Scarcity, exclusivity & our word is our word

Posted by admin

Exclusivity is a part of every good campaign, and we’ve thus used it in ours as well. Exclusivity gives us a chance to focus on groups during our launch and gives the audiences (users) a chance to be part of something bigger.

Firstly, our launch drive is built on limited access seats. We’re not bringing people into the platform all at once - we’re running open gate windows for adding interested users onto the app.

Secondly, we’re introducing our app to a limited number of early adopters first - our initial set of users, instead of opening to public.

Thirdly, we will be working with handpicked super promoters throughout our campaign - everyone can not just become a promoter if they don’t meet the requirements.

Fourthly, our upcoming - and much sought after - ebook will be available for free to a selected group of promoters.  

All of this exclusivity is important for our application and our launch, alike. More than that, it is important for our users. We want our most valued users to get the attention they deserve right through the launch. It’s human nature that people in general like getting attention and feeling important. Also a part of human psyche is the fact the people fear scarcity. For successful marketing you have to build on these emotional aspects. Another important factor that I should mention here is that if you promise anything through your campaign then be sure to fulfill that promise. People may let you play with their emotions but nobody likes being taken for a ride.

Exclusivity: Tell the people that it’s all about them and do this on an individual basis. I am not saying that you treat all the visitors to your website exclusively; instead go for the early adopters. You can give them special offers like sneak peak to videos or photos. Make sure these are the people who get any info first so they feel special. If you do this the right way and make them feel like part of your team, this select group will do wonders marketing your event for free!

Scarcity: For this to work, you have to get the people excited about an event first. Build the hype slowly and gradually and don’t give away too much info. There are people who will be interested just because there is a shortage of tickets but you are catering to a wider market and for this reason you just don’t want last minute buyers. Get the people hooked from the very start so they know that missing your event would be a huge loss.

Once you have the people interested, you can subtly convey that there are not enough tickets to go around. This way they’ll queue up to get the “golden ticket” so to speak. This creates a sense of urgency and makes people take quick decisions. Another powerful aspect of scarcity is that it can help you increase the price. If you have built the hype in such a manner that people believe that the event is not to be missed at any cost then they’ll even pay more to get the tickets. Remember timing is everything, don’t be too early or too late or it will all boil down to nothing.

Final word of warning: keep your word. Don’t promise people something you can’t pull off.

When we open up our application for the initial set of users, only those people who know someone in the initial set will be able to request access instead of a full-blown public access. Anyone who is interested in trying out the application will have to find users to request access from. You can read our posts here and here to understand our strategies better.

Creating high impact launches - with minimum investment

Posted by writer

For most businesses, launches are important determinants of the future success of a venture. However, if you’re new in the market it’s often difficult to build that level of interest in crowds. Lets expand on an example that I mentioned in one of my previous posts of launching night-clubs. As a night-club owner, you want to attract the right audiences and create a lot of buzz at launch. The problem is that if people haven’t heard of you before, they will be skeptic about attending. If they don’t attend, your launch wont be a success. If your launch isn’t a success, it may never catch the popularity wave.

Lets face it, a $200,000 a year lawyer will not risk attending an unknown club launch if they believe the event will be full of railway workers. Likewise railway workers would rather walk on fire than attend an event full of lawyers.

The key is to create a story of the event being filled with the perfect crowd in the perfect venue for a perfect night out. When you know your crowd you will know what this story needs to be, and all you will need to do is get the story out.

Now if you know what you are doing, all of this can be achieved by using online social tools that are an ideal platform for leaking your story to create buzz. Lets take an example of how you can use Facebook in this scenario.

Target the early adopters. These people are the first to catch the fever and are usually the most active online.

If you get them on your lists, you’ll invariably create an environment of excitement around your nightclub launch. Of course, they won’t be easy to convince unless they see the value in it for them. Make it all about “them”.

Step 1: So, the first step is to create a virtual group on facebook of a cool usergroup who have great parties every now and then. You don’t have to mention the venues or details of the parties these people attend, in fact you can build a culture within the group where doing so is considered a taboo. Focus on group member’s party experiences & stories after a weekend, build excitement, promote their pictures — and the fun they all have each weekend! You want new viewers of the group to think two things: 1- these people are cool. 2- the parties they go to rock.

Step 2: You want to keep updating this group page with new activities, party ideas, themes, photos and all of the things that would attract your targeted audience as much as possible. Remember its taboo to mention a party venue, date or time. Promote the story pertaining to the event: 1- get people to start following the group in anticipation. 2- get them to share it with their friends. 3- get them to add stories and photos of their own nights out, in the lead up to your event. Remember the emphasis is always on non-disclosure of your venue or the date of your launch, though you would want to indicate a month. You may also want to promote personalities within the group as being the kind of people you want at your event. (always create that feeling of scarcity wherever possible).

Step 3: Suggest a “anything goes” policy (within the law), release parcels of information over weeks not days. Remember you are getting the crowd excited, by telling them the story where they can become the stars (if lucky). The story must reflect the perfect night out for these people. The key is to engage them into a conversation by having them participate in it. Get them to answer survey questions online (use survey monkey) about the entertainment or dress regulations, even crowd selection, make the group feel like they are organizing the biggest night out since the Beatles. The thought leaders, people who can move other people will rise to the top of this group through natural selection.

Step 4: As each thought leader puts their hand up you can leak a little more information to these people only, give them more detail regarding plans than you do for the rest of the group.

Remember don’t let them or the group know when the event will be held or where it will be, but you can leak details like the capacity, ticketing & how the selection process will play out. Give these people some ownership, give them something that sets them apart from the pack, its what they live for and you are going to need their support. Get your target audience excited about the concept of your launch party and begin syndicating this story through microblogging, use link baiting, photo tagging and other strategies to drive traffic to the group while the buzz builds momentum. Keep building the suspense until you have the group publicly asking how they can get tickets.

Step 5: When you have the numbers you want buzzing around the launch, outline your plans. Give the group a location but not the venue (address) and give them the date. Send out electronic invitations along with the party ticket capacity ensuring the number is well below the number of active members you have attracted to your Face book group (say 600 people). Be prepared to partition walls if you have to, ensure the venue size matches what ever crowd capacity you end up with. You are telling the story that everyone has bought into for this big night out, at the end of the night what you said will and must go down at all costs. You need to put your reputation on it and come out the other side.

Inform the hungry crowd that only people who RSVP as interested are eligible to attend. Make it clear that people are not to RSVP as confirmed, you don’t want to build walls around your story that you cant tear down if you need to. You want the group knowing that everyone wants to come without them knowing who will be there. Anyone who RSVP’s as confirmed is instantly deemed not-eligible for entry.

Step 6: If you have done everything well to this point you will have at least twice as many people that have indicated an interest in attending the launch than the number of people you have declared to be your capacity. Communicate the situation of scarcity to the group with concern for those who look like missing out. Do not allow yourself to become the door bitch whatever happens. Ask the group to decide on a door policy, have them fill out a quick survey about how to deal with the problem.

Now this is a multiple choice survey, so whoever writes it will want to make sure the group gets an option to vote for the lead personalities in the group to hand-pick a certain number of guests each from the list of people marked as interested. Most people in the group will know one of these leaders directly or indirectly which gives everyone a better chance of getting a ticket than your promotions team implementing a door-policy, its the choice I would pick.

Let everyone know that the leadership group will decide who receives tickets and these lucky people will receive text messages on the night of the launch event. Messages will go out between 9.00pm and 10.00pm and it will include the venue, directions & instructions for the midnight launch.

Included within the text message will be a pin number that can be used to open a locked doorway in a back alley (preferably) that leads them into a chamber where security will greet them.

Timing is everything in this game. Pick your launch night when the groups interest peaks - if you delay the hype may begin to wane and the result may even be a flop.

Its a fine line between getting this right and getting it wrong. Time your launch well, hit the right emotional triggers at the right time and you will see the results.

Your event launch will not only be full, patrons will have paid top dollar to get in. The marketing will have cost less than the security pin pad at the front door and all the people who couldn’t get in will spend the following week telling everyone about your club. More importantly you have already established a second tier of early adopters who all feel like they own the club, ensuring long term success.

Of course all of this is virtual instigated hype - some may consider it manipulative even. But again, nobody is forcing anyone to do anything against their will. If you want high impact launches without investing in promotions or losing out on ticket values or sales revenue because of freebies or discounts - this is the way to go. I’ve been involved in massively huge club launches based on this tactic alone. If you already have a market presence, creating online traction won’t require any virtual or artificial hype. A good example of that is how Techcrunch markets its conferences.

Creating scarcity in tickets and merchandising

Posted by writer

I am sure you have heard about how marketers often play with certain emotional triggers to entice people to act quickly. You can use the same principles of scarcity when selling tickets and merchandising to your audiences. Creating scarcity implies restricting the supply of the things that you are selling to create a perception of shortage. This becomes even more effective if it is bundled up with a promotional offer, such as a discount or bonuses.

Some people are indecisive or slow about making their decisions and often end up being too late. Scarcity puts them in a spot where they become more inclined to jumping for it rather than “thinking about it later”.

If they are on your lists, they already are interested in your services. Give them a great offer for a limited time and they might say “heck, why not”.

I have even used scarcity for high demand markets by increasing the prices up by 25%. This happened in an “open theater concert” that we were planning a few years back on the East Coast. It was going to be the first concert of that summer and people were already looking forward to it. Regardless of the prices, we would have sold a total number of 980 tickets for 980 seats. We decided to play with the scarcity approach to increase the prices up 25% from our usual rates for a limited time short supply. This trigger helped us sell all of our tickets in a record time and earn 25% more than we usually do from such events.