Archive for the ‘Inbound Marketing’ Category

Use QR Codes to Give Away Free Music with Your Wine

Thursday, July 14th, 2011

One of our clients is a national Smooth Jazz band. They have a new album coming out soon and we are working on ways to get their music into the ears of more people. We are working through the planning phase of our process whereby we set our goals and determine what marketing strategies and tactics will work best to accomplish those goals. With the goal of building more awareness for our client’s music we are thinking that a great strategy for accomplishing this would be to giveaway some of the tunes that aren’t going make the album. Many times bands create much more music than what gets released. A lot of the music that goes unreleased is still good music. Bands need to take advantage of this as we have seen musicians from many genres use this same strategy successfully. We actually wrote about Lil’ Wayne’s meteoric rise to superstardom through the use of this strategy. Lil’ Wayne used the mixtape circuit to grow his fanbase. So, now that our goals are set and our strategy is in place it’s time to develop our marketing tactics.

Jazz Band Partners with Local Winery to Serve Customers Smooth Jazz Music with their Wine

In order to get the free music into the ears of our client’s target audience we came up with the idea of partnering with a winery and using QR codes as a way for wine customers to download our client’s music. Drinking wine and some smooth jazz go great together. It doesn’t matter if you’re 65 or 25, if you’re buying wine then chances are you will enjoy a great smooth jazz tune. The band can find a local or national winery to partner with and then setup the QR code campaign.

Step 1: Partner with a Winery

We have to find the right partner for our client. You want to find a winery or wine brand that targets the same audience as your band. The winery will benefit from increased marketing exposure and they are able to offer their customers added value with their purchase for no added costs. Once you find a great partner and pitch them on the idea, the next step is to setup the QR code campaign.

QR Code Wine

Image Courtesy of Cellar Key

Step 2: Setup the QR code

Setup the QR code so that when a customer scans the QR code with their smart phone that they are either able to download the music file OR input their email address so that the file can be sent to them. The way you set it up really depends on what technologies you want to use. Each way has pros and cons, but the goal of getting the band’s music into the ears of new listeners is accomplished. You also have to determine how the QR codes will be printed and adhered to the wine bottle. A great way to do it is through creating a tag around the bottle neck. See the image to the right for a visual representation. You will incur some costs here, but they can be as small or large as you want (depending on how you want to adhere the QR code and how many bottles you’ll be putting it on).

Step 3: Promote the QR Code Campaign

The only thing left to do is promote the campaign. Use all of your social media channels and definitely take pictures and shoot video. Ask the winery to do some promotion as well. The campaign might even be newsworthy with the local news if you’re partnering with a local winery. Be sure to track how many QR codes were scanned so that you can track results.

We’ll see if our client goes for it. What are your thoughts? If you were the client, would you move forward with partnering with a local winery and use QR codes to allow new listeners to download your music for free? Leave your comments below.

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Add a QR Code to Your Business Card

Thursday, June 23rd, 2011

Just the other day I was in a meeting with a client, an app developer, and we got on the subject of attending conventions. My client looked at me and made the comment, “do you know that even at a ‘geeky tech event’ like a Developer’s convention, EVERYONE still hands out business cards…” He was in awe and after I thought about it more, I too was in awe. You would think tech dudes would use the Bump app to exchange contact information. It seems so much easier. Unfortunately, or fortunately (if you have thousands of business cards already printed out), people still use business cards to exchange information. A few years ago we wrote an article about adding social media links to your business cards as a way to drive more people to join your online community. Now, through QR codes, business owners can further optimize their business cards by putting a custom QR code on your cards.

QR codes are quickly catching on with businesses looking to take advantage of new technology to further their marketing effectiveness. Creating a marketing campaign with QR codes can be extremely beneficial when implemented correctly. QR Codes allow you to provide a customer or prospect with a quick marketing message, display educational information, or even link them to your website or social media profiles. So, how do you get a QR code in front of your target audience? Well…

QR Code Business CardPrint the QR code on your business card… One thing to remember when planning to add a QR code to your business card is that if you print out a lot of them, you probably won’t go through them right away. This means your message must be a long-term message. If you are trying to promote an upcoming event, you may want to use a different marketing tactic. Whereby if you simply want to drive your new network to your website or blog, a QR code on your business card will work well. When implementing any new marketing campaign it’s critical to think through all of these little details ahead of time. Some business owners, strapped for time, simply read about the latest marketing idea and jump to implement it. It’s especially important to think through marketing campaigns that have costs involved like printing new business cards. Once you know what you want to accomplish by adding a QR code to your business card you can then go ahead and have them printed so that you can begin passing them out.

Adding a QR code to your business card can be an extremely worthwhile marketing initiative for your small business. One of the benefits to adding a QR code to your business card is that more people will remember you because of the uniqueness of your business card, which may lead to a higher percentage of those folks who actually take action to call you or scan your QR code to participate in your marketing campaign. A negative at this time is that not everyone knows what QR codes are and even fewer folks have a QR code scanner app on their phone. QR code usage is still in its infancy, but the trend is firmly in place and in a year or so we will be talking about QR codes the same way we now talk about Twitter, another online tool that not everyone was convinced about at first.

The next time you’re ready to print new business cards, be sure to consider adding a QR code to them.

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Create Your Own Connect with Us Cards

Monday, June 7th, 2010

Are you still looking for effective ways to promote your online presence? It’s a good idea to always be looking for new, and creative, ways to drive traffic to your online assets. It’s hard for people to connect with you online when they have no idea that you’re using the Internet to promote your business. Almost every interaction with a customer, or prospect, provides an opportunity to promote your online presence. It doesn’t matter if you’re using Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare YouTube, a Blog, or any other online social tool, be sure to take the opportunity to drive traffic to your online tools as often as possible. In today’s post, we are going to explain the art of the “Connect with Us” Card – a simple tool that packs a big punch when it comes to driving traffic to your online tools.

The Connect with Us Card is a simple idea that was sparked through an email conversation with a Catalyst client, the local Central Bucks Family YMCA of Doylestown. The Marketing Director at the Y was explaining that a Senior Membership Director was heading out into the local Doylestown community to hand out 2-week membership passes to employees of local Doylestown businesses. During the conversation, we realized that we had missed an opportunity to promote our online presence. We wanted to print our Twitter & Facebook URLs on the 2-week membership passes. From there, the idea of the Connect with Us Card was born. Instead of printing the URLs on the 2-week membership passes, and any other subsequent print materials that we wanted to promote on, the YMCA created the Connect with Us Card.

The concept for the Connect with Us Card is simple. It’s like a business card for the organization’s online presence. On the front of the card is the Central Bucks Family YMCA logo, the logos of each of the online tools that they use to connect, and build relationships with, their members and the surrounding community, as well as, their physical street address. On the back of the card are simply the links to each of their online tools. The card is clean, and to the point, connect with Central Bucks Family YMCA online.

FRONT

Promote my social media sites

BACK

Promote my social media sites

As you can see from the images above, it’s critical that you create custom URLs for each online tool that you use. Having a custom URL that isn’t very long provides you with much flexibility when creating promotional tools like Connect with Us cards. A few months back we wrote about the importance of having a custom Facebook URL for your Facebook business page, and this is a perfect example of why it’s important to have that custom URL. Can you imagine if you wanted to create a Connect with Us Card with that ugly URL string that all Facebook Business pages have before you customize your URL? The card would have to be 6 inches long just to contain the URL.

If you need to shorten your URL for Facebook and don’t have 25 Likes yet, then you can use URL shortening tools like bit.ly, and even customize your URLs. Using URL shorteners may even be the best bet for your Connect with Us Cards, as you can create customize short URLs for each online tool, which you can then track via the Analytics section of bit.ly – Just be sure not to use those same URLs in other tactics, as that will taint your data. If you create customized URLs for only the Connect with Us Card, you’ll be able to tell how much traffic the cards are driving to each of your online tools, simply by checking the Clicks for each link.

Connect with Us cards can be given out at events, during trade shows, with receipts at your store, with deliveries, etc. If you have been trying to answer the question, how do I promote my online tools, then Connect with Us Cards are a great answer to your question. Have you been using something similar? How has it been working for you?

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Inbound Marketing with Sunbelt Granola

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010

Sunbelt Granola gets it. They are doing a lot of things right when it comes to Inbound Marketing. Sunbelt Granola is one of food manufacturer, McKee Foods’, brands. Whoever is charge of Marketing for McKee Foods Sunbelt Granola brand is doing a great job. I have to say, my guy Jimmy Matorin from Smartketing, and I have been talking for months about some major food manufacturers who just seem oblivious to Inbound Marketing, Mobile Marketing, and other technology-based ways to connect, and communicate with their customers. It’s refreshing to see Sunbelt Granola making Inbound Marketing work hard for their brand.

Sunbelt Granola produces whole grain, preservative free granola bars. They have identified their target audience as young, active kids and tweens. I’m assuming that part of Sunbelt Granola’s strategy is to connect with their target audience, build relationships with those folks, and ultimately sell more granola bars. In order to achieve their goals, Sunbelt Granola has launched a well thought out Inbound Marketing campaign. In this post, we’ll go through the four most critical steps that Sunbelt Granola took in order to reach, and connect with, their customers.

Identify a Target Audience

Sunbelt Granola claims that their granola bars provide customers with some quick energy. Granola bars are viewed as a quick and healthy snack. Many people enjoy granola bars, but Sunbelt Granola decided to focus on the youth market. I’m sure they’ve done a lot of market research and made the conscious decision that this market had the most potential for them. Now that they know what their customer looks like, it’s time to start the Campaign Development progress.

Partner with a Community Organization

Food Manufacturer Content MarketingSunbelt Granola decided to partner with US Youth Soccer. I’m sure they figure that many of our youth play soccer – it’s a popular sport across the entire country (unlike, say, ice hockey, which is popular only in certain subsets across the US). Partnering with a community organization like US Youth Soccer provides a number of benefits to Sunbelt Granola. With that said, it’s up to Sunbelt Granola to develop a campaign around this new partnership.

If you want to partner with a community organization or a non-profit, be sure to do your due dilligence before deciding which organization is the best possible partner for you. First, identify a number of organizations. Next, meet with decision makers from each of those organizations. Then, determine which organization best aligns with your goals, and your ideals or philanthropic philosophies. When searching for a partner, it’s also important to select an organization that aligns to your target audience. In Sunbelt Granola’s case, they chose to partner with US Youth Soccer, as the US Youth Soccer organization caters to the same audience as Sunbelt, young kids and tweens.

Develop an Inbound Marketing Campaign

As we wrote about briefly above, the goals for Sunbelt Granola are probably to connect with their target audience, build relationships with those folks, and ultimately sell more granola bars. In order to achieve those goals, Sunbelt Granola decided to use an Inbound Marketing campaign. They have also decided to partner with US Youth Soccer to tie in some Cause Marketing tactics. Sunbelt Granola determined that the best way to reach their target audience was to use their own product packaging as a vehicle for building awareness and driving action. The goal is to get youth to connect with Sunbelt Granola online, which they can easily do since Sunbelt Granola has put their website link on the box, along with mentioning that they are on Facebook & Twitter as well. Now their target audience knows just how to connect with Sunbelt Granola online.

Leverage Online Tools to Engage Your Target Audience

Food Manufacturer Content MarketingSunbelt Granola has done a masterful job at using product packaging to promote their social sites. With that said, their job is not over yet, now it’s time to engage their target audience, learn from them, build trust and relationships with them, so that eventually, those folks become brand loyalists and influencers. This ultimately leads Sunbelt Granola to their ultimate goal of selling more granola bars.

Lets dive into the Inbound Marketing campaign that Sunbelt Granola is using to achieve their organizational goals. Sunbelt Granola is marketing their granola bars to youth soccer players because they know that youth soccer players are their target audience. They have partnered with US Youth Soccer to run their Free Kicks Campaign. As part of the campaign, Sunbelt Granola knows that they have to offer youth soccer players something of value in exchange for any actions that they hope those folks will take. In the case of the Free Kicks Campaign, Sunbelt Granola is providing unique codes on the top of each box of granola bars. Customers can take that code, go to SunbeltFreeKicks.com, register, input their code, and take a free kick on the Sunbelt Granola online soccer game. Customers who score a goal, win a $25 shopping spree at Soccer.com (another strategic partner of Sunbelt Granola).

Even if customers do not win the free shopping spree, there are two other offers that customers receive when they enter their code on SunbeltFreeKicks.com. Each code that gets entered earns cash for the customer’s youth soccer club. The website has already integrated all of the soccer clubs around the country in order to make it EASY for customers to select their club. Sunbelt was able to get access to this information through their partnership with US Youth Soccer.

On top of a potential free shopping spree and earning cash for their soccer club, customers of Sunbelt Granola can win $1,000 as part of a monthly cash drawing. They can also win up to $2,500 through two semi-annual drawings. That’s a lot of cash just for entering one code. Each code customers enter is another chance to win all three offers. If I was a youth soccer player, I know I’d participate.

Once there’s a solid offer in place, it’s up to Sunbelt Granola to engage their customers when they start registering at SunbeltFreeKicks.com. Sunbelt Granola is actively adding their target audience to their email marketing list. Hopefully some of those folks also connected with Sunbelt on Facebook and Twitter as well. Sunbelt can now begin the relationship-building process with each individual customer. I’m not sure how Sunbelt is going about this process, but if they’ve set it up with as much attention to detail as they’ve done with the rest of the campaign, I’d imagine they are well on their way to building some strong customer relationships with the youth of America.

Inbound Marketing for a Small Business

Seeing Inbound Marketing campaigns like this really gets me psyched. I love it when large organizations ‘get it’. The one thing I hope to see in the future from Sunbelt Granola, and I know my man Jimmy Matorin would as well, is a mobile component. Sunbelt Granola’s target audience is one of the biggest segments of mobile users in the country. They can roll out a text campaign or even create an iPhone application from their online game. There’s so much potential with mobile, so hopefully they are in the planning phase of getting their mobile channel ready.

If you are not a large food manufacturer with the resources of Sunbelt Granola, that’s OK. Use their Inbound Marketing campaign as your guide. Find creative ways to execute your campaign within your budget. Their are a ton of free online tools out there to help you in your quest. It’s easier than ever before for small businesses to compete with the big boys. If you’re an avid reader of this blog, then you know that all it takes to run a highly successful Inbound Marketing campaign is a little creativity, a solid plan, and the right online tools. You can make it happen, just like Sunbelt Granola!

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4 More Inbound Marketing Ideas for Hotels

Monday, May 10th, 2010

We recently published a blog article entitled, 5 Inbound Marketing Ideas for Hotels. Being that there are so many creative ways that hotels can leverage the power of Inbound Marketing, we wanted to add a few more ideas to the list. Below are four more Inbound Marketing ideas for hotels.

BlogTalkRadio Show – Local Events Program

BlogTalkRadio is a free online tool that allows anyone to host their own radio show. You can have guest callers or just broadcast the show yourself. Each radio show is archived, so that those who cannot listen live, can listen to the archived version. It’s really a great tool for small businesses. Hosting your own radio show is a great way to produce audio-based content for your business. Hotels can certainly take advantage of a free radio show.

Content Marketing for HotelsHotels can start out with with a weekly Blog Talk Radio show, whereby you can discuss upcoming events in and around your local hotel. Each week there are a ton of local events in every community. Many times, local residents don’t even know about these events, which means there are even fewer travelers who know about local events. With that said, when people are traveling to a destination, either on business or for fun, they are always looking to find out what’s going on in the local area. Your radio show can help your guests understand just what’s happening in the area while they’re in town. Even if they can’t catch the live show, you can point them to a recent archive that discusses events that are happening during their stay. Guests will find this information extremely valuable, which will entice them to spread the word about your hotel AND continue to use your services each time they are in town. Hosting a Blog Talk Radio show for your hotel is a great way to produce relevant and valuable content for your guests. Be sure to promote your radio shows in your hotel and through all of your online social tools.

(more…)

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5 Inbound Marketing Ideas for Hotels

Sunday, May 2nd, 2010

The travel industry has been hit particularly hard over the past few years. With less discretionary income, families are traveling less or simply staying local. Businesses are starting to use tools like Skype, for video chats, instead of flying to clients for in-person meetings. These two factors have forced hotels to evolve or die. Many forward-thinking hotels are looking to the Internet as a way to better market their their offerings to customers and prospects. Inbound Marketing, a new-age marketing activity that allows customers to find you online, can be hugely beneficial for hotels.

Inbound Marketing for HotelsIn this post, we will explore 5 separate Inbound Marketing ideas for Hotels. Each idea revolves around the use of a specific online tool, such as YouTube, Twitter, foursquare, etc. With that said, many of the ideas below can be implemented using numerous tools. I simply chose the tools that I thought made the most sense for each idea. Before implementing any of these ideas, it’s best to create a Strategic Marketing Plan that lists your goals, strategies, and tactics. This way you’ll have a guide for implementing these ideas, and you’ll also have something to look back at in 3, 6, 9 months to see how you’re tracking against your goals. Without a plan, it’s easy to get lost in all of these Inbound Marketing tactics, and it’s hard to determine your level of success (or failure) if you don’t have a plan, with goals and performance measures, to look back at.

YouTube Customer Testimonial Series

Customer testimonials are one of the biggest drivers of trust between prospective customer and a business. Video is the most powerful medium for communicating with customers and prospects besides face-to-face meetings. By combining customer testimonials with video, you can create a powerful YouTube Video Series full of great customer testimonials.

Hotels have the ability to produce high quality customer testimonial videos. Upon check-in let each customer know that if they are willing to take 10 minutes, at some point during their stay, to answer a few questions about their stay, you will provide them with some sort of incentive (free drink at the bar, free breakfast, 5% off of room service, etc). Hotels have ample space to record customer testimonial videos. Ask customers to schedule their interview and then take 30 minutes prior to shoot time to setup an empty hotel room or banquet room with your video equipment. Then have your hotel guest come in and talk about his or her stay so far at your hotel. Take that video, edit it, and publish it to your YouTube Channel. Hotels have so many guests on any given day that you should be able to produce a few quality videos each month.

These videos have the potential to entice a prospective customer to stay at your hotel, instead of the hotel down the street that he was considering. The reason, he now has another person’s perspective on the accommodations at your hotel. Reading a print ad or watching a TV commercial gives the customer an idea that you’re out there, but it doesn’t give him an unbiased opinion of the accommodations. These videos do that. Be sure to capture the opinions of different guest types (ie. family travelers, echo boomers who are traveling with friends, business travelers, etc). This will allow each prospective guest-type to see videos from individuals who they can relate with.

Foursquare Swarm Badge Party

A few weeks ago, we wrote about running a foursquare Swarm Badge Promotion for businesses. The Swarm Badge is unlocked when 50 or more people check-in at the same location, all within a short time of one another. Hotels can absolutely take advantage of this foursquare badge. Hotels can throw a foursquare Swarm Badge party at their bar. You can invite people from the local area AND guests. This promotion doesn’t just have to be geared towards guests, which is one of the biggest reasons why you should run it at your hotel. Hotel managers usually only think about their guests when it comes to revenue sources, but the local community can also be a revenue source when it comes to coming in to have dinner or drinks at your hotel.

UPDATE: Download our new FREE eBook: How to Use Foursquare to Grow Your Business

Host an event, whereby you invite anyone who wants to come, to have a free drink at your bar. Explain that you’re hoping to unlock the foursquare Swarm Badge for all participants. Let participants know that in order to get their free drink, they must check-in at your hotel or hotel bar on foursquare. Once 50 people check-in, the foursquare Swarm Badge is released to all participants. Participants then get a free drink and the highly coveted Swarm Badge. Hotels running this promotion build awareness for your hotel and hotel bar and you will generate revenue from participants (people are going to have more than one drink and some will buy food). You may be thinking that foursquare isn’t all that big yet, but they already have over 1 million users and they are growing at a fast rate. By the time you plan out this event, those numbers might be very different. Foursquare is here to stay, so it’s time to start incorporating it as a go-to platform in your hotel marketing activities.

Free Food for Facebook Fans

Hotels can reward Facebook fans with free food or drinks at their hotel restaurants and bars. This promotion is geared towards enticing guests to be active Facebook fans. Upon check-in, ask guests if they “Like” the Hotel Facebook fan page. If they say they do, ask them to pull up their Facebook account, show the front desk staff that they ‘Like’ the hotel’s fan page, and finally show that they’ve recently engaged in some fan page activity (ie. wrote a wall post, posted a comment, posted an image, participated in a discussion, etc).

In exchange for being an active Facebook fan, hotel management can provide guests with a free appetizer from the bar or room service. The offer could be a discount on your entire meal or even a free drink. There are many ways that hotel management can offer value here, it simply comes down to putting the right offer in front of the right people. Nobody should know your customers better than you, so I’m sure there are a few offers popping into your head now that might make sense for your clientele. Whatever offer you decide to go with, be sure to establish your goals for this program before you go live, and then start promoting it through your social tools (not just Facebook) and inside your hotel. This way, customers know about the program and how they can participate.

Start a Travel Group on LinkedIn

Start a LinkedIn Group around your geo-location and the hotel industry. You can connect with business travelers and engage them in conversations around travel and staying in hotels. You can learn a TON about common interests, needs, and desires, straight from your target audience. You can also use your LinkedIn Group to start discussions around your blog articles or promote new specials. When it comes to using LinkedIn, it’s best to be a lot more educational than promotional. People don’t want to read discussions solely about your promotions. Figure out an educational tie-in and lead with that. Somewhere, where it makes sense, fit in your promotional copy and a link to wherever you’re looking to drive traffic (your blog, your YouTube Channel, etc). In an earlier post on the Catalyst Marketers Blog, we wrote about how LinkedIn Discussions Can Generate Sales for Your Small Business – check it out if you’re unfamiliar with LinkedIn Groups and LinkedIn Discussions.

Blog, Blog, Blog

Blog about all of it. Use your blog as your main content platform. New blog posts can be written about all of the marketing ideas above. Blog posts can be written to generate buzz for upcoming programs, but posts can also be written at the conclusion of programs. For example, you can create blog posts leading up to your Foursquare Swarm Badge party, which should help drive traffic to your hotel on the night of the event. You can then write a blog post, and even create a Flickr Slide Show (which should then be linked to the blog post), post-event. This blog article will share information about how the event went down, how fun it was, include any sound bites from participants, etc. Sometimes Management wonders what they will write about on their blog, but once they create one, they realize that there’s never a shortage of content. There are a ton of relevant content stories just knocking up against the walls of your hotel, it’s just a matter of creating a plan for how you will share those stories with the world. A hotel blog can do that for you.

We hope these 5 Inbound Marketing ideas help you market your hotel accommodations to both customers and prospects. Be on the lookout for a future post with a few more Inbound Marketing ideas for hotels. Feel free to subscribe to the Catalyst Marketers Blog if you want to receive an email each time we publish a new article.

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