately 1/2 million in Germany with a very nice profit margin, and is looking for a direct response marketer to help expand the company to the English speaking world. (He speaks English fluently himself)
I suggested he let me interview him about the development of his business (definitely a Jay Abraham story!) including as many specifics as he could possibly feel free to share (which he did)…
So that you could benefit from the marketing lessons and he could benefit from the exposure.
I will take NOTHING from whatever deal he happens to strike… this is one from the heart (Joe is really helping children during a critical developmental period… I used to work with kids this age and I know how devastating school difficulties can feel to them… I hope this will be a good match for someone well schooled in my methods)
Enjoy,
G
PS – You can email Joe here
Willpower for Marketers
I was listening to a scientific review of all the psychological research
on willpower today and learned a few reasonably surprising things I
think we marketers should take note of:
1) It’s not a yes/no thing, but more like “gas in the tank”
2) Willpower is 100% proportional to your blood sugar.
If you spike and dip, you not only lose willpower regarding
food, but regarding everything else you’re working on. It
doesn’t matter how determined or “strong willed” you
try to force yourself to be… if you let your blood sugar
dip too low, all bets are off. (This was the biggest and
most consistent finding)
3) Mental work depletes the gas in the tank… especially
the work of making difficult mental decisions.
4) You can improve your ability to retain willpower longer
(your “fuel efficiency” if you will) by working on odd habits.
For example, teaching yourself to always eat with your left
hand (if you’re a righty) improves your willpower for workouts,
financial discipline, food, etc.
5) Choose ONE major willpower goal at a time. For example,
never try to lose weight while you’re also trying to totally
revamp your work or sleep habits. Studies show this actually
results in regression.
6) Thinking of lofty concepts like God, the meaning of life,
and who you want to be in the world seriously increases willpower,
whereas focussing on the mundane seriously decreases it.
(E.g. focus on WHY rather than HOW)
7) Women struggle with willpower during PMS because they
let their blood sugar drop. Their reproductive needs require
an extra 120 calories a day at that time of month, but they
rarely let themselves have it, so they get really moody instead.
(I wish I knew this 20 years ago!)
Name of the book is “Willpower Rediscovered” and the author
is Roy Baumeister. It’s written in the same style as Cialdini’s
“Influence” book (thorough research review followed by summary
of principles discovered)
IMPLICATIONS FOR MARKETERS
a) Decide on your single most important marketing goal and singlemindedly
focus on it to the exclusion of everything else. Of course you can have other
goals in the background, but don’t focus too much energy on them.
(In retrospect, EVERYTHING of significance I’ve ever accomplished
was during a period of single minded focus like this)
b) Find some easy to change, totally unrelated habit to integrate.
Maybe doing 3 pushups as soon as you roll out of bed. Or brushing
your hair before bed. Or brushing your teeth with the opposite hand.
(ANYTHING – as long as it’s ultra easy and signals a consistent change
in controlled behavior)
c) Snack on healthy protein throughout the day. (Raw seeds, lean
animal protein, etc). Don’t let your blood sugar spike or dip… your
BANK ACCOUNT depends on it at least as much as your health does.
d) When you’ve got a long day of particularly difficult problems and
decisions to make, emphasize #3 even more. Otherwise, you’ll wind
up leaning towards overly safe status-quo type of decisions which
don’t produce progress.
e) When you set a single minded marketing goal, take the time to think
about WHY you’re setting it. Don’t be content with “features” like
money, fame, etc. Think about loftier BENEFITS such as THE
PERSON you will be when it is achieved… how will it change your
contribution to the world? Your family? Community?
Food for thought…
G
www.HyperResponsiveMarketingSecrets.com
PS – The only thing I took issue with was their understanding
of the 12 step programs. They reviewed research which showed
they were equally effective to all other forms of treatment, and
concluded that means they should be taken seriously. But they
neglected to mention that NO treatment for addiction works
much better than doing NOTHING at all, and some make
the problem worse.
Proof Hiding Disease
Do you or a loved one suffer from Proof Hiding Disease?
Proof Hiding Disease (PHD) is a tragic illness which spreads from marketer to marketer faster than a stud rooster in a chicken coup…
You know what I mean…
PHD is that disease which makes you say “I think I’ll bury my accomplishments on my About page, because that’s where nice, proper people with good breeding put them. We can’t be bothering the prospect with good reasons they should trust me… it’s just not polite”
(As opposed to plastering it all over the page and near every claim… like I do on www.HyperResponsiveMarketingSecrets.com for example )
PHD is that creepy feeling that makes you forget to screenshot your Facebook or Twitter account when someone says something cool about you or your product…
It’s that sick feeling in your gut which prevents you from organizing your publicity mentions…
Or talking about your successes…
Or implementing a testimonial gathering system…
Or shooting that product demonstration…
Or holding a free seminar just so you can get people raving about your product or service ON VIDEO.
Yes, Proof Hiding Disease is very real indeed, and it’s costing our economy millions.
Go. YES YOU. Right now!…
Dig through your site for hidden proof and move it front and center to back up your claims. It’s probably the #1 thing you can do to bump your conversion this month…
And if you’re like most marketers I’ve met, I’ll bet my left testicle you’ve got some powerful proof, sitting buried somewhere polite people wouldn’t think to look.
Come back here and tell me what you did OK?
Dr. G
PS – One of the things which drove my success more than any other was gathering any and all proof about ME over the years, even if it seemed irrelevant and I had NO idea how I was going to use it.
For example, I did a lot of surveys back in the late 80s and early 90s about weird and diverse topics like “Who calls 900#s?”, “Are fat people happier?”, “Do smokers have trouble eating cheese?”, “what’s your money personality?”, etc. Whenever I’d get any press (sometimes they were feature stories, but lots of times they were just one liners), I’d xerox it for my files and add “his work has been covered in ____” to my CV. Before I knew it I looked like a giant, and I could say so on any project I was working on. And people stopped asking for references on the large projects… all because I got me cured of that pesky proof hiding disease.
GO! YOU! Now! :-)
America Rising – 10 Years Later
Most of you know Sharon and I lived just outside NYC on 9/11. Today, I thought it appropriate to share an article we published in the aftermath. (It was also picked up by Enterpreneur magazine online )
All of your thoughts most welcome…
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On Tuesday September 11th, we were running a moderator training program at our offices in Syosset, a suburb of New York City. People were collecting for breakfast before the second day of the workshop began. One of the managers walked in with an incredulous look on her face. “Did you hear? A plane just collided with the World Trade Center!” Shortly after, our VP’s husband called to say that he saw the crash happen from his Garden City office window. As he was on the phone, describing this incredible incident, the second plane exploded through the next tower before his eyes. You remember the sight. We’ve all seen the shocking replay over and over on TV.
Time stopped. Or did it just go into slow motion? Then the Pentagon news. Or was it the crumbling of the icons of our financial world? Can’t remember. Events blurred. And, then the crash in Pennsylvania. TERRORISTS HAVE ATTACKED AMERICA!! First thoughts, who do we know that works downtown? Oh my god, we sent Christine into the city! Michele’s brother in law works there. We hungered for information. Turned on the radio, but could only get a local college station that kept announcing closing of classes interspersed with a little more global information about the fear-provoking , can’t really be possible string of tragedies.
The class of 10 people sat stiffly riveted in their seats, stunned looking to me for leadership. One woman kept asking me, “What’s the best thing to do in this circumstance? You’re a psychologist. What should we do? There must be something we should be doing now, isn’t there?” The rest of the office attacked the phone lines attempting to contact family and friends to reassure themselves of their loved one’s safety. People expressed feelings of helplessness, vulnerability, uncertainty. How were people in the class going to get back home? California, Seattle, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Manhattan. Long Island was trapped with all roads closed to the city. There were two more days of training. Do we go ahead? And if we could, should we? How callous would that be!
No one felt capable of attending to work. We officially closed the office. The workshop attendees congregated in my home to sit glued in front of the big screen TV and watch the unfolding of the psychotic display of hate. The word “surreal” was mentioned over and over. We had lunch delivered to the house instead of the office. Some people spoke, most watched and listened in silence. What were they thinking? Were they thinking? What were they feeling? Were they feeling? Could they articulate their feelings? One woman nervously rambled on and on about the importance of getting home. In the course of an hour, everything had changed forever.
Acts of terrorism throw people off balance. In addition to having to cope with the grief and shock of sudden loss, this acute stress and trauma leave people feeling helpless and fearful. Seemingly random acts of violence targeted at civilians strip the victim society of a sense of control and security. It doesn’t make sense. Nothing will ever be the same. Who can we trust? How will we ever get back on an airplane? How were we so lucky to survive, when we could have been at a meeting in one of those structures? A woman who worked in the suite next door was having lunch at Windows on the World. A man down the hall was on flight 11.
The initial reaction: Shock
People first respond to drastic change with shock. They say things like “I can’t believe this is happening” or “I don’t believe it.”
Shock serves a protective function, numbing us to pain and fear. Until the disaster, all was well. People knew what was expected of them and they knew how to react. How to get to work. How long it would take? How to make a phone call or make a plane reservation. They had, most importantly, a sense of predictability and control.
When catastrophe strikes, suddenly everything once counted on is called into question. Shock has an evolutionary biological foundation. When threatened, we either fight or run away. This reaction served a protective function when primitive man faced life-threatening situations. But fighting or fleeing our threats are not options in the workplace. Instead, we become immobilized. We stop what we are doing and don’t attend to and retain information.
Who Is Affected?
After an attack of the magnitude of September 11th events, we all feel the impact. People who have experienced or witnessed a terrorist attack including viewing the blow by blow account on the media coverage may go into a state of acute stress reaction. According to the literature on stress responses, we become vulnerable to:
- Recurring thoughts of the incident
- Becoming afraid of everything, not leaving the house, or isolating yourself
- Stopping usual functioning, no longer maintaining daily routines
- Survivor guilt — “Why did I survive? I should have done something more.”
- Tremendous sense of loss
- Reluctance to express your feelings, losing a sense of control over your life
- Impaired concentration, confusion, disorientation, difficulty making decisions, short attention spans, forgetfulness, hypervigilance, free floating anxiety, self blame, etc. etc.
Coping with the Trauma
First and foremost we all need to remind ourselves that strange feelings and reactions are a normal response to an abnormal situation. In the aftermath of this type of tragedy, our jobs are a godsend. The workplace lends itself to recovery and the beginning of the healing process in a number of ways.
People need routine, a return to normalcy. So when possible, try to return to typical patterns as you’ve done them before. Structure time and keep busy.
Everyone in the work environment will be feeling stressed. Check in with each other to see how everyone is doing. Take some time to talk to clients, co-workers and employees about personal experiences of the disaster. Often people need to rehash the story to diffuse feelings. In the verbalization of feelings, they become more manageable and less threatening. Verbalizing helps people regain a sense of control.
Try to avoid getting immersed in media coverage. Research shows that repeated viewing of such disturbing events can exacerbate the effects of trauma.
Encourage people to try to eat regular and balanced meals and get plenty of rest even if when they don’t feel like it. Emotional strength is contingent on physical strength.
For those suffering more extreme losses and resultant stress symptoms, avoid telling them “you’re lucky, it could have been worse.” Instead, say you’re sorry that such an event happened and you want to understand and assist them.
Remind people that our American institutions of democracy are still in place and our government is intact. We’re a resilient society that has a long history of bouncing back from adversity. Consider company wide sponsorship of relief efforts to build morale.
Remember times when you as a company have overcome adversity in the past. Try to remember what you did that helped you overcome the fear and helplessness in that situation.
Think positively. Realize that things will get better. Be realistic about the time it takes to feel better.
If a staff member is having trouble coping with the terrorist attacks, consider seeking help from a psychologist or other mental health professional. There are many ways to feel traumatized by terrorist incidents. Psychologists and other licensed mental health professionals are trained to help people cope and take positive steps toward managing their feelings and behaviors
Recognize that the nature of terrorist attacks creates fear and uncertainty about the future. Continue to do the things in your life that you enjoy. Try to avoid preoccupation with the things you cannot control to the extent that they prevent you from living your normal life. Remember the Serenity Prayer: God grant me the serenity to accept the things I can’t change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.
The best revenge is a good life.
Set achievable stepwise, controllable goals for your company to succeed. Terrorists are bullies who want to undermine the victims’ sense of self esteem, to cause us to feel fear, insecurity and guilt. We can defeat them by recommitting to our American values and work ethic, by reminding ourselves of our individuality and unique talents.. A succession of little successes are empowering, rebuilding self respect and self confidence for the individual and the company.
