What the Super Bowl taught me about growing my Pilates Studio…
Carey Sadler of Rivercity Pilates
If you are a small business owner I think you’ll enjoy this story. Empowering others to inspire their life through healthy movement is my passion and I am a small business owner who is trying to figure out how to share my passion with the world by creating a business I love and one that is successful. Like many small business owners I’m a knowledge geek. I love the challenge of learning new things and then applying them to my passion, my business and my life to keep moving in the upward direction. I often find that my learning moments can come in some unexpected places…..like the Super Bowl!!
Like many of you I didn’t really have a team for this week’s Super Bowl and I have to be honest….I really just wanted to watch the commercials! Not just because they were cute and funny but because something I’ve learned from Becky is that one of the best places to study marketing and social media is during big televised events. By watching things like the presidential race(read Becky’s blog about this one!) , the World Series, TV shows (I often use this as an excuse to watch Big Bang and American Idol…), and the Super Bowl you can learn sooo much!
Here’s a few of my favorite takeaways from the big game:
- Emotions sell. I don’t know if you noticed but most of the commercials had nothing to do with the product the company was selling. Many of my favorites were ones that I could easily connect with and brought up “happy” feelings! Jeep did a great job of portraying “We don’t make the Jeep. You Do.” By the end of the commercial I was thinking of how my grandpa used to drive a jeep in the military and reminiscing to my husband’s Jeep he had when we were first dating…..I was feeling connected to everyone else who had ever owned or drove a Jeep. I also loved the Kia commercial as it spoke to my entrepreneurial (not sure if that’s a word!), passionate, getting ahead in the world side! I don’t like to be “the beige socks” so immediately I found this commercial intriguing, funny and relatable. I’m not looking to buy a new vehicle and I quite honestly couldn’t even tell you what the latest version of these companies vehicles were….. but that doesn’t really matter. Which leads me to number #2.
- When you connect to something you like to share it! I retweeted those commercials and made a comment. The connection those companies made with me (and millions of others) propelled their messages worldwide (genius way to spread awareness of your brand and product…).
- Fun, quick hashtags make it easy to share. The Kia commercial had the hastag #Pizzaz on the screen and I immediately was able to search on Twitter, find the hashtag and share it. Probably bigger than that is I still remember the hashtag and it reminds me of the Kia commercial I liked (great branding!) Budwiser’s #giveadamn commercial also stands out in my mind. This funny commercial didn’t sound like a commercial at all. When you first watched it you felt like Budwiser was doing a public service announcement by spreading the message of not driving drunk (how cool is that!)#Giveadamm is not a hashtag you easily forget and let’s face it who doesn’t want to share a great message like that with everyone they know?
So what does this all have to do with growing a Pilates studio that doesn’t have a million dollar marketing budget? Everything! First of all it re-emphasizes my commitment to write blogs, produce small Youtube videos, and content on our web site that connects us to people. By continuing to share my passion in a way that connects with others, I am able to continue to expand our reach, build our brand and spread my passion to the world!
It also made me realize how lucky I am to have found Becky at Farm Girl Marketing Solutions. These large companies spend millions of dollars to get their messages out to the world. As a small business my marketing budget is pretty small and I have to see a return on my investment to make it worth my while. Becky has helped me create a consistent social media and blog presence that continues to allow me to spread my passion to the world and continue to spend my days doing things I love!
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