McCurry Associates Marketing Idea Exchange Archives
Newsletter 9 - June 26, 2002
Idea #1 - Jolly Prints in Jolly Olde England
Paul Singer, Photo Image Works,
Cirencester, England (www.photoimageworks.co.uk)
Over the Golden Jubilee week we broke
every record, and we're still recovering. Now with the football we're on the
same roll... and the sun is shining!
Being 100% English I could offer a tongue in cheek tip to
wildly increase USA processing, get a Royal family.... in 50 years time you'll
thank me for the tip. It generates so much film sales, processing, but above all
a reason to get the camera out. Of course the challenge is maximising the
opportunity and apart from the obvious, we rolled out one of the old favourites
- custom T shirts. The Queen kindly made the Jubilee logo public access so we
were able to make up really good quality custom printed shirts.
And that takes me onto my first tip. Walking adverts. It's one
of the oldest, but it's so easy to make up a T Shirt or polo shirt for the sales
associates to wear with the current offer / promo on the back. We made up the
Jubilee logo shirts with the offer on the reverse for all the associates. We're
now running 'prints from digital cameras' as an awareness campaign to tie in
with the current advertising in monthly journals. With all the other messages in
a busy store customers really cannot take them all in. However they cannot help
but notice a great big offer walking around on someone's back!
If you would like another one idea, we're using my 21st year
in the photo business as an excuse to celebrate & have offers all year long.
Just using the tried & trusted 'save the anniversary sticker' off the
processing wallets we have ensured that our customers can join in the success
and get a great deal on film & Single Use Cameras as well. The obvious
effect being we're putting more (quality) film in the system (that's been paid
for not offered free) for processing.
Hope these are what you're looking for - I've read the others
with great interest. I would agree 100% about CD's (issue 7) - we have never
offered unbranded or cheap private label CDs. Just using a reverse out print
process (white on a silver CD) you get a great looking custom CD for a
reasonable price, with all our details on including the web site (to order
prints from).
Idea #2 - Think outside the norm for media distribution
and printing options
Gary Grinaker, The Photo Express
Cleverly Hidden in Kirkwood Mall, Bismarck, ND (www.thephotoexpress.net)
We had great success using our new
Noritsu 2901 to create a 4x6 full-color postcards. We've promoted our new
digital services by offering each of our customers the opportunity to make 25
4x6 prints from their digital media during the following week.
Being cautious, we mailed batches of 400 cards at a time until
we hit our entire mailing list. This kept the redemptions down to a reasonable
level for any one week. It also allowed us to refine the postcard as we received
feedback from our customers. We had excellent redemption rates.
As a follow-up I was going to do a direct mail the digital
trial postcard inviting all the local business to try out our prints from
digital media in July.
Then I discovered that for a fourth of the cost of mailing the
postcards, I could insert the cards into the "Enterprise Connection",
a monthly newspaper that goes to local businesses. Inserting my piece is a
fraction of the cost of placing an ad in the same publication. And it will be in
full color at photographic quality.
The problem with great promotional offers is most people come
in the day the coupon expires. Having new customers lined up out the door on the
last day of the month just wouldn't do. Also, overstressing our production
capacity that day wouldn't make for a good example of our quick service.
But what to do with 5,500 postcards all being delivered at
once?
Duh, digital printed coupons are easy to alter. So we're
printing them in batches of 600, each batch with a slightly different expiration
date. Also, no coupon will expire on our busiest days.
Idea #3 - Profitable relationship with professional
photographers
Mike St Germain, Concord, NH (www.concordcamera.com)
Ever have customers ask you to refer
them to a professional photographer? We keep a book full of business cards of
the professionals that are our regular customers. If a customer asks for a
photographer we open the book, pull out a few cards for that specialty and say,
"Here are cards from a few photographers we know. We've seen these people's
work and they do good things."
When the professional photographer comes in the
store we say, "Let's check your supply of business cards in our referral
book." They know we send them business so they give us a significant part
of their film and processing business in return. We aren't a professional stock
house type of store but it provides us with some profitable professional
business for routine finishing and film.
Response to Issue #7 -
Ken Sutton, K-Ellis PHOTOCENTER, N
Dartmouth, MA
I absolutely love the idea from Maureen
Welsh of inserting a blank CD with every order! (Especially if they are custom
labeled to your shop. BY THE WAY, LET'S MAKE IT OFFICIAL--THEY ARE NO LONGER
PHOTO CD's, FROM NOW ON THEY ARE CALLED DIGITAL NEGATIVES (or electronic
negatives)
LEGAL MUMBO JUMBO OUR COUNSEL WANTS YOU TO READ
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