Outdoor Retailer - Summer 2016 - 16

THE PULSE

NITTY GRITTY

How Not to Spend Your
Marketing Budget
You think you know how to build your brand? Think again. You
may as well be setting that cash on fire. These expert tips will help
you maximize your precious budget and help you share your story.
by Mike Geraci
THERE'S NO WAY TO WIN.
That is what you're thinking as you try to make sense of all the traditional and social media
properties begging for your attention and budget. The sheer number of channels has seemingly
grown exponentially, but your marketing budget, alas, has not.
There are just too many choices that seem pretty good and similar. So, what to do? I suggest following the advice my tutor, Ms. Stubbs, drilled into my head as I was preparing to take the SATs for
the third time: "Process of elimination, Mike. Process of elimination!"
But, before we begin to look at where you don't want to spend your money, let's first establish
a strategic framework to guide our process of elimination so we aren't just randomly hating on
trends and tactics.
Because, as that great winner Sun Tzu may have written, "Strategy without tactics is the slowest

16 OUTDOOR RETAILER

/ Summer 2016

route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the
noise before defeat."
Strategically, don't think of your store as
specialty, think of your store as a subcategory. In marketing, subcategories are markets
related to the main category with unique and
distinct elements that reframe the competitive landscape and discussion. Greek yogurt is
a subcategory of yogurt, for example. Electric
cars are a subcategory of cars. Chobani doesn't
directly compete with Dannon, and the
Prius doesn't really compete with an Accord.
Similar, but different.
That means we are going to let the REIs,
Amazons, and Backcountry.coms of the world
compete to see who is the category leader. Our
subcategory strategy relies less on big data and
big budgets (and big discounts) and more on
our intimate connection to a unique culture
and the niche groups that exist just under
(sub) the mainstream. "But, wait!" you say, "I
do want to be mainstream." Have you talked to
Sports Authority lately?
You win when you are the champion of organic, novel approaches flowing out of your
area that the big boys-flying at 30,000 feet-
can't see.
So, with a subcategory strategy in mind, let's
look at what marketing spends don't work:

NO #1 - DON'T BUY JETS
Stick with me, it's a metaphor. Amazon, REI,
and to some extent Backcountry.com have
essentially established a no-fly zone for specialty outdoor retailers when it comes to mainstream media marketing and top-level SEO
and SEM campaigns. They have Pentagonsized budgets and small armies dedicated to
placing and optimizing these buys. You can't
compete with the firepower they have. But
you can win the ground war as the subcategory leader. How? Local, targeted, agile campaigns. More on that later.
NO #2 - SOCIAL MEDIA EXPERTS OR
AGENCIES
Outsourcing social media is like getting pregnant with donor sperm or eggs. You have a
pretty good idea of what you might get, but it's
not truly your DNA. (Let's not get into nature
vs. nurture here.)

Andrew Kornylak / Aurora Photos

Here's your
marketing budget.
We expect to see
the beanstalk
tomorrow.

http://www.Backcountry.com

Outdoor Retailer - Summer 2016

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