Its easy to get caught up in the technology, the latest Quora/hashable app du jour… and trust me I love them all, but you have to apply every thing you do to real life. Often times that means taking a step back and thinking, simple right? Well most of us get caught up in our to do list, things that pop up unexpectedly, and then before we know it we realize that we missed our chance to prepare for the present.
That is why this year I am going to ask you to Market to the Calendar. Right now I am meeting with my GuestFeed clients and we are mapping out January into February. We are looking at the upcoming events at each venue, the holidays upcoming (Valentine’s Day) and planning out when and how the marketing of them will be most effective. You should be doing the same.
For one of my clients, I am laying it out like this:
January’s Theme: Emphasize the Authenticity of the Ethnic Menu Items (They are made by his Immigrant Mother)
Week One: Tweet and Facebook post pictures of the menu items, with messages that express the authenticity of each item.
Week Two: Continued Tweets with a GuestFeed produced video of his Mother making some of the items. An email sharing this video with the email subscribers, and also sharing the video on the restaurant’s facebook pages and twitter account.
Week Three: His chef is given a deadline of the 21st to have the first draft of the Valentine’s Menu ready. This is where the Marketing to the calendar comes in. We have a start date of January 28th for Valentine’s day marketing. GuestFeed will layout his menu, distribute it through all the channels, there will be in house marketing done at the restaurant for three weekends beginning with the 28th, and we will have the ability to send two emails about the Valentine’s day holiday without feeling rushed. During this time the restaurant will also be sharing photos, stories, the videos, its special event menus, etc… but the Valentine’s Day Holiday will be center stage in our minds.
I am going to cut the detail short here. What I really want to get to is that throughout the year your have to be thinking ahead marketing wise. The message takes time to form, distribute, reinforce, and be acted upon. Read that line again. What day does Valentine’s Day fall on this year? If you don’t know yet you aren’t doing it right. I don’t mean to sound harsh but I know how it is, I have been there, and that is why I am working to help as many small business owners as ask me to. I know that one of your waitresses just went on maternity leave, a bartender you relied on just took a day job, the grease trap has been leaking for a month and you can’t find the right person to fix it. I know that you have a disorganized mountain of paper on your desk, and ten other things to do.
Valentine’s Day is on a Monday this year. It has the potential for one of the best weeks of the year. Lets not let that opportunity pass, let’s prepare for it with that in mind. Thats what I am here for, if reading this is all you needed, great. If you need more I am here to help in any way you want. You can find me via comments here, twitter.com/spirocks, or spiro@guestfeed.com I would love to meet/hear from you.
Oh yeah, Happy Valentine’s Day Planning.
I am Spirocks on Twitter.