Is Your Company A Member Of The Community?
One particularly hot south Texas day, I was making a routine sales call to a family Mexican restaurant. Angela, with whom I had an appointment, is a real "hands on" lady. She can't sit still in her restaurant and let others do all the work. Therefore, it's always a bit of a wait to talk to her, but this place has great iced tea, so I didn't mind the wait. I finally got some of her time, where she sat down, covered in flour as usual. I have a strong amount of respect for Angela. She's such a strong entrepreneur, and she makes a great glass of iced tea. I really wanted to provide her with specifically the right kind of marketing that she was looking for. I asked her if there was anything she had in mind for her marketing efforts. She barely hesitated, and said, "I want to be common knowledge that my restaurant is a member of this community!" Apparently, most of her restaurant's business was from local truckers passing by. This Mexican restaurant is in a small town, bordering the very big town of San Antonio. Angela was happy with the number of customers from San Antonio who were passing by on mostly work related missions. But she was a little disappointed that there were only a small handful of "locals" stopping in. Angela presented me with a unique problem. This was the first time I had ever heard this particular request. My mind started racing, as I took sips of my iced tea to buy me some time. I thought about the local periodicals, which I'd already knew she advertised in and, being in the promotional product advertising sales business, of course I tried hard to think of something, anything I had available that met her needs. Luckily for me, Angela had to get up and spend about 10 or 15 minutes working out something, and speaking in Spanish to the cook. Okay, this is good. It gives me time to think of something. I wish I could describe some divine-like epiphany, and the hallelujah chorus playing in the background, but that's not what happened. I did have a new idea that I was quite proud of, but that's validated only if Angela liked it well enough to buy into it. Since football season is just around the corner for high schools all over the country, my idea was for Angela to buy some foam hands holding up the "number 1" sign, fairly common at sporting events. They would support the local high school, with big bold letters saying "GO BULLDOGS" on it, and in much smaller print below it, "brought to you by," and the restaurant name. Schools don't usually trademark their logos, mascots, or name, so there's no additional cost. Always a good thing when you want to make a sale. I also suggested that they be distributed in two different ways. One, sold at cost ($1.25 each) when your ticket is over 20 dollars. The second way was to sell them for $2.50 each, no purchase necessary. Angela loved the idea, because she saw it for what it was. Free advertising! Promotional product advertising focused specifically at the market where she aims. By supporting the local high school football team, she's making the statement that she is in fact a supportive member of the local community. She gets a few thousand people seeing her ad every Friday for the next few months, and she gets "the locals" to come in and try her food. I just hope this doesn't mean I have to wait too long in my stops for iced tea. "My only bummer," Angela revealed, "is that I have to wait the month or so before football season starts!" Is your business viewed by "the locals" as a member of the community? It will be of value to you, to reflect on this, and pay strict attention to your customers. My idea paid off quite well for Angela. Once people in the area tasted her food, she was just as competitive in the local market as she was with passers by. Article by Kirk Otto of http://www.MakeYourCompanyVisible.com - a premiere source for promotional product advertising.
Related News
|
 |
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
A Questionnaire for Businesses
As best you can, answer the following twenty-five questions. There's no scoring. But
you'll know whether you should be satisfied with your answers, or not. If you aren't,
perhaps you have some work to do.
Put Your Marketing To The So What? Test
Want to get Better at your Marketing today?
Let Your Survey Write Your Business Plan
Most entrepreneurs first write their business plan and then
develop their services or products. This causes them to
generate and fulfill a marketing plan that requires them to
swim upstream using the backstroke. To save the stress,
consider placing the business plan on hold until first
completing a few customer surveys. Okay, some of you are
saying, "Catherine, how can you do a survey before you know
who your market is?" Yes, this is one challenging double
edge sword, that is, if you're mindset is set there.
Top 10 Ways to Create and Manage Opportunity
Most of us are used to the concepts of risk management or time management. Many of the same principles can be applied to creating and responding to opportunities. Instead of thinking of opportunities as just "coming along", you can actually increase the number of opportunities available to you, and there are specific principles you can use to assess whether a "possibility" has real "probability" and "profitability" for you. In times of rapid change, increasing the number of options you have available, and a system for prioritizing and responding to possibilities are critical business functions.
The Biggest Problem With Your Marketing Is...?
What is the biggest problem most marketers have? Who knows. We don't, and they certainly don't either. That is exactly the problem. Most marketers don't know whether or not their campaigns are working because they don't know how to track the results.
10 Tips to Grow Your Business Plain & Simple
"Try not to become a man of success but rather to become a man of value." Albert Einstein
People Pleasing Postcards
Why are more businesses turning to full-color postcards as a key form of promotion? The biggest reason is the simplest: You don't have to open a postcard. It won't get lumped in with all the direct mail envelopes that people toss without opening.
The Five Most Common Joint Venture Marketing Mistakes To Avoid
Joint Venture marketing has become a highly popular way for small businesses to maximize their profits. When two or more businesses combine their resources synergistically, it creates greater marketing impact and bigger profits than either can have alone.
What to be Successful? Marketing Makes the Difference
When you hear the word "marketing" what comes to mind? More business or wasted money? If your experience with marketing or advertising has been less than positive your cynicism may be well founded. Yet, have you ever noticed a competitor with a mediocre product and a healthy business? The difference is often marketing.
Multicultural Marketing ? Taking Care of Business At Hand
Multicultural marketing mirrors the changed face of America and is getting the attention of small-business and other organizations looking for an edge in diverse ethnic markets. "Gone are the days when businesses succeed with a 'one size fits all' approach to marketing. It's a 'mass market' no longer," insists Rhonda Albey, a diversity consultant with Allen Associates in Los Angeles, "The multicultural markets are where the opportunities are, and successful entrepreneurs are quickly learning how to get there."
A Creative RIOT
Relevant, original and impactful: that's what my friend Creative Director Jim Mountjoy says that effective creative must be. With apologies to Jim, I have my own acronym because I think ROI is only 75 percent of the way there. Effective creative is a RIOT: relevant, impactful, original and true.
How to Convey Trustworthiness in Direct Mail Marketing Sales Letter
A person or business that might buy from you is called a prospect. But they might just as accurately be called a skeptic. We live in the age of the spam filter. And call-display. We live in what fellow-copywriter Herschell Gordon Lewis calls, "The Age of Skepticism."
Corporate Gift Tips To Wow Clients & Associates
1) Know the company and their culture. Are they trendy and artistic or conservative and elegant? Your gift giving should reflect this. Also, global customs vary significantly. Ensure you understand the proper gift etiquette to avoid offending overseas clients.
Small Business Pricing Strategies
Think the best way to get more customers is to have the lowest prices in town? Think again. Think the best way to create a successful business is to try to appeal to everyone? Wrong again.
Successful Marketing Through Seminars
One of the best ways for potential clients to find out about you and your company is through public speaking. Free seminars attract potential clients. It is a chance for them to get information straight from you. You are the best marketing tool for your business. Speaking to groups is nothing more than a large conversation. It is powerful and efficient marketing.
Web Site Marketing Strategy: 8 Ways To Increase The Perceived Value Of Your Freebies
It is a well known web site marketing strategy: To attract
new customers and traffic, give out something for free:
e-zine, ebooks, software, services etc.
Small Business Marketing Tip - Focus on a Niche or Target Market
I think selling and marketing today often feels a bit like talking to a brick wall and that in interesting metaphor to help grasp the importance of niche marketing especially when it comes to small business marketing. Imagine for a moment that you are attacking that brick wall with a hammer, randomly hitting it everywhere. What would be the effect? Practically no effect at all. You might knock off a few chips but come back a day or so later, there will be no evidence you were even there.
Service Marketing - A Relationship Building Approach
Can we imagine a place in the world today without a marketing activity. It looks remote. When we all move from one place to the other, we need an interactive or a Communicative Response System (CRS) to facilitate a marketing activity and enable the market to respond. When this Communicative Response System (CRS) eventually reaches a market, there are buyers and sellers waiting to respond.
Creative Marketing: Just Your Style
You've enlisted some of the traditional marketing
methods to sell your services: you received some
publicity in your local paper; your website is up and
running; and you're listed in the Yellow Pages. So
why isn't the phone ringing off the hook? Maybe
you're marketing strategies need to get more creative!
13 Lessons in Marketing, Super Bowl Style
Each year, the Super Bowl provides marketers opportunity to study and learn from the games' advertisers, players, and coordinators. Super Bowl XXXVI (February, 2002) was no exception. Foremost, of course, was The Game's appropriately patriotic theme. America's mettle and proud heritage were showcased to the world through this year's red, white, and blue logo; music selection by the performers; and depictions of historic U.S. icons. The Game further supported U.S. patriotism through the presence of the armed services, police department, and fire department at the game as well as interviews with troops in Afghanistan. Finally, as if by design, the unlikely Patriots won the championship.
|
