Lynn Lilly Speaks in Entrepreneurship Classes
Lynn Lilly, of The Lilly Group, shared her experiences as an entrepreneur with Georgia Southern University business students on Tuesday. Entrepreneurial Fellow of the Center of Entrepreneurial Learning and Leadership Jim Williams’ hosted Lilly as she strived to help students learn some tips to brand a business and how to be successful. Williams chose Lilly to speak based on her years of experience with marketing, advertising, public relationships and all different types of writing.
Lilly started the Lilly Group, an advertising and marketing communications consultancy, back in 2001 after acquiring years of experience as one of the youngest owners and the youngest vice presidents of an $85 million marketing and communications company. She has worked on and produced communications for many major companies including OfficeMax, Dirt Devil, Jo-Ann Fabrics, PURELL, General Electric Lighting and many more. Lilly prides herself in continually working hard “to develop communications concepts that get noticed and get results.”
Lilly began her presentation with the Liggett-Stashower Communication Strategy Model, an eight-page document she helped construct years ago as a strategic planning tool. The agency she worked for put this document together to help conduct their business. “Every agency has its own way of pitching a business,” Lilly said. “This was our process.”
The strategy is a step-by-step method of planning developed from the concept of marketing objectives. By asking a series of questions and clearly defining the market of a product, the probability of success increases. According to Lilly, understanding the market is “necessary to evaluate the potential for successfully marketing your product.”
Lilly also made a point to highlight the importance of demographics. “The way you talk to each group will make a difference,” she said. She explained different things matter to different people and therefore, the way to approach separate audiences will give a company different results.
Next, Lilly moved on to discuss how to brand a business. She reminded the students, “it’s not about you, it’s about the customers.” A believer in brainstorming, Lilly advised the students to start with all kinds of ideas. After some consideration, the bad ideas should be taken away and the best ideas will shine through. “Everything you do should be perfect,” said Lilly. “You must make sure of this.”
Intrigued by Lilly, the students proceeded to ask her several questions after her presentation. Some students even waited after class to speak directly to her. It was obvious that Lilly enjoyed the students’ dialogue.
At Georgia Southern, Lilly is an Entrepreneurial Fellow of the Center for Entrepreneurial Learning and Leadership; a member of the Advisory Board to Students In Free Enterprise-SIFE; and a member of the Community Advisory Board of the Department of Writing and Linguistics.
Posted in Guest Speakers, Teaching and Learning