Last time I took a 3 day kitesurfing holiday, I ended up coming home and collapsing on my kitchen floor. A quick ride in the ambulance and $3,000 worth of medical tests later, it was determined that I had become so dehydrated while on the ocean (kiting each day almost 6hrs straight) somehow my body slipped into toxic shock. So now I only kitesurf on the weekends, I tone it down and I mix in some mountain biking when I can (thank you Ventana).
Which brings up Ocean Kayaking. For years, no desire whatsoever to me. But now that I'm getting up there in age, the thought of cruising around on the ocean (with fresh water to drink) and take it easy is incredibly appealing to me.
I am an outdoor enthusiast, true and true. My entire basement, all 1,200 sq feet is packed to the gills with gear. I actually lose sleep at night thinking about where I am going to put this 16' water craft. But that is another story.
What appeals to me about the Valley brand is that it is a niche product. You can't walk into REI and find these, you can't find them at Dick's, but what you can do is walk into a small dealer (Kennebunk Maine), get some one on one service, get a demo on the product and then get support for life ---at least as long as the smaller retailer stays in business.
I really wish more and more smaller niche retailers understood online marketing. Here is the power. If Valley is only distributing its Kayaks through niche retailers, and the niche retailers are on the hook for holding the inventory, why don't the two get together and launch a co-op campaign that targets outdoor enthusiasts?
This is so easy to do its mind boggling. Valley could allocate a certain amount of its marketing budget to online. They could find a network like our Outdoor Channel, and then we could make sure that the ads are only targeted to a 60 mile radius around the cities where they have supporting dealers.
This accomplishes a couple of things. It drives retail traffic to the stores, it shows the stores that the brand is behind them, and by leveraging the reach of a targeted network, the campaign would most attract new entrants to the sport.....the kinds who may be more willing to pay full retail in the expectation of a demo and support. Why this in fact describes me!
So how did I find out about Valley? Did I look through the ads in the various print magazines? No. Did I have a friend who suggested one? No, remember I am just getting into this. So what did I do? Two things. One, is I found out about a group ride occuring in my area and I went into the parking lot to watch, ask questions, and then suvey the brands being loaded into the water. There were lots of Valley Kayaks.
Second thing I did was I went to the Valley website and searched their dealer database to find a retailer close to me. From here it was just a matter of swinging up to Maine to see them live.
But what I'm sure Valley completely understands, is that not everyone is like me. But what they should know is that I spend 4 hours a day online while at work, often visiting my favorite gear forums ( rockclimbing.com, gear junkie..etc..etc) and that with just ONE targeted ad to me noting that Valley kayaks were a niche brand and available in Maine -- a short 30 minute drive, the need for me to go to a parking lot and see the brands rep'd first to focus on Valley could have been avoided. What if I went to the parking lot and everyone was on Necky? Wilderness ?
The point here is that in order to succeed in attracting new customers, you have to be advertising where they hang out, even before they are in the market for your product. I'm going to explain this a little more in another post.
Which brings up Ocean Kayaking. For years, no desire whatsoever to me. But now that I'm getting up there in age, the thought of cruising around on the ocean (with fresh water to drink) and take it easy is incredibly appealing to me.
I am an outdoor enthusiast, true and true. My entire basement, all 1,200 sq feet is packed to the gills with gear. I actually lose sleep at night thinking about where I am going to put this 16' water craft. But that is another story.
What appeals to me about the Valley brand is that it is a niche product. You can't walk into REI and find these, you can't find them at Dick's, but what you can do is walk into a small dealer (Kennebunk Maine), get some one on one service, get a demo on the product and then get support for life ---at least as long as the smaller retailer stays in business.
I really wish more and more smaller niche retailers understood online marketing. Here is the power. If Valley is only distributing its Kayaks through niche retailers, and the niche retailers are on the hook for holding the inventory, why don't the two get together and launch a co-op campaign that targets outdoor enthusiasts?
This is so easy to do its mind boggling. Valley could allocate a certain amount of its marketing budget to online. They could find a network like our Outdoor Channel, and then we could make sure that the ads are only targeted to a 60 mile radius around the cities where they have supporting dealers.
This accomplishes a couple of things. It drives retail traffic to the stores, it shows the stores that the brand is behind them, and by leveraging the reach of a targeted network, the campaign would most attract new entrants to the sport.....the kinds who may be more willing to pay full retail in the expectation of a demo and support. Why this in fact describes me!
So how did I find out about Valley? Did I look through the ads in the various print magazines? No. Did I have a friend who suggested one? No, remember I am just getting into this. So what did I do? Two things. One, is I found out about a group ride occuring in my area and I went into the parking lot to watch, ask questions, and then suvey the brands being loaded into the water. There were lots of Valley Kayaks.
Second thing I did was I went to the Valley website and searched their dealer database to find a retailer close to me. From here it was just a matter of swinging up to Maine to see them live.
But what I'm sure Valley completely understands, is that not everyone is like me. But what they should know is that I spend 4 hours a day online while at work, often visiting my favorite gear forums ( rockclimbing.com, gear junkie..etc..etc) and that with just ONE targeted ad to me noting that Valley kayaks were a niche brand and available in Maine -- a short 30 minute drive, the need for me to go to a parking lot and see the brands rep'd first to focus on Valley could have been avoided. What if I went to the parking lot and everyone was on Necky? Wilderness ?
The point here is that in order to succeed in attracting new customers, you have to be advertising where they hang out, even before they are in the market for your product. I'm going to explain this a little more in another post.
