Now, I don’t actually think that you should shamelessly promote your company this or any other month, but it might be a good time to take a look at your marketing and promotion plan. You do have one, right? If not, then it’s definitely time to have a brainstorming session and come up with some new marketing ideas.
If you do have a plan in place, then someone should assess how the different marketing and promotion elements and the strategy as a whole are working for the company. Maybe you’d like to do this assessment yourself, or delegate this task to a less-biased individual.
Keep the elements that are working well and replace the ones that aren’t. And then consider if there are some new ideas or strategies you should be utilizing. Below are only three of the many, many things your company can do that can be incorporated into your marketing and promotion strategies.
1. Let everyone know what you and your company are doing.
You can do this in numerous ways, which include sending out a press release to local/trade media outlets, posting information online, and networking with local associations (such as a chamber of commerce).
Here are some of the things you should be getting the word out about: your involvement in a high-profile or unique project, your company’s growth (especially if you’ve hired a few more people), and your involvement with charity organizations.
But don’t be boring and just send out text – include high-resolution photos and videos of what you are up to. This grabs the attention of your customers and the press.
2. Engage with potential and current customers via social media.
Use Facebook, Twitter, and other social media to inform your audience of deals your company is offering.
Plus, you can engage with folks and share other helpful information they should know about HVACR, like when to change an air filter.
With social media, it’s OK to be entertaining and post things unrelated to your company or HVACR, such as something about a local event or what happened on this date in history. Just be mindful that what you tweet or post will still have your company’s name on it. Is it worth alienating customers and building a bad reputation over a poorly chosen joke or disparaging comment?
3. Host a contest.
This can be a great way to catch the attention of current and potential customers. Your contest could invite your customers to enter a drawing to win something related to your company’s services. Another approach to a contest is to have people vote on something.
One example of this from the HVACR industry is Emerson Climate Technologies is running a contest right now where people can vote once a day, until Sept 26. on their favorite compressor that Emerson employees painted, in honor of the Emerson’s 100 millionth Copeland Scroll™ compressor. You can see the painted compressors at http://bit.ly/NT6rME and in person at some upcoming industry events: AHR Mexico, Chillventa, Emerson’s Wholesaler Conference, AHR Expo and China Refrigeration Expo.
Make sure that you use the principles from the first two tips to share the news about your contest. Spread the word about it via your enewsletter, website, tweets, Facebook page, press release to the media, etc.
