Hey
readers, I’ve discovered a crazy cool marketing strategy for restaurants, bars,
clubs, gyms or any other similar types of service businesses. Best of all –
it’s F-R-E-E.
So,
according to mybroadband.co.za over 3.2million South Africans are blackberry
(or what I call crackberry) users. And 97% of all crackberry users are on that
little app … the infamous Blackberry Messenger.
Ever
seen beautiful women ferociously hammering away at a blackberry?
[Yes
I have no idea why they keep their cell phone so close to their pretty little
faces. Maybe they use it as a mirror for makeup as well.]
But
when they are chatting away you can bet that they (and others) are using
crackberry chat – BBM.
“So what are you
getting at Mr. Smarty pants?”
See
I knew you were going to ask that question! Don’t blame me when you smack yourself
on the forehead when you’ve finished reading this post J
Here’s
the point: You probably know SMS marketing is the new hot thing. You’ve seen
those ads haven’t you? SMS this number to subscribe. SMS that number to
subscribe. Yadda, yadda ya. Well it works. Once you SMS that 5 digit number,
you get notified again & again (and again) about upcoming specials, deals
and steals.
Here’s the problem:
Ø It is a little intrusive when you hear your SMS
ringtone expecting it to be from a friend and it turns out to be promotional
Ø It costs money to run an SMS marketing campaign
(Yes
30cents per SMS is not a lot, but when you have a 1000 customers for example,
it does add up).
So
here is the alternative:
Invite
your customers on blackberry messenger. Sounds crazy right? It. Is. Crazy.
Brilliant.
Here’s
why:
Ø It’s free
Ø It can generate revenue for you
Ø Keeps customers in the know
Ø You can message your entire customer database simultaneously
via group messaging
Ø Its less of an intrusion
Ø Its less of an interruption than normal SMS
Ø Customers can just delete your profile when they
don’t want your promotions
Ø You can actually build a 2way conversation with
clients (remember customers buy for their reasons, not what you want to sell
them – and if we have conversation with a lot of them, we can find out those
reasons)
There
is a downside of course. Not everyone has a blackberry. There’s no tracking or
split testing available. You won’t be able to target a certain demographic. BUT
– you can target your customers who do have a blackberry.
Let’s
go outside the box for a while longer. We don’t have to use blackberry messenger
just to generate sales. Let us say you run a restaurant for example. You can
survey your customers through BBM and ask them – what type of food they like
the most. What type of food they would like to see on the menu. The
possibilities & variations are almost endless.
Side note:
Input
from your customers is the best type of business intelligence you can have,
because your clients generate a 100% of your revenue right now. Remember, a
happy customer tells on average 3 other people about you, but an angry customer
tells 7 others about you (not good). That is why some type of customer feedback
system is crucial.
[Yes,
it is better to be in the loop about the customers experience rather than
having the customer say nothing and be silently moving his business to another
vendor.]
Anyway,
here are some more ways businesses can use Blackberry Messenger or BBM to
generate sales or newfound revenue:
Video store: Can use blackberry messages to tell its current
client base about the new movie releases it has available.
Bicycle shop: Can notify customers about upcoming bike races
(guess where the customers are going to buy the gear?)
Restaurants: Can notify customers about coffee specials or ask
the customer for feedback on the saxophone player they hired (some restaurants
hire artists to perform loving the show but may not realize their customers hate it – what’s the point then?)
Gyms: Can post new exercises/diet tips/easy healthy meals
to the BBM following.
If
you already use SMS marketing to great effect, then don’t stop using it.
Augment it by adding BBM, measure the response and go from there.
P.S.
If you found this post at least somewhat helpful and enjoyable, could you
please share it with your colleagues? Hover your mouse over the share button
below and click on the Facebook icon. In the next window just click share link.
Thank you J.
