We were recently given the pleasure of capturing a few minutes of time from Bodie Czeladka, director of one of Melbourne’s most prestigious promotional companies, Secret Society.
Here is what he had to say:
Q: Secret Society is a well-developed brand with much success under its belt in the Melbourne scene. Can you summarise what few points you think helped you achieve the success in exposing your brand?
BC: We injected a lot of cash and time into the branding early with a lot of support and loyalty from our venues. We still do to this day, to show gratitude by showing a lot of loyalty to them for that initial support and faith in our business. We also realise the value in building brand strength and using strong branding on all appropriate mediums.
Q: What do you think is the most effective way that bars, clubs and restaurants can communicate and involve their target market?
BC: I think it’s a triangle of interaction. If you lose one corner your branding and business will suffer. We find that it is a combination of:
1) Supplying your patrons with a good product when they come to the venue (and value for money).
2) Create and maintain a good online following, somewhere that patrons can easily source content, enter competition and be eligible for giveaways.
3) The most important is old school marketing techniques, not just online. Human interaction and word of mouth creates the best branding for any business.
Q:What is the one or two most important pieces of advice you would give to anybody thinking of running a venue or promoting it?
BC:Don’t try to do too much. I have seen so many promoters over the years build up a great following and then blow it all by watering down their product and trying to put their fingers in too many pies. Try not to be a jack of all trades master of none. Constantly try to reinvent your self and your branding, and keeping things fresh, is the best way to stay on top.
Q:What is one “No-No” of the hospitality industry that always cringes you and you wish could be fixed or not done any more?
BC: Bulk text messages and spamming with no valuable content to the consumer and no opt outs in emails and texts.
Q:Naturally everybody promotes on well known public holidays and days in the year, but is there a secret little part of the year that you think works wonders and perhaps one that venues or promotional crew don’t particular take too much notice of?
BC: Unfortunately no I don’t, but if I did this wouldn’t be the forum I would be sharing it in as then it wouldn’t be a secret 
Q: Do you think Online Social Media is a must for all hospitality venues and what do you think is the best way to use it?
BC: Definitely but it has to be complimented with a solid product. You can have the best marketing campaign in the world but if your product is rubbish it won’t give you a client base. It is dependant on the particular product, for us it has always been as a portal to direct people back to our website.
We think of social media like we do dating or a night club it is a place to meet new people and after interacting with them for a bit you invite them back to you place (Website). THAT is where true relationships, trust and loyalty is built and a product can be sold.
Q:Do you feel like Facebook may be getting a little overrun by promoters and venues all pushing their brand out to people. How can this be combated?
BC:It can’t be, all we can do as a promotions company is lead by example and upcoming promoters follow suit. Our rule is in regards to events or club nights if you don’t have anything to say, a point to make or something to give patrons don’t say anything at all.
Q:Have you used MyGuestlist and if so, what kind of positive help (if any) has it contributed to your marketing campaigns or admin procedures?
BC: Our main goal over the past 3 years has been to focus on building a strong database, and since joining Myguestlist we have never felt in more control our our database. We have gained knowledge about what our subscribers like and don’t like through the use of myguestlist back end statistics and gained new concepts and ideas for extra ways to increase our subscribe rate and reduce our opt out. We never would have been able to if not for this fantastic product.
Not to mention the 7 days a week 24 hr support we receive from this ever so helpful team.
Q:How do you see the relationship between the Internet, patrons and the hospitality industry evolving over the next decade or so?
We can only speak in the short term as a decade from now, anything could be possible. But..
I believe newspapers and a lot of other forms of non-targeted advertising and marketing will become null and void. There are a number of high traffic bloggers that will be probably be identified and recognized for doing better research with better reporting and less bias than the traditional media. So blogging will increase and be a place where reviews and opinions on venue’s and nightclubs will really hold weight so it isn’t just about advertising online, it’s about maintaining credibility and helping promote the goodwill of your product/brand/venue.
Whilst Facebook and it’s successor will grow and no doubt surpass google, unless google join the race with a solid product.. and dependence on services like google ad words and analytics will increase and become an integral part of ALL businesses, rather than primarily web focussed businesses like it is currently.
I believe Facebook and other social mediums will find away to counter the overuse and spamming problem and true business with true content will survive and continue to grow whilst time wasting content will hopefully fade into the background.
Q:Any regrets? Do anything different?
BC: No regrets, but obviously there will always be things we could or can do better but the key is not to dwell, just keep your eye on the prize and keep moving forward.
Q:What’s upcoming in the world of Secret Society?
BC:A lot more fun and a continual improvement in our product and service. We hope we to get into a lot more one off events this year which will give us a chance to branch out of not only our comfort zones but our venues.
Our business is people so we will be making it our number one goal to find not necessarily a large number of people , but the RIGHT people to join the team, working for Secret Society has a lot of perks but we are also very selective with our team, people who work for Secret Society don’t see it as a job, but as a lifestyle.
What are you waiting for http://secretsociety.tv
So it’s no secret that we’re crazy about data here at MyGuestlist.
Ahhh…not stealing it that is, but rather creating models, metrics and generating some useful information from that data to use as leverage for critical decision making in our development and a sales sectors.
So it should come as no surprise then, that many of the world’s tech companies (including us) are utilising what is known as the viral coefficient to deduce whether a certain action/application/entity is technically considered viral or not.
Up to now, this information has not been really interpreted for all us other bar, restaurant and club folk, but let us do that for you.
So, how do you find out if your latest video is going viral? How do you know whether that last competition you just created in MyGuestlist is working its magic? Is your Facebook promotion actually making some sort of impact? Is word of mouth spreading online? We finally have a way of measuring it all.
Let’s explore a little.
So the idea behind the concept of something being viral, is that new members or new activity is introduced to the parent (or original) concept in a perpetuating fashion. So instead of you finding members for your mailing list, they find you. Instead of you finding patrons to enter competitions, they find your competition and spread the word on to their friends. Those friends to friends of their own and so on. This is all well and good but there are two questions that need to be answered.
How do I create viral content?
How do I measure viral activity?
This post is focusing on the latter.
There is a variable in our formula called the viral coefficient. What this is, is a measure of the number of additional members, each new member brings with them.
So based on this information, if the viral coefficient is 1 (i.e each new member brings only one other new member in), the activity/content/distribution will grow, but only at a linear rate and eventually topping out.
So the scenario may be as follows:
10 people become members
10 invites sent per person
10% of those people convert to new members
End Point: 10 new member to the site
So therefore, 10 new members / 10 original = 1 (which is our viral coefficient)
Above 1 however, it achieves our desired and classic hockey stick on the graph scenario of exponential growth.
10 people become members
15 invites per person
10% of those people convert to new members
End point: 15 new members to the site
15 new members / 10 original = 1.5 viral coefficient
The following table is created by Jeremy Liew, a venture capitalist in San Fransisco’s Silicon Valley. Study it carefully as it illustrates the difference between a tiny increase in the viral coefficient of 0.6, 0.9 and 1.2. In the example, Liew starts with a base of only 10 members and a viral coefficient of 0.6 and defined time as the period it takes for a member to invite others, which he estimated could be anywhere from 2-8 weeks for this specific experiment.
Viral Coefficient Stats
So the idea was that starting with a base of 10 members and a viral coefficient of 0.6, you flatten out at 25 people, a gain of 15 members. At 0.9, you end up with 75 new members and growth slows dramatically.
With a viral coefficient of 1.2 however, those same 10 members, yield an amazing 1,271 additional members.
We come up with the following formula:
Viral Coefficient = Invitations x Conversion x Infection
where Invitations = average number of users invited by each active user
Conversion = proportion of invited users who activate
Infection = proportion of new active users who invite additional new users
For some more info on how to calculate growth and population forecasting, read this blog entry by Robert Zubek.
So, what to do about increasing this viral coefficient?
Identified, are 5 solid ways to increase the viral coefficient. To first understand these 5, we need to understand what we are trying to do. This is:
- Trying to get our members to send more invites or share our content more to other non-members.
- Try to get our members to return more often to our site/content/venue/party so that they are able to invite more often.
- Find more channels and mediums for the recipient to receive the invites.
With the above in mind, we can now explore the techniques for increasing our viral coefficient so that this can be achieved.
1) Invitations/Sharing integrated as a part of the core
To increase the average number of members that each of your active members invites, you must ensure that new member invitations are a core process in your marketing, action or content.
Examples:
- Hotmail has a small invitation at the bottom of every email which helped with early adoption.
- PayPal allows members to send money to non-members and provides a referral bonus if they join.
2) Immediate utility or usage without external needs
In order to achieve traction with initial members, you must provide some immediate action/task/utility for them to look at, play around with even when none of the member’s personal contacts have joined.
Examples:
- Twitter allows you to micro blog, before you’ve started following or getting followers
- Linked in allows you to setup resumes and connections prior to any invites going out
This step is quite important as most users will not invite other friends until they’re familiar with what is being presented to them. If you don’t provide them with something to do before they’re ready to invite others, you will probably lose them before they reach that stage.
3) Persistence. Keep pulling people back into your world over and over.
There are heaps of examples of this. From Facebook pulling you back in to update your status, to Facebook apps like Mob Wars reminding users of new features that are unlocked. You should always remain in touch and keep sending useful communication that will encourage people to come back to your event, or website.
In addition, once you do one of these pull-ins, remind these active members that they can invite more people and what the benefits are of doing so. Just be careful to not fall into the trap of becoming a spam machine and sending reminders or newsletters all the time without a good reason.
4) No Artificial barriers
According to the CyWorld Behavioural Distribution from “Do friends influence purchases in a social network?”, Raghuram Iyengar, Sangman Han and Sunil Gupta, there is a following approximate distribution:
47% of people are not well connected, have limited interaction with others and are unaffected by social pressure.
43% of people are moderately connected and “Keep up with the Joneses”
10% of people are highly connected and can also be negatively influenced by others
So the fact of the matter is:
- Most people will not invite anybody
- A few people will want to invite lots of people
- Ask yourself how you will make it easy for those few to invite as many as they want: 5, 10, 20, 40 people at a time
5) Influencer targeting
It isn’t important that your content or word of mouth is just spreading, but it is equally as important to make sure they are spreading from the right person. The connectors.
You should select those people to receive viral content based on the number of friends they have, the size of their network (online and off) as well as the probability of instigating action.
If you have anything to add which you may think increases the viral coefficient of your promotions and content in the hospitality industry, please share it in the comments.
While you were all busy over the holiday period hosting your Christmas and end of year functions and parties, we decided to add in some hospitality specific HTML email templates into your accounts as a present from us.
These include:
3 x Nightclub templates
2 Casual Dining Restaurant templates
1 Fine Dining Restaurant template
1 Music Festival template
1 Pub Template
1 Birthday specific template
These will be topped up later in the year with Christmas, Easter, St Patrick’s Day, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Australia Day, Valentines Day, Asian themed, Spring Racing, Middle Eastern Themed, Classic, Retro, Cyberpunk, Noir, Comic, Electro/Futuristic flavours and probably more that we may think of until then.
Got any ideas? Let us know.
But in the meantime, check out what we have below:
Birthday Theme
Use this for personalised birthday messages to your patrons
Nightclub #1
You can easily modify these to represent your own brand.
Nightclub #2
You can use your patron's first name as a means of grabbing their attention right away.
Nightclub #3
Who's playing where?
Casual Restaurant #1
Nice way to show off that new dish or lunch menu
Casual Dining #2
New Menu? New Restaurant? Why note let people know about it.
Fine Dining
Simple, black, white and classy. Insert photo images and enjoy. Bon appetit!
Festival
Event? Big acts? Go big on your promotion.
Pub
A pot n parma never tasted better.
Having monitored the open rates and analysed the effectiveness of millions of emails, we now have some solid data and helpful hints to provide you with in the hope that you will eliminate all actions that assist in your e-newsletter and promotions ending in the recycle bin.
There are a number of DO NOT DOs, but that is a whole different article altogether.
Here are 5 methods you can employ to gauge your patrons’ interests and have them look forward to your emails rather than think of them as trash.
How-to Content is instructional, and teaches your patrons how to do something specific. This content will usually end up being your most read and your most linked-to posts or pages.
From cocktails, to recipes, to track mixing and mashups for those in the club scene. Use your creativity and come up with a a few topics on what advice and tips you could for free to your patrons.
Remember, Google doesn’t make a cent when you search for something, but they still make money from all their happy users by what is considered a free service. Granted this is from a whole different advertising model, but nonetheless, free is good.
Offer information for free, so that you can make money off your events, nights, cooking classes, cd launches, fashion shows etc.
Product reviews are the first thing that come to mind, but you can publish a review on practically anything: popular websites in your niche, new liqueurs, new recipes, new acts, news stories in the mainstream media channels, discussion forums, magazines, meet-ups – basically anything of interest to your readers that you can write an opinion about.
Writing these reviews and talking about how you are or plan to use these products or services in your venue is a great way of building anticipation in your patrons to some interesting things that they can sample in the near future.
Lists are very popular and make for very easy content. You can create a list and just write a short description in a sentence or two for each.
Lists are fun & easy to write.
Some examples that you could offer your patrons:
- Top 10 cocktails of all time
- 15 low fat but delicious meals you can enjoy at [venue name]
- 5 reasons why having your birthday at [venue name] will make it the best night of the year
Tip: Try adding the word “best” or “top” to your title as well as a number to indicate to the reader that it will be a dot point summary of information and thereby making it easier and more enjoyable to read
Interviews make for great easy web content. You can start with just 3-10 questions, and the person you interview basically creates the rest of the content for you. They’ll be willing to do this for the exposure to your readership, and for the relevant backlink to their website.
Interview someone that is relevant to your line of business and that your readers may know. If this is out of reach, then make the content of the interview something inspiring to your readers. They will love to know how someone created, designed or thought of something and will love reading about it if you can strike a proverbial chord with them.
- SUM UP WITH SPECIAL OFFER
This last chunk can be a call to action for your reader. If you tantalised their taste buds with some delicious food and drinks, or got them interested enough to know more about you, you can now ask them to have their next night outwith you and have a “click here” to book a table or “create a guestlist” link in the email. Better yet, you could give them the option of doing it, right from within the email as indicated in the image below with the aid of the “One-Click-Guestlist” feature in MyGuestlist.
This is an example of a personalised birthday email with a direct call to action for a guestlist right from within the email.
From our investigations, the above formula seems to be quite effective at keeping a loyal base of patrons which eventually turn into customers who have grown to love your brand and what you offer, enough to have their next birthday or function with you.
The only other piece of advice that goes hand-in-hand with all the above and probably the most important of them all is to make sure that you keep these informative and useful e-newsletters recurring. Whether it’s weekly, fortnightly or otherwise, do not fall off the radar and let laziness kill your online campaigns.
If you have trouble looking for any good email templates, check out our next blog post or let us know and we’ll lend a helping hand to give you some free templates for you to choose from and even customise one to your liking.
Well it has finally come. An official (albeit beta) release for the mobile app that has been in the works for quite some time now. 
It is accessible for FREE to all current myguestlist users and venues. You can access it from your mobile device at http://m.myguestlist.com.au
There is a lot of stuff that you can do from it (both already available and in the works) and we will continue to update it reflecting the changes that all of you request over the next few months.
But enough diddley-daddlying, let’s take a look at what’s under the hood:
View your dashboard
This is the first screen you see and will give you access to the main functionality of the app. Everything you need is just a tap away and can be accessed quite quickly once you are on a wireless network. 3G is also fine, but if your venue does have a wireless network, try jump on it as it will give you a quicker and smoother experience.
The Dashboard panel will give you a quick summary of your guestlists/bookings as well as your database size. As you can see here on the right, our test account has 0 guestlists and we filled it with some dummy data for the purpose of this rundown.
Just below that, you will see the 3 main features of the app, currently of which only 2 are available. My Database and My Guestlists. Tapping on each one of those will take you to their own respective menus. Bulk SMS will be available soon and the “coming soon” label will appropriately be removed.
Underneath that, you have a separate panel labelled Tonight’s Guestlists which is a quick shortcut to only display the guestlists/bookings/reservations for tonight. This is a quick way of checking on the status of your night as soon as you have logged in.
Manage your Database
On this screen, you can select whether you want to Add a member to your database or Browse the database.
This is the place you go to when you want to add someone to your database on the go or if you have somebody on a clipboard or at the cloakroom. You can completely replace the need of a paper based system in favour of the app so that it can be synced to your database immediately and not have to double up on work.
In some cases, adding to your database can be used as a VIP Membership function. For example if you are a nightclub, and it is say $20 entry fee at the door, you may propose that it can be $10 entry (and maybe a free drink?) should they become a member. The staff member can at that point, enter the patron’s details into the app in a VIP Members category and know that they have accurately done so at the start of a night and not at some point in the middle where information gained amongst loud music and/or drunkenness often leads to inaccurate database entries.
Add Patrons to your Database on the go
Here is the screen that allows you to add a patron into your database. All these fields are highly customisable based on what fields you choose to capture. For example, if you capture “favourite drink” or “favourite meal” in your MyGuestlist account, those fields will also be reflected here so that the information can be neat, accurate and as detailed as you possibly like.
You can select your desired category (e.g Saturday nights) and use it as a way of adding information on the go even on that particular night. It is a great way of adding business card information or even just information laying around in the office on scrap paper and post-it notes.
There is complete syncronisation with your web MyGuestlist account so what you add in here will reflect in your database on the web also and will not require any doubling up of data entry. Remember that any information that you override for a patron here will be updated and seen as the newest and most relevant. So for example if you have a patron in your “Friday Night” category, but you use the mobile app to add them in the “Saturday Night” category and you also change their mobile number, this mobile number will then be changed for the patron and they will exist in both categories (but still only receive a campaign e-newsletter or SMS once when sending out)
Browse & change the details of patrons in your database
Here you can take a look at all the patrons in your database and have them displayed based on only the info that you like. Females, 21 year olds, only those which like a particular genre of music, your corporates etc.
You have the ability of opting somebody out from your marketing campaigns. This comes in handy when you may be dealing with somebody face to face and they politely ask you to do this. Now you don’t need to do it from your computer or write a note to yourself to do it at some point in the future, you can do it right there and then.
Communicate with your patrons
If you have forgotten the contact details of one of your patrons, you can now call, email or send an SMS to them by clicking on the Advanced Features part of this screen.
This is particularly helpful if you do not have this patron as a personal contact in your phone but know that there is some connection with the venue so you can do a search in the app and contact them via this screen.
You can also take a look at how long they have been a member with your venue for, as well as any other personal information that you have acquired from them.
If you want to update their details (e.g new email address, new mobile number, add their date of birth) you can also do this from this screen. Think of it as a way to keep the information on your patrons up to date, as well as the ability to contact them should you find the need to do so.
Manage all your guestlists
As the title suggests, from this screen, you can view all upcoming guestlists, search for a particular one that you may known about or have in your head as well as create one for somebody you might be chatting to on the go, or someone that is simply enquiring about booking or reserving their function with you.
Just like in your web MyGuestlist account, in the “Search All Guestlists” section you can search by any criteria that you like effectively giving you the opportunity to use it as a tracking tool as well.
You can search by a given name from one of your promoters, to determine how many guestlists they have put through or how many birthdays you have had come through in the past 6 months etc.
Use the “Upcoming” option to see every guestlist from today onwards, or just do a search if you can’t remember the timing of one but can remember other details such as the creator’s name or the company name for a corporate function.
Create guestlists on the go or whilst you are chatting to one of your patrons
This is a nifty little feature that allows you to put a guestlist in for somebody that you are just chatting to or is even semi-interested in coming on a given night or day. They will immediately be sent an email from your venue informing them they are now on the guestlist for this weekend or that their function enquiry has been received and that you will get back to them shorty. This is great because the patron is added directly to your database, and your engagement with them is increased by being able to cut out the time needed to give them that special incentive to come to your night, event or restaurant.
View and update the details of your guestlists
If you now have some updated details on your bookings or guestlists, you can change them from your phone at any time.
Want to check on the attendees?
Left the venue and can’t remember some special requirements associated to the function?
Need to remind yourself on something about this particular booking?
You can now do so at any time and from anywhere.
View all your lists and mark patrons attendance
This is completely optional, however is a great feature of the mobile app which allows you to see the patrons on a private guestlist and mark off who has arrived and who hasn’t.
This information is then synced to your web MyGuestlist account and is added to your patron statistics to determine the amount of patrons you have had arriving on a guestlist on any given night.
It’s a neat little metric to have and is even right now used at the door of some clubs and bars. But it can effectively be used in any hospitality venue.
So as you can see, there are some awesome time saving and revenue generating features in the mobile app and we hope that you will enjoy using the benefits it provides.
Stay tuned for future posts outlining new features and additions.
Cheerio!
When people first think about starting up a new database, they tend to measure their success in terms of how many patrons there are in there.
Let’s talk honestly, having patrons on your list is important, but it’s not the only, or even the best, measure of a good database.
In this case, size really doesn't matter.
Why is it, then, that so many venues and promoters fear doing anything that might result in a reduction in the overall number of patrons in their database?
Mark Brownlow, a knowledgable internet guru in enewsletters has published an excellent article discussing our obsession with list size. To summarise he makes the following good points:
- There are other metrics that we can and should measure: message open rates, clicks and conversions, for example
- Quality is far more important than Quantity in regards to the type of patrons you have in your database
- It’s “much easier to do what we’ve been doing — with adequate results — than change things and risk a disaster” (in this case, any drop in your list size)
We have analysed the performance of several emails that have gone through MyGuestlist this year, and every single time we came up with the same exact outcome:
Any venue or promoter which has a smaller sized database but full of patrons and members that have been to the venue/event or had some sort of interaction with them, will always have a higher success rate in their promotional campaigns as opposed to those who believe just quantity is important.
It’s often said in the web design world that people don’t read on their computers, they scan.
That is why when confronted with large amounts of information, people tend not to read and read. Instead, they take a glimpse and unless something pops out at them, they move on .
Consider the patrons in your database. They get your messages in their inboxes along with lots of personal mail and junk, maybe while at work, or possibly with screaming kids in the background. If they signed up for your campaign, then surely they are interested in what you have to say. But in order to build on their interest, how you say it is just as important.
Keeping your messages short and to the point has two important benefits:
- Catering to the short attention span of your readers. Give your patrons something interesting and engaging to see so that they can digest it quickly rather than a feast that seems bloated. If you are selling tickets then take them to your website for more information with an aim to make them purchase them. Or alternatively, you can use One-Click-Guestlist-Bookings to allow your patrons to reserve/book/allocate their time with you on a given night from their emails. This feature is now live. Stay tuned for a blog post about it.
- Less is less. The smaller the amount of content you have in your messages, the fewer words or phrases the SPAM filters ISP’s use will have to find issue with. You really don’t want to say “Buy now!” fifteen times in an e-mail. Less is more too, since your messages mean nothing to your patrons if they can’t even get them.
We’ve all heard it before. The Keep It Simple Stupid rule. But when it comes to promotions, it is more important than ever.
Segment, refine, and keep things short, sharp, clear and targeted. Do this, and you will be guaranteed to have an increase in open rates in your email campaigns.
So you’ve probably opened an account and not known how to make Twitter work its magic as you’ve heard it has for some others.
The varying ways in which you can use it alter based on whether you will be tweeting as an individual or a company and there is a ridiculous amount of help and assistance on what the best way to utilise Twitter and social media in general, but most of it might not be applicable to the way which you do business.
For example, many large companies such as Starbucks, CNN and Ford utilise Twitter to listen to their customers and respond to any problems, rectify any public mistakes or speak up when there is negative chatter about their brands in general.
This sounds good in theory, but as somebody involved with a club/bar/restaurant/venue, this doesn’t hold much strength for you.
Let’s have a look at what you should be tweeting about as somebody within the hospitality game if you want to provide direct value to your followers:
1. Announcement of specials and discounts on drinks, food or tickets
2. Welcome a new staff member and explain their upcoming role
3. Promote a new product in your bar, a new dish in your menu or a new act which will be playing
4. Run competitions and giveaways to gain participation from your followers. Do NOT make prize a gimmick or unworthy of participation (this is a double benefit because you will also be able to grow your database)
5. Recruit new staff by listing job vacancies
6. Post media releases on your venue or night, as well as any other media articles related to your business.
7. Promote happy hours
8. Retweet messages from friends within the industry
9. Thank everybody for coming to your night, event, the weekend
10. Promote your next event with a direct link for your patron to book/enquire
11. Get customer feedback (if you don’t have a large following this can be tough, but keep it in mind for when your follower base grows)
12. Comment on current affairs in relation to the hospitality industry
13. Share useful websites for your business and the industry
14. Link to your new blog posts (yes it’s time to get a blog as well if you don’t have one)
15. Broadcast updates made to your website
16. Promote your other social media networks eg. Facebook, LinkedIn
17. Conduct customer surveys
18. Notify customers to changes in upcoming events or nights.
19. Showcase your new radio or print ads
20. Tell your customers about great service you have received from another business within the industry
21. Get feedback on any new systems, software or equipment you plan to purchase
22. Search for new suppliers
23. Promote associations and organisations your venue/business belongs to
24. Booking/Enquiry/Guestlist availabilities caused by last minute cancellations
25. Give tips and free advice on drinks, meals, coffee etc. (e.g Mention a cocktail that one of your bar staff has created and list the ingredients. You can offer to give a free one to all who come this friday night
26. Broadcast news in relation to the hospitality industry.
27. Highlight your Twitter/Facebook milestones, eg. 1,000 Followers / Fans
28. Profile your staff members with some cool fun facts.
29. Post changes to schedules, timetables or opening hours
30. Discounts for mentioning your Twitter posts
31. Any appearances you are making, eg. trade shows, workshops, seminars
32. Seasonal greeting to customers, eg. Merry Christmas, Happy International Left Handlers Day
33. New address and phone numbers if you have moved
34. Any unfortunate outages or delays that will affect a day or night of trade
35. Highlight any community involvement or charity associations
36. Send reminders to your customers, eg. Melbourne Cup Weekend coming, NYE etc.
37. Give your venue/business a personality – share a joke or two
38. Link to photos from your latest event or night.
39. Promote a business award nomination or achievement
40. Link to forums you regularly participate in (yes, you should be doing that as well as Twitter updates)
41. Share cost savings for buying a “birthday” or “hens night” package from your venue
42. Use Twitter as a customer service/help desk for your business (will probably only work if you have many followers.)
43. Celebrate venue milestones, eg. 25 years in service
44. Encourage people to follow some of your favourite Twitters
45. Promote birthday packages
Viral videos are one of the great mysteries of the universe.
Every “marketing expert” is pitching them as the best way to expose your brand/business without actually advertising.
But how do you know what’s right and wrong? How do you know what will be the next numa numa, star wars kid or chk chk boom girl?
Short and truthful answer is, you can’t. And you probably won’t be able to. There will never be a formula for what makes a successful viral video. However, we can look at one company that has taken somewhat of a structured approach.
Blendtec is a company in the U.S. that makes blenders, has made a series of videos where a scientist-looking figure attempts to blend the wackiest of things, from marbles to coke cans to crowbars, using one of their blenders. The videos are all on YouTube, but you can see one of them below:
Will it blend
These videos have all of the ingredients of perfect social media marketing:
- Interesting and different
- Easy and free to access medium (youtube)
- Fun to watch
- Markets the product’s strengths, while not focusing on them specifically
- Consistency with the brand – showing of other products and logo prominently in videos
In fact, this marketing has done so amazingly well that Blendtec’s sales have gone up by 700%! Each video has over 1 million views each – and to be honest, I even felt a slight urge to go buy one of those blenders after watching!
So what lesson can we learn as nightlife & hospitality troopers?
Well have a think about how you can incorporate those 5 points above into certain elements of your venue. Here are just some ideas to get your creative juices flowing:
- Funny cooking class videos from your chef with interesting and non-conventional cooking ingredients
- A competition between two patrons in your venue in some funny game. Award prizes.
- All you can eat/drink competition
- A musical in your venue. No jokes! Check out this and this. These are incredibly viral & shareable amongst friends on Facebook.
- Exhibit the skills of one of your staff into a cool and impressive video. This could be cocktail mixing, musical performance or anything else they may be good at.
- Do a spoof of a popular trend, music video, film or show. Done the right way, these can be explosive.
- Do a funny false “media statement” where you announce new events, nights, meals, drinks, offers, musical acts.
- Do a coke vs pepsi styled taste test between one of your signature cocktails and another similar beverage
There are so many more that you can add to this list, that it can almost be the basis of another blog post.
Be creative, make a video that is engaging, shareable amongst your friends and friends of your friends, with the ultimate goal of sparking more interest in your venue or event.
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