A niche market is a narrowly defined group of potential customers. An often used technique for online marketers is Internet-based niche marketing. By appealing to smaller segments of larger markets, referred to as niches, a website can be developed and promoted quickly to uniquely serve a targeted and usually loyal customer base. The Internet has made the online landscape incredibly “efficient” by allowing businesses of all sizes to position their goods with customers that are seeking their products or services. An online niche based marketing strategy can disaffiliate the clutter and place your brand right in front of your core audience.

Before you can go out and market to your audience you need to evaluate your position. Are you a ‘digital native’ or an “immigrant”? What about your audience? Are they web savvy and hip to today’s online culture and technology? Do you have the right communication resources to reach your core demographic? If you do successfully reach them what will your message be? And will your audience understand it?

The growth of social networks such as Facebook, MySpace and MyYearBook.com, have made it increasingly easy to locate, segment, collect information on, and market to a particular audience. Blogging (i.e. WordPress, Blogger, Square Space), and micro blogging sites like Twitter, Posterous and tumblr have seen incremental growth in recent years as marketers utilize these platforms as a home base for their content (i.e. their message) to live. The ease of use and low cost of entry with chance of high return have raised marketer’s eyebrows across almost any type of industry.  This is a good thing right? Well, let’s contemplate this for a second. Doesn’t low barrier to entry cause clutter? And if it does, doesn’t that mean marketers will end up paying more to weed out the noise to reach their audience? Want to hear my thoughts and learn more. Visit Nichecircles.com and sign up!

You can also join the Niche Circles LinkedIn group. The purpose of this group is to create a network of marketing professionals with experience or interest in niche-based marketing. The group will promote thought leadership topics, generate discussions and encourage interaction among members. Click here to to join.

The adidas Originals MEGA Diner officially opened and was ready for business on July 30, 2010.  A commercial was posted to the adidas Originals YouTube page and a virtual MEGA diner was created on the adidas Originals website. adidas Originals announced: “Get in line with Paul Iacono for your own tasty MEGA Special, served up fresh by B.o.B. behind the grill. Enter the MEGA Diner online and our smokin’ hot waitress will take your order, leaving it to B.o.B. to deliver a custom MEGA Special personalized for you and your friends. It’s the biggest, baddest, freshest thing we got. Get it while it’s hot!”

To most people, this would most likely be seen as just another advertisement. To me it was a MEGA opportunity! And one that I had to jump on quickly while the campaign still had  full momentum. But why would adidas Originals and B.o.B ever want to associate with a small sneaker site - AllWhiteKicks.com? I remember thinking that they must find me somewhat influential since AllWhiteKicks.com was already a member of adidas Originals’ exclusive list of people they follow on Twitter. You can read my entire story about how that relationship transpired in my previous post How Twitter Helped Me Become An Influencer In The Sneaker Industry.

Jumping On An Opportunity

On Thursday, August 12 my wife (@katcadwell) told me she bought tickets to the B.o.B concert playing at the House of Blues in Boston on the 15th. At the time, I was actually mad at myself because I did not realize  B.o.B was going to be in town. I thought it was a golden opportunity that I had missed out on – if only I had known about this concert a week or two earlier I could have made something special happen through my connections with adidas Originals. After spending a few miserable hours moping, an idea finally came to me. It was a long shot but I had to try something. I was going to report live from the concert through my mobile phone and post the content on AllWhiteKicks.com. In addition, I would use Twitter for my messaging and flickr for my photos and videos.

I quickly relayed my idea to my contacts at adidas Originals. At first, my request was to see if I could get an interview with B.o.B himself. To my surprise, this far out request was not shut down. In fact, they responded quickly to my request and tried immediately to secure an interview for me. I knew from my time running events at Going.com that a two day window (one being a business day and the other on a weekend) would probably not be enough time for adidas Originals to secure an interview with their talent. As I waited patiently I knew I needed to find an alternative route to take advantage of this opportunity and bring my concept to life. My original idea was that the content from my interview would drive traffic. But it soon became clear that the content I created from the concert that would need to drive it. But how in the world would I get the word out about my coverage?

So once again I sent what I thought would be a far reaching request out to adidas Originals. I wanted them to promote the AllWhiteKicks.com coverage of the B.o.B event to their Twitter followers (30,000 +) and their Facebook group, which is nearly 3.9 million strong! Don’t forget, if people ‘like’ the event (1,000 + people did) on the adidas Originals page, my reach would be further extended through their network. On the day of the event I sent this request to adidas Originals asking if they would promote our coverage on their Twitter and Facebook communities. And sure enough, they said……YES!

A Shining Moment

AllWhiteKicks.com originated in a classroom at Northeastern University. My goal was to create a niche based website with little to no capital invested – the site was going to grow organically. I knew the sneaker world very well and also understood how competitive it would be. Thus, I decided to focus on one type of sneaker and own that vertical – all white kicks. As many people know growing a site organically takes a ton of time and a huge amount of dedication. I am not going to lie. Keeping AllWhiteKicks.com afloat through working full-time, planning a wedding (I got married June 13), and going to business school was an extraordinary challenge. But to me as an aspiring entrepreneur I believed in my skills and in my idea. And on August 15, 2010 all of my hard work paid off. AllWhiteKicks.com was introduced to the sneaker world. My brand (my idea!) was introduced to millions of people across the globe!

The Campaign

The day of the campaign my wife and I rushed to the Adidas outlet store in Wrentham, MA. We of course had to stalk up on adidas Originals gear. We made an entire day out of the event and created some pretty amazing content. To see the live event post from the day of the event visit here http://allwhitekicks.com/awk-bob-concert-boston/ and to see our follow up post after the event visit here http://allwhitekicks.com/awk-at-the-bob-concert/.

End Results

For all of you out there who have read this post,  you are probably thinking that while this is a great story, it did not make money. I say this to you all– It’s pretty hard to find a link or recommendation on AllWhiteKicks.com that is not part of an affiliated deal . The campaign delivered thousands upon thousands of page views. To my surprise I also had a few hundred people sign up for our newsletter. This is something we don’t push very strongly on the site.

The real success of AllWhiteKicks.com was not in this campaign alone. The true success lays within its organically grown route to grow traffic and gain the attraction of brands like adidas Originals. If you type “White Sneakers” into Google we are on the second page and climbing. If you type “White sneaker” into Google we are on the first page. When I started the site almost a year ago my first and most important goal was to gain a first page ranking for both of these terms. We are getting there!

Something To Ponder

• I achieved all of this with little to no capital invested
• I attended business school at Northeastern University (Part-time)
• I work full time as a director of New Media at a kick ass PR firm
• I had to help plan a wedding (Far and away the largest challenge – guys you know what I mean)

If I could achieve all this with all these other things going on then you can do it to! Just be sure to pick the right concept, develop the right message, and don’t give up. I can’t tell you how many people thought I was crazy and that AllWhiteKicks.com would never amount to anything. Well, now those who used to be opposed are big fans. Not only because they like white sneakers but because they like the story. The little guy made it!

As one of the first employees at Going.com (originally HeyLetsGo.com), an events based social networking site, I had the unique opportunity to build a community from the bottom up. I still remember my first day at Going.com – I was confused, lost and unsure of my new found profession. I had just finished graduate school and was previously working for the New England Patriots in their corporate sales department. I was well versed in the online space being that I had just spent two years in Emerson’s integrated marketing communication program. I had also picked up some awesome sales experiences during my time with the Patriots. Nonetheless, I still felt unprepared to tackle the initial challenges I was faced with at Going.com.

When I arrived at Going.com the site was solely Boston-based and the community had about fifteen thousand members. Later down the road, I would help launch their first major market – New York. However, my initial task was to focus on developing the Boston market. It seemed like a gigantic task granted the fact I had not the slightest clue on how to acquire members to a new networking site. My first instinct was to invite all of my friends that were currently on Facebook. But then I thought to myself, “well I could invite all of my friends, but it’s definitely not going to be a sustainable model.” In addition, I was unsure if my friends would even find the site valuable. At the advise of our CEO I decided to speak with the founders of Going.com to learn about their past successes. They had recently ran HeyLetsGo Fenway Fest, a popular event that drew just about 5,000 users to the website.

Video created by Roy (Co-Founder of Going.com)

After meeting with each founder for about two hours I had more information than I knew what to do with. They told me how the site started and how they initially got their friends to sign up. More importantly they told me how they got their friends of friends to sign up. My mission was starting to become clear. I now had a game plan to work from and understood how the offline to online acquisition strategy worked. I would have to create dozens of events and have people RSVP on Going.com. The HeyLetsGo Fenway Fest was only one single event. How was I going to duplicate this model over and over again? Creating and managing dozens of events at once would be almost impossible. Don’t forget I would also be on the hook to promote them. We had to create a strategy that would allow us to scale not only in Boston but in our upcoming markets.

Coming Together

We all knew that in order to be successful we were going to have to create a network of promoters (aka partners). Leveraging their events was going to be  a huge asset from both an online content and member acquisition standpoint. But, how in the world were we going to convince them to post their events on our site? We had to develop a pitch that promoters could relate to and see value in. The company was very excited to launch in New York. New York is without a doubt one of the nation’s most popular event-going cities. For our opening party we booked Albert Hammond Jr. to play at Hiro Ballroom.

If I remember correctly, this was the key event that allowed us to figure out our go-to-market strategy. Our newly hired New York city manager had been in the club business for years. He had managed multiple venues in both Boston and New York and had a reputation throughout the country for being a top club promoter. He was and still is today one of the smartest and most creative people I know. He brought to Going.com a wealth of knowledge that all of us respected and appreciated. When we all gathered for a meeting to discuss the promotion of the Albert Hammond Jr. event he had already materialized in his head how it was going to play out. He was going to give each promoter (aka partner) a certain dollar amount for each RSVP they drove to the event page. Once a person RSVP’d on our website they became a member and began to receive our weekly email updates. We were able to track the success rate of each promoter by providing them with unique URL’s that accrued the amount of RSVP’s they brought back to the site. As you can see from the event flyer above we worked with popular New York promoters Filter and GBH to promote the event which received 3,382 members for Going.com.

Integrating Our Efforts

Not to long after this event our amazing engineering team built a back end email system for our partners to use. This made our job’s as city managers a whole lot easier. Anyone who has managed a large email list will understand the costs associated with sending out emails through service providers. We built a system for our partners that allowed them to blast out their emails for free. It’s important to note that we never took the email lists they uploaded into our system. We would only acquire a member from their list when a person on the list RSVP’d to one of their events posted on Going.com. The email system was fantastic from a member acquisition standpoint because it provided a huge value add for our partners and allowed us to effectively control how much we wanted to pay for members (CPA model). It is important to note that we did use unique URL’s for those partners who preferred to use their own email systems.

Instead of worrying about throwing my own events I now had to figure out a way to grow a network of promoters in Boston. Lucky for me I was already close friends with one of the largest promotions groups in Boston – 6one7 Productions. I knew they had thousands of emails and were probably the most influential group when it came to Boston nightlife. After a few meetings 6one7 joined up with Going.com and started to promote their events on our website. In addition, we worked with 6one7 to throw some pretty awesome parties in the city.

As word spread of our parties and our site became more popular, promoters of all sorts started to outreach to us. I was fielding calls from charities, restaurant groups and music halls to name a few. It was important to us to have a wide array of events – not just nightlife. Either way, I was able to effectively manage dozens of events without even having to leave the office. Promoters would call me and ask if Going.com wanted to sponsor an event. They knew that we would only pay per RSVP so my risk of “sponsoring” any given event was low as it was directly ROI based. If they did a good job driving RSVP’s to the event they would be highly rewarded. For example, if we paid 4 dollars per RSVP and they drove 400 RSVP’s they would get $1,200 dollars. The Going.com team became very good at figuring out what type of promoters and events pulled best. I must note that we did not work with every promoter you see on the site. By working with leading influencers in each market it also attracted other promoters ( we had no prior relationship with) to use the site to host their events and manage their RSVP’s. It was starting to become cool to have your event sposted on Going.com!

Business Development

As the site grew my role eventually developed into more of a business development/sales role. Our go-to-market strategy and our growing knowledge of what worked and what did not helped us launch our next three cities: San Fransisco, Chicago and Los Angeles. We were becoming very popular and were attracting major press with all of our high profile events.

I had the opportunity to meet with leading interactive agencies throughout the country and work with nationally recognized brands including JetBlue, Stoli Vodka, Miller Lite, Malibu and Heineken. Below is a video highlight of some of our marquee events.

6 Tips: Formulate A Member Acquisition Strategy

I have five bits of advice to anyone out there looking to formulate a member acquisition strategy.

1. Figure out exactly who you want to target – keeping a narrow focus is always good.
2. Identify who the movers and shakers are within your core audience. Who are the influencers?
3. Understand your influencers. What are their strenths, pains, and weaknesses? How can you help them achieve their goals while accomplishing your own?
   
4. Develop a cost per acquisition model. It’s important to understand how much you are willing to pay for each member. This will allow you to control your costs and lower your risks.
5. It’s ALWAYS important to make sure when acquiring members you walk them through the front door of your site. Make sure your acquisition strategy some how relates to what you are about. For example, at Going.com having people RSVP to events made sense since we were an events social network.
   
6. Have a retention strategy in place to draw users back to your site after they have signed up.

Conclusion

My time at Going.com was truly amazing. The management team at Going.com was absolutely fantastic. It was a true entrepreneurial atmosphere that sparked excitement and encouraged innovation. Not many people get to experience the process of building a social network from the bottom up. I feel very fortunate to have been a part of the Going.com story and to have worked with some incredible people. Of course, I can’t include every single aspect of my tail here in this post. This is just a high-level recap of what I experienced from the early stages forward. I hope that sharing my story interested you and that my tips on developing a member acquisition strategy helped. If you have any additional questions please feel free to outreach to me here. Thanks!

Marketing has traditionally focused on the four “Ps”: Product, Price, Place and Promotion. Social media has morphed into the fifth, and possibly most important “P”: People. A people strategy is at the center of today’s dynamic and fluid social marketing mix. John Janitsch of Duct Tape Marketing has another take on the four Ps, and has turned them into four Cs for the social age: Content, Context, Connection and Community.

A people strategy is much broader, deeper and more profound than consumer targeting. It involves listening to and engaging with everyone who can touch or influence current and potential customers at all stages of brand interaction. Jeff Pulver is a savvy guy who has had his finger on the pulse of this dynamic for some time. “The social media revolution is less about “we the people” and more about “me the people,” Pulver said.

Social media has changed the way people interact amongst themselves and with their media. People play multiple — sometimes simultaneous — roles as receivers, creators, critics, advocates, transformers and transmitters of messages. Brian Solis’ conversation prism helps to put this mash-up into perspective.

A “Me the People” mindset changes the way companies strategize, organize, monetize and commercialize their business. This recent statement from Bob MacDonald, CEO of Procter & Gamble, sums up just how far a “me the people” movement can go: “What I would like to have is a one-on-one relationship with seven billion people in the world and be able to customize offerings for those seven billion people. Digital allows that relationship.”

Seth Godin’s insight into how this is driving change in C-suites is brilliant — the role of the CMO has changed from Chief Marketing Officer to Chief Movement Officer.

The stage is set. In 2010, social media has introduced the advertising business to its next big disruption. But this time the state of the advertising business is quite different. Advertising is struggling to recapture relevance. It is mired in murky fee-based compensation systems, dealing with loss of control and trying to keep up with the accelerating pace of media dispersion.

To read the full article visit Mashable.com


Information provided at Mashable.com

Like the ocean’s tide, fashions ebb and flow. Whether it’s an indie band, a type of beer, a style of facial hair, a cut of jean, or t-shirt with obscure references, all trends come and go. (And then come and go again with each new generation, so keep those keffiyehs somewhere safe for your future children.) The infographic above deconstructs the natural cycle of hipster fashion, using the example of a hat. Does this  line up with what you’ve seen?

(Designed by Emily Miethner)

Information provided at flavorwire.com

This video has over 2 million plays so you might have seen it once or twice before. As I watched it for a second time today certain points really struck me as interesting. The video points out that Ashton Kutcher and Ellen DeGeneres have more Twitter followers than the entire population of Ireland, Norway and Panama. Talk about having the whole world in the palm of your hand.  Why is this so impressive? They are communicating through a platform (i.e. Twitter) that has absolutely zero cost to maintain – not to mention worldwide reach. Take a look at the video below and then check out the rest of the post.

Why am I making such a big deal about the obvious? It’s because I wonder what will happen to all those everyday social media users in the upcoming years. You know the people I am talking about – the ones scratching and clawing everyday for another Twitter follower or friend on Facebook. From the research I’ve done I think it’s safe to say that a vast majority of people with an obscene amount of followers/friends did something offline first to build up their notoriety online. Take a look at recent YouTube sensation Greyson Chance. He performed “Paparazzi” by Lady Gaga at his sixth grade festival and later posted the video of his performance on YouTube. The point here is that he performed offline before gaining popularity online.

I wonder how long it will take for all those self proclaimed “social media” experts  out there to realize stardom does not start online (Of course their are a few exceptions – But very few).  It starts by developing yourself and your brand offline! To be honest I was one of the guys who helped build Going.com (Acquired by AOL) and I don’t even know what it means to be a social media expert. In my opinion they are marketers who understand how to communicate through the use of social media. Either way they are a core group of people who do help spread the use of social media. How long will it take though for people and organizations that listen and hire these “experts” to realize social media is just one component of a marketing campaign? Even grass roots social media efforts can’t stand – they rely on content!

Did Social Media Grow To Fast?

Taking a look back at the first video or by looking at the image below we can see just how fast social media grew compared to other media outlets. Wow! These numbers are truly staggering. But now that the storm is over and the dust has settled what’s next? Is it possible that social media hit us with such a force that we ourselves don’t truly understand it’s inherent long-term value? Would social media be different today if like TV it took thirteen years to hit a critical mass? I don’t know the answers – These are just some things I wondered while watching the social media revolution video.

What Will Happen To The Early Adopters?

I have witnessed more and more people dropping off of Facebook for a variety of reasons. Will the next cool thing be to not have a Facebook profile? Dan Yoder author of the article 10 Reasons To Delete Your Facebook Account states, “After some reflection, I’ve decided to delete my account on Facebook. I’d like to encourage you to do the same. This is part altruism and part selfish. The altruism part is that I think Facebook, as a company, is unethical. The selfish part is that I’d like my own social network to migrate away from Facebook so that I’m not missing anything (via businessinsider.com).”

It will be interesting to see what happens with not only Facebook but all the other social networks as well. If you think about it – entering into these networks is really not much different then entering into a matrix. Will issues like privacy and loss of control scare people away? I don’t know but I am seeing more and more of it each day.

Is Social Media A Fad?

I don’t think social media will ever go away. What I believe is that the way people perceive and use social media will change over time. It’s my prediction that people looking to make a big impact in social media will start to do things the old fashioned way – they will work to grow offline. Building your brand offline like Ashton, Ellen or even Greyson is what in my opinion people should be focusing on. I also believe that social media “experts” will mold themselves back into marketers and that the use of social outlets will be universally understood as an outlet for communication to promote an individual, brand, or company.

These are just of course my thoughts and opinions. I could be totally wrong. Please feel free to share your thoughts and don’t be scared to object to any of my comments above. All opinions are always welcome!