“We partnered with Restaurant.com to offer companies an enhanced dining incentive for their marketing campaigns. By working with Restaurant.com we instantly bring incredible value-added marketing solutions to companies that are trying to reconnect with their clients, prospects and employees,” said Adam Alfia, the Managing Director behind WOW! Personal Assistance. “We know that people love to eat out. Dining out for less is even better. Recipients of the cards can even have our personal assistants make the reservation for them and get a true VIP experience.”

The restaurant gift certificate incentive is the first of its kind for WOW!, which provides branded personal assistance for clients like American Airlines, Anheuser Busch, Ford, Nokia and many others. The WOW! program is the promotional product division of Maestro Personal Assistance which provides branded programs for a variety of industries, including automotive, apartment communities, banks, and real estate.

“Maestro is becoming a live ‘Google on the go’ where we see national trends reflected in what people ask,” Alfia remarks when asked what types of calls their agents answer. “We save people time and money by providing callers a wide range of live assistance. Since restaurant recommendations and reservations are one of our most popular requests, it makes perfect sense to integrate Restaurant.com. A $25 gift certificate and thousands of restaurant choices brings real dollar value benefit to the entire program. And since our service is always branded in our clients’ names, callers never even know that it’s Maestro orchestrating the magic.”

For more information on the WOW! promotional products program, please visit http://www.woweveryone.com.

Nowadays, every supplier has a catalog filled with thousands of products; some even offer distributors branded web sites, but cookie cutter templates don’t grab attention. The traditional approaches have turned brilliant marketing consultants into an army of order takers. In a market bombarded by the stagnation of multiple variations of the same products, what can distributors do to stand out from copycats?

Introducing WOW! Powered by Maestro. Not only does our product stand head and shoulders above the rest, but our sales and marketing tools are a refreshing change to the monotony of the industry. We call it the WOW! Preferred Distributor Program (WPDP), and its advantages are broken down into two parts:

• Demonstration - All distributors immediately receive a demo account to our service. This sales tool is available electronically whenever they need it, 24 hours a day. It enables them to call our live, branded personal assistants and perform a live demonstration on the spot, branded in their client’s name. No catalogs, no ordering of samples, no shipping, no charges - just a phone call.

• Control - We also offer complimentary access to the WPDP online control panel, a full-fledged marketing vehicle and point of centralization for all of our distributor’s sales tasks.

These two elements allow distributors to:

• Change their demo account greeting and closing to match their client
• Offer an instantly accessible trial account to any client
• Monitor trial account usage
• Manage trial accounts (making notes, setting reminders, etc.)
• Receive text and/or e-mail notifications when trial accounts are accessed
• Send text and/or e-mail notifications to trial accounts
• Request client-specific virtual proofs, upload logos, or suggest new design elements
• Request custom presentation sheets with details about the service
• Set up their branded distributor web site
• Send out branded marketing e-mails that allow the recipient to sign up for a trial account
• Monitor their sales representatives and WOW! related activities
• Access downloadable marketing tools like PowerPoint presentations, the virtual WOW! Catalog, or any other industry specific marketing materials

Our sales and marketing tools equip our preferred distributors with everything they need to successfully market the WOW program and truly differentiate themselves from competitors - the most important part of any modern promotion program.

But as most entrepreneurs can probably testify, innovation begins with research — you’re a student before you’re the teacher.

In my studies, I’ve noticed two recurring trends in the wake of guideline changes by the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) organization: concern for ethics and expenses. It is important to patrons of the health industry to know that new medicine is being marketed in an honest and educational manner.

With the era of excess concluded, how can pharmaceutical companies continue to ensure brand penetration?

According to this study, the vast majority of sales budgets are poured into expensive, person-to-person campaigns through medical sales representatives. This personal touch leaves a lasting impression, by building a relationship and embedding trust, but with many instruments of the trade now disallowed, there is room on the belts of sales representatives for new tools.

The WOW PhRMA Card is just that tool. It represents much more than a Q&A hotline; it represents trust and dependability, channeled through our simple and transparent branding process, from beginning to end. It is an on-demand knowledge base powered by live information experts; it’s about people helping people.

And at Maestro, that’s our specialty. Our prescription could present an interesting cure for the ailments of pharmaceutical promotion companies, but with the landscape now completely rearranged, the task of pioneering creative ideas is left on the shoulders of the pharmaceutical marketing gurus.

When coupled with our reliable personal assistance service, it’s no surprise that recipients are amazed with how quickly we field any question about any topic. Without a doubt, Maestro’s level of service is unmatched. We stand out in the minds of our clients in every moment of their daily lives.

Proof of this is seen in the types of needs we fulfill every day here at Maestro; our highly skilled assistants serve some pretty unique calls! On May 18, 2009, one of our client’s had the misfortune of being pulled over by a police officer on the highway. Before dialing anyone else, he trusted us alone with the responsibility of contacting his family (and attorney) if the situation soured. He knew his personal assistant would always be available, 24 hours a day, 7 days out of every week, ready to cater to his needs.

Relationships that build trust and brand loyalty are what companies strive for in today’s turbulent economy. Maestro accomplishes this through our transparent branding process, and in doing so, the assistance and security we provide is immediately associated with our client’s brand. When you gift our service to prospects or employees, they are exposed to your brand and your brand alone.

You take the credit - let Maestro orchestrate the magic.

For years promotional products catering to the pharmaceutical industry have consisted of an endless gauntlet of branded pens, mugs, gizmos, and gadgetry to reach health practitioners and patients. Those days are no more; last year, with one fell swoop, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) organization issued new guidelines and cut out a large segment of the promotional products industry.

What does the PhRMA want out of their promotional items instead? That they be:

• Educational
• Less than $100 in value

With the rules now changed, the original strategies are no longer allowed — an entire industry must retool, and while many promotional products companies catering specifically to the pharmaceutical industry scramble to get on their feet, Maestro Personal Assistants is poised to launch our inimitable, open solution that can be adapted to virtually any industry.

As a personal assistance service, Maestro specializes in providing phone based, on-demand solutions to life’s most common problems, no matter how big or how small — if the internet could talk, Maestro is how it would sound. By taking this flexibility and matching it with wholly customizable branding, our service represents an ideal solution to the problems of the struggling pharmaceuticals promotion business.

The branding process begins with our WOW Card promotional product, which can be tailored to any desire, with text and designs of your choice, for easy access in your client’s wallet. This customization allows pharmaceutical companies to provide useful, educational benefits in addition to memorable, unique brand visibility; the client is exposed to your brand from start to finish, even while they’re on the phone.

The versatility doesn’t stop there — with customizable content on every WOW Card, there is no limit to the creative potential. Pharmaceutical companies can help promote health education and usefulness in the daily lives of their clients in a variety of ways! Asthmatic and need a weather report? Out of town and need details about a prescription? If a question can be thought, Maestro can answer it.

Maestro’s approach matches the convenience of a reliable, telephone based concierge service with the adaptability of open-infrastructure technologies being pioneered around the world.

We all want to promise the world to our client, but unfortunately very few of us actually reach that lofty goal of consistently exceeding clients’ quality expectations. As the average American becomes more and more skillful in finding information online, the concierge industry is finding itself in challenging, yet exciting, times.

Impressing a client with memorable concierge and personal assistance service now means getting the information they need and packaging it in a way they couldn’t do themselves. But how does one do that?

In our 5+ years of experience in the concierge industry, we have observed that the most fundamental building block of exceeding the client’s quality expectations is attention to detail. This concept of attention to detail practically has to become the service provider’s obsession and must be baked in from the beginning: from finding the right concierge phone reps to quality assurance, to the executive team’s long-term planning. Attention to detail can mean anything from giving alternate driving directions if a traffic accident is detected when helping a lost client find their way, to preventing use of dangling prepositions in email correspondence with the client.

The other pillar of exceeding customer service quality in concierge services is giving the client what they need, not only what they want. Because of the open-ended nature of concierge service, many times the customer is not quite sure exactly what they are looking for. They may be searching for a reputable auto-shop (to avoid getting ripped-off) to replace their tires but not realize (until we point out to them) that replacing tires is much less expensive at a national tire outlet (like NTB). Or if the client needs dinner reservations for their wedding anniversary and we suggest pre-ordering chilled champagne in a bucket of ice to be ready at the table when they arrive. It’s up to the concierge representative to think ahead and fill in the gaps that the client doesn’t yet know exist.

If these two ideas can be implemented successfully, exceeding your concierge clients’ quality expectations is almost guaranteed.