Viability Report: DSM Approaches
– Social Networking: Twitter/Facebook/ Instagram
Advantages
- Broad exposure at low cost to all segments E.g. over 200 million twitter users (Telegraph 2013)
- Easy to broaden following though re-tweets and sharing – more people within each segment
- Creates an interlinked online presence – all platforms can be linked increasing exposure.
Disadvantages
- Work and university computers may block social networking sites
- “Likes”appear to friends – surprise party planners may not interact due to surprise being ruined.
– Email Marketing
Advantages
- Cheap to produce. Distributed easily to a large group of people within all segments – 3.6 billion email accounts exist in the Uk 2013 (Radicati 2013)
- Personalized subject lines are 22.2% more likely to be opened (Adestra 2012) – appeals more to professionals.
- Different approaches can be easily tested and tracked to determine the best approach for each segment.
- Emails through to smartphones – 25% of 18-44 year olds always have smartphone next to them (Fast Company 2013)
Disadvantages
- May not be read if perceived as junk
- Timing of email determines views – Monday emails have the highest revenue per email – (Experian 2013). Professionals and students may be preoccupied during these times.
– Advert on Visit Manchester website
Advantages
- Party planners may not live in Manchester – would visit tourism websites to find/book activities
- Accessible to all segments
Disadvantages
- Young creative and local professional segments more likely to already live in Manchester – Less likely to use tourist site.
Priorities
- Social networking. Online presence needed to boost awareness and gain customers. User demographics growing with aged 55-64 being the fastest growing demographic on Twitter in 2013 (Fast Company 2013). All demographics can be targeted any time of the day with 189 million Facebook users being “mobile only”. (Fast Company 2013)
- Email Marketing. Can be used at all stages of consumer lifecycle and personalised to build relationship with customers. Latest statistics show 61% of emails are opened on smart phones (Amy Gesenhues 2013) showing the ease at which customers can be reached at any time of the day.
Issues & Risks
Social networking:
- Not in total control of content – customer comments could cause negative online presence
- Could be targeting people out of target audience – anyone can ‘follow’
Email Marketing:
- Perceived as junk
Issues and risks with discarding Visit Manchester Advert
- Disregards one of target audiences – Party planners, some of which may be arranging it a city i.e. Manchester, and use tourism sites.
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