When I first started in the Marine Industry I was shocked to learn that the new models were rolled out in the summer. This seemed to break-up the traditional selling season and not help anyone other than manufacturers.
In an effort to help boat show exhibitors move some of their previous years’ inventory during the challenging economic climate, the National Marine Manufacturers Association (NMMA) Executive Committee today approved a recommendation made by the NMMA Shows Committee to temporarily relax the non-current show policy for the 2009 winter boat show season.
The policy change makes it possible for exhibitors to display up to 50 percent of their previous model year products at any 2009 NMMA winter boat show, a significant increase from the traditional allotment of 20 percent, and is intended to help dealerships sell off their existing 2008 inventory.
“All 2009 NMMA winter boat shows will allow up to a 50-50 mix of 2009 models and clean, unused 2008 model boats to be displayed at this winter’s boat shows,” says NMMA executive vice president Ben Wold. “The NMMA Shows Committee, Executive Committee and staff understand the economic realities currently facing the boating industry and believe this one-time policy change will give dealers a prime opportunity to sell more product at boat shows over the next few months.”
Maybe these hard times will help push some positive change on the Marine Industry!
Bloomberg is reporting that Brunswick, maker of such notable brands such as Sea Ray and Boston Whaler has plans to close more plants and layoff more workers.
“Brunswick, whose Marine unit contributed 81 percent to 2007 sales of $5.67 billion, said it may fire as many as 2,700 workers. The company had 27,050 employees at the end of last year, according to its most recent annual report. Read full article…“
I hope seeing Brunswick take this opportunity to refocus on creating brands that get people passionate and stand for something. There has been a lot of talk of consolidation in the in the marine industry. While there is no doubt that we will increasingly start seeing this take place in wide boating categories, I see great opportunity for brands appealing to passionate niche markets such as fishing, wake boarding and sailing. I wonder what Brunswick will do to reposition its brands…
Are you looking where your brand lives and engaging the audience using your brand? Your boat brand or equipment brand is being discussed on the internet. Are you making time to participate in that discussion?
It is easy to dismiss the rantings of people discussing your brand on the Internet and deciding to continue turning your focus on shotgun marketing approaches. While I do not advocate abandoning traditional channels I urge companies in the marine industry to start searching for people discussing your products. You may be surprised to find out how passionate a core group of your customers are and how interested they are in promoting your company name.
While it is often countered that engaging these communities is just preaching to the choir, I would argue that it the sweet song of the choir that will entice other boaters to become part of your brands fraternity. I often hear the objection that disgruntled customers will flame a company on its own page. My response had firmly remained that your company will be flamed either on your own site or somewhere else on the net.
Having said all of this the company that I am currently working with is not directly engaging consumers online and does not give them a forum to express themselves other than email. I am and will continue to strive to allow customers to have a forum where I may engage them, answere their questions, and identify their concerns.
I was involved in a trial campaign using FetchBack technology and was impressed with the range of sites that my banner ads were appearing in. This technology has a strong capability to keep the conversation and awareness going long after a visitor has navigated away from your site and brand experience. There is no doubt that FetchBack helps increase brand awareness.
In the campaign that I was running success was based on completion of an action that resulted in a purchase. This was not the best measure as it did not take into account the number of people who returned to the site to browse, navigate or otherwise engage in our consumer offerings.
ScribeFire is a great Firefox extension that lets you blog straight from your browser without having to log into your blogs administrative panel. Just configure and go! This is a great way to share all of the cool content you find on the web via your blog. Just be sure to play fair and link back!
Erick Schonfeld posted on TechCrunch the slow down in display ad advertising, I would like to see how this is translating into slowdown within industries such as marine.
In the first quarter of 2008, the growth in spending on Internet display advertising slowed to 8.5 percent from 16.7 percent growth last year, according to estimates put out today by TNS Media Intelligence. Even with the slowdown Internet ad spending still grew faster than that for TV (1.7 percent), magazines (0.8 percent), newspapers (-5.2 percent), radio (-4.5 percent), and outdoor (2.5 percent). The overall growth of all advertising spending that TNS measures was flat at 0.6 percent growth over the first quarter of 2007. Read the full post…
Are advertisers increasingly switching to internet advertising or are they bunkering down with there old methods of print and radio now that times are tougher?
This Hitwise article about content aggregation vs. creation raises difficult questions about the role of content within lead generation websites.
“Aggregators are taking a larger piece of the pie but the size of the pie is growing with visits to content creators and all News and Media websites growing. The trouble is - creating all that content is expensive. It’s tough to justify the cost of content creation if those that sift and sort are gaining on those that create.”
Asks us a tough question about creating content vs. just aggregating it from different sources.Aggregation could be interesting to both increase page views and banner ads. However, content creation will need to find new revenue streams to stay afloat. Their seems to be an imbalance in this relationship that will need to be worked out.
There is no better way to use up a bunch of wilting basil than making up a quick pesto. You are than able to use your pesto to compliment pasta, vegetables, fish and even pizza. Follow these simple steps to a successful and easy pesto sauce.
Time: less than 10 minutes
Ingredients:
1 bunch of basil
handful pine nuts (walnuts or even almonds)
2 cloves of garlic
salt to taste
one tablespoons Parmigiano Reggiano cheese
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup water
Steps:
Wash basil and remove leaves from biggest stems.
Add all dry ingredients in a tall container or mortar.
Add olive oil and a couple tablespoons of water
Blend with immersion blender or pestle
Keep adding water until creamy consistency is attained.
Toss with pasta or spread on par baked pizza for great meal. Beware that over heating pesto will make it turn dark. If desired add 1 raw tomato, a 1/4 cup of sun dried tomatoes, or one can of anchovies. My favorite is with anchovies and plenty of nuts. If you decide to make your pesto with anchovies make sure that you run them under water for a minute to remove excess salt.
While still firmly in online marketing for the marine industry, I am taking a change of tactics and opening up the focus of my blog from exclusively the marine industry to a wider range of interests including food, luxury, fashion and travel as well as marketing for the marine industry. Tactics and strategies are applicable across several vertical markets. Additionally, I am changing the name of the blog from Online marine marketing to LaurentRains.com in an effort to build a greater personal brand and give people not necessarily interested in the marine industry to keep track of what I am up to and what I am working on.
I look forward to continuing to write, post and promoting brands, services and products that have passion, love and a determination to make to serve their customers.
This evening I was plowing through “Marketing to the Social Web” by Larry Weber and I came across the following reference to the Genmar Toughboats campaign regarding advertising as a conversation starter.
The “bubba tests” is one of the rare marketing campaigns from the marine industry that actually gets passed around the office via email and instant messenger. As soon as the campaign has a new installment it is immediately passed throughout the office. If asked even none boaters who have seen the advertisement will undoubtedly proclaim that Triumph boats are the toughest boats around.
So why exactly does this campaign stand out from the myriad of other Manufacturer advertisement that we so often see and forget in a never ending sea of boats. Larry Weber answers this question by quoting Triumph’s president,
“Why post the “bubba test” video online and seed it on boatrelated blogs and sites? “We can start a conversation with the consumer, and it’s measurable.”
This idea of starting a conversation with customers is the standout concept. These advertising messages are highly social engaging people with a simple message, “Triumph boats are tough” and providing people with the manner to spread that message, funny videos. However it took more than just posting the video and hoping for people to see it. This campaign actively seeded boating related blogs and other sites.
We must be active in seeking out these areas and transparent that we are engaging customers. They want us to show them our products and if we present a great product well are happy to evangelize to all of their friends. Get to the core of your product offering and engage your prospective and current customers about that core. If you want any hints check out www.toughboats.com.
