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Being in business is a lot like being ringmaster at your very own three-ring circus. As ringmaster, your greatest challenge is to keep the audience focused on the action you want them to see…your product or service. You can significantly increase your public image and sales by playing ringmaster for local business and community events as well. This article can help you stake your claim to the center ring…and have other people pay you for it. I’m talking about self-promotion through co-promotion partnering.
Co-promotion partnering involves combining the resources of multiple “stakeholders” through partnering, rooted in the barter economy of yesteryear. This allows individual participants to maximize their return on minimal marketing investments. The best news of all is that the ringmaster or initiator of activity gets to choose the goals and the players involved.
Co-promotion marketing is a lot like puzzle building. First you need to see the big “picture on the box”…what is your goal or where do you want to go with partnering? Next, consider what you need to make your pictured future a reality…i.e., what do the puzzle pieces look like, and how many pieces are needed to make the whole picture. Then think about who the “stakeholders” are in the promotion or event you are considering. Potential stakeholders are the organizations and/or individuals who could potentially benefit in some way from what you are trying to do. Then come the key stages: stakeholder analysis and planning.
Barter relationships are based on the concept of trading goods and services without the intermediary of money. What you are really proposing with co-promotion partnering is a win/win version of “this is what I have that I would give up to get this other thing.” So think about the value the stakeholders can get from participating in the promotion or event…and what they can contribute in product and/or service in order for them to get that value. In other words…it’s back to sales 101, of identifying the costs, features and benefits, then presenting them to your target audience. You also want to consider possible objections and understand each stakeholder’s unique position, which would allow them to give you what you want from them.
When you are the ringmaster of the partnering relationship…your wants and desires are considered first. What do you want out of the exchange in order for you to make the desired reality happen? Like most true entrepreneurial activities…the idea originator (ringmaster) stands to gain the biggest benefit. When you are a promotional products professional, this can mean increased sales and visibility for you and your company.
An example in co-promotion partnering: Winning the right to host a Statewide Ambassador Conference in Flint, Michigan.
A few years ago there was a promotional products distributor in Flint, Michigan who successfully utilized this model. The distributor was running his business on a shoestring budget and wanted to make a name for himself as someone who could maximize marketing exposure for minimal investments. As many do, the distributor principal got involved in his local chamber of commerce as an ambassador, and soon became chair of the ambassador committee. In looking for how to best educate his audience about program vs. “product” selling…he remembered his mother telling him “actions speak louder than words.” So he looked for the biggest challenge he felt he could reasonably turn into reality.
As you may recall from the movie “Roger and Me”, Flint, Michigan had an image problem in the mid 1990’s. Being the birthplace of both General Motors and the UAW, Flint had recently been featured unflatteringly in a number of regional and national publications as well as the film. This provided the distributor an “opportunity for improvement” too good to pass up.
Opportunity Knocks
Ambassadors from chambers of commerce all around the state of Michigan met once a year for an “Ambassadors conference,” to share ideas, learn new methods of networking and servicing chamber members…and to co-promote other areas of the state. Hosting the statewide ambassador conference was seen as a feather in the cap of the host chamber…and it meant business for the winning community. The competition to host the annual event had heated up over recent years and generally the meetings were in resort locations or quaint tourist destinations…NOT industrial based places like Flint, MI. Therein lay the opportunity and the challenge to set the distributor apart from his competitors.
It wasn’t about “products”…this was clearly a promotional “program” where the goal of the program was to win the right to host the statewide ambassadors conference. Identified stakeholders were: The Promotional Products Distributor, ambassadors of the Flint area Chamber of Commerce, The Chamber itself as well as the chamber president and board members, The town of Flint and surrounding communities, businesses in the greater Flint metropolitan area, other local chambers of commerce in the region, and a new director of the Flint Convention and Visitors Bureau.
The first step was to convince the chamber president that as a club, the ambassadors could win the conference…and that it was a worthwhile goal for the chamber to support. This ultimately involved agreeing that it wouldn’t cost the chamber anything to win or produce the conference. The chamber president was a well-connected businessperson who liked to be at the center of attention. This became in important factor when the effort hit a roadblock in obtaining a donation of vehicles to use. The chamber president had the power to get the cars donated, but was only moved to action when a focal role in the project was developed for him.
In September, 1994, 17 Ambassadors from the Flint area Regional Chamber of Commerce, dressed in loaned tuxedos and carrying loaned two-way radios, were given a police escort (donated) to the annual statewide ambassador conference. They were driving nine brand new Buick Park Avenue automobiles (loaned by General Motors) with American flags and custom chamber of commerce flags flying from the cars like visiting dignitaries. At each official function of the two-day ambassador conference, the Flint ambassadors wore a different custom clothing item, emblazoned with chamber information and local business sponsors. They handed out lapel pins, stickers and “campaign” literature. When it came time to vote for the host of the future conference…all three competing chambers (all well-liked, trendy tourist destinations), conceded the race to Flint without a vote.
The Ambassador club of Flint, MI surprised several other Michigan chambers by winning the right to host the statewide ambassador’s conference in convincing style. At the center of the chamber’s co-promotion effort stood a promotional products distributor who was able to look past the “stuff” of promotional products and put together a convincing promotion that utilized promotional products and raised the distributor’s visibility as a problem solver in the community and brought new business his way.
Was it worth the time and effort required…you BET! The distributor netted $3,500 in direct conference related sales, and gained several new clients from the stakeholders he brought into the project. The distributor also added a new line of business to his portfolio…producing chamber of commerce membership directories for profit.
This model of partnership marketing can be repeated in many settings from chamber mixers and golf outings to your own company open house or other community based events. You don’t always have to be the ringmaster either. Participation as a member of a golf outing committee or non-profit board of directors can give you opportunities to showcase your talents as a promotional products professional while attracting and creating new business. Partnership marketing can also be seen when a number of local businesses combine resources to help a particular charity. Local charities and chambers are full of projects waiting for ringmasters…will you step into the ring?
In my next article, we will look at “Retrospective Pre-Action” as a planning method to help you realize your goals.