Local Marketing is the group of activities, messages and media channels that allow you, the Chief Mile Owner to immerse your organization into efforts to reach customers in a geographic area. These platforms help develop dialog and a level of engagement that ultimately, will determine your success as an organization. It doesn’t matter whether your organization is a dry cleaner, a restaurant or a bowling facility, the goal is to establish that connection and continue to grow it with meaningful exchange with the customer that into the community and build relationships.
Though generating revenue is the obvious goal, Local Marketing comes down to one word…ATTITUDE. When you make the decision to become an active member of the community, your attitude is all about giving people the right to craft their own experiences locally while empowering them to move beyond the jargon and corporate speak of many of faceless corporations that have set up in different communities.
It is a balancing act indeed. Make no mistake…It is not all just about attending the high school homecoming or sponsoring the local little league team. Local Marketing has evolved and is far more sophisticated. Those faceless corporations that were mentioned previously are allocating more dollars to execute local marketing and looking for better ways to reach customers on a more personalized level.
Being For most companies, Local Marketing comes down to strategic integration of four media platforms including:
- Owned (Engage Your Customers & Tell Your Story!)
Your owned channels are the touchpoints that give you the opportunity to deploy your message and establish an interaction. These platforms include your digital and social communication, any on-site communication (Point of Sale in the retail world) and would also include your website.
- Earned (Talk Value, Raise Awareness, Incent Trial)
Earned Channels are typically obtained through Public Relations, Community Outreach and possibly a giveaway or special promotion. The great advantage of our social media driven society is that one really cool promotion or giveaway can spread like wildfire without a lot of effort from the company. On the other hand, these promotions and opportunities, if not executed flawlessly can cause you a bunch of pain relative to social backlash or bad reviews.
- Paid (Amplify Your Message and Hit Em Right Between The Eyes)
Billions of dollars are spent each year on paid campaigns with not a whole lot of evidence to show whether the investment worked or not. The strategic use of resources is a huge opportunity that will be analyzed often as Chief Mile Owner.
- Activation (Tie it all together to generate buzz and frequency)
By far it is the coolest, but hardest part to pull off, the activation element brings you face to face with your customers. Whether you are offering free massages for referring new clients or offering an incentive for folks to join your loyalty club, the active interaction with your customers is (or at least can be) a rewarding and wonderful experience.
