With all the new media options available to businesses these days, it’s important to determine which best suit your business and how to best utilize these options.  With social media and electronic media being increasingly important for businesses, it’s key that they are used properly.  If used improperly, it’s very easy for people to opt out thus losing the link with these potential customers.  Let’s look at some specific platforms:

Bulk e-mailers:  Anyone who has an e-mail account, which is most of the population now, knows how annoying spam is.  If you’re a company sending out bulk e-mails as a way to communicate with potential clients, you’re a spammer.  So how do you avoid being too annoying and increase your chance of actually being read as people wade through the masses of spam they get daily? 

To avoid being too annoying, be selective about how often you e-mail your bulk list.  Here at GaitPost we send out 2 bulk e-mails per month to remind people about our deadlines.  Inevitably, we receive some requests to be removed from our bulk list and the odd piece of hate mail. (We’re sorryJ.) If you can build a strong list of contacts and take a few nastygrams, this is a really effective avenue for informing the masses about your company.

To increase the chances of people actually reading your e-mail, keep it brief and to the point.

Twitter:  It is for the dedicated because anyone who has any sort of “following” list has to spend some serious time reading all of the posts.  Make sure that your posts are interesting and relevant.  Twitter is not for conversations! It’s really important not to post too often.  It’s okay to post multiple times per day if you have something important to post, but if you find yourself posting every random musing you have, stop yourself!  If a “follower” is wading through too many of your posts and they are not even useful posts, they will simply “unfollow” you. 

Facebook: This medium can be a really useful tool for businesses.  This social media is particularly useful for interesting & fun tidbits, short newsy posts and gives companies the chance get feedback from their customers.  Remember there is an etiquette associated with using Facebook, mostly don’t overdo your posts.

The prevailing theme is moderation, don’t go overboard.  It’s just like a rider with really busy hands, sooner or later the horse will get sick of the over-communication and tune out.

It’s crucial when running a business to know your customer; meaning to have an idea of who your average customer is.  In the equestrian world, your target market could be very broad being all people that are involved with horses or be very specific to a discipline or breed.

This is much like knowing your horse and what discipline he or she is best suited for.  If your horse is a fantastic trail horse, you’re going to seek out trails that will provide enjoyment for you and your horse.  If your horse is a talented jumper, you will then seek out competitions which offer challenging courses along with good prize money.  And if your horse is especially good at being a field ornament, you’re going to find a lush field for them to put their grass gobbling skills to good use.

Once you’re familiar with who your products or service is most appropriate for, this will help you pick how and where to advertise.  The how being the way you present your product or service and the where being what channels are best suited to promote your business.  Some popular channels for promoting horse businesses are:

-Equine Magazines (yes, I’m biased;)

Examine if a regional vs. national is appropriate for you.  Also, is a discipline or breed specific publication better for your company or more all encompassing?

-Online ads

Banner ads on popular websites can be effective, especially for driving traffic to your own website.  Determine which websites have good traffic to their sites and also attract your target market.

-Horse Shows

Horse show venues often offer several different types of promotional opportunities: banners, sponsorship, vendor tables, prize donations, prize book ads, etc.. This is often a good way to target a specific group.

As a small business owner, wearing many hats is part of the job.  However, it’s important to delegate some tasks.  Often there is more value in paying a professional to do a job rather than doing it yourself.  Even if you are able, many times outsourcing can save a lot of time and frustration.  It’s important to know how your time is best spent as a business owner.

Many riders have the ability to start their own horses under saddle but may have a professional do it instead because they lack the time, equipment, guts, ability to stick a buck, etc.  Similarly, business owners may want to tackle creating their own marketing materials and will have much of the knowledge required but might lack the time, software, etc. 

I can’t stress it enough - image matters when promoting your product or service.  Consumers want to see a professional image of your product or service in order to gain confidence in your brand.  It is worth the investment of hiring a professional to create a professional looking image of your company be it packaging, advertising, website, or any other form of promotion.  What you save in not investing in your image, you will lose much more from lost sales.

Just like it’s important to choose the right professional to instill the basics in your horse, the image of a company is its foundation.

Continuing on my previous discussion on consistency (Get With The Program) and its ability to build company recognition, an important factor in this is branding.  You could pay a boat load for advertising but it needs to all relate if you are going to get the most value out of it. 

Branding your company means creating consistency across all of your correspondences, ie. using the same or similar logos, colours, fonts, styles, etc, so that the audience builds familiarity with your company.   

People become confident with consistency much the same way that horses do.  Many horses will spook when they’re introduced to a new jump but most will become confident after they’ve gone over it a few times and realized it didn’t eat them.  Or if it’s my horse, he’s always going to be suspicious that the jump might spontaneously come to life as a purple dragon and eat him. 

Take to the barn message:  Don’t keep people guessing, with the multitude of messages we receive everyday, make sure that yours is recognized.

The saying “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket” is ageless and holds true for many situations. In the equestrian world there are a multitude of ways that this saying applies.  Top level riders live by this rule.  If their top horse comes up lame they can’t afford to sit on the side lines until the horse is rehabbed, they always have a string of horses to call on so that they can stay in the game.  Additionally, riders who ride multiple horses per day build their skills and confidence at a higher rate compared to a rider who only rides once per day and always the same horse. 

This theory translates comparably into the advertising world.  When advertising your company remember to spread your budget out over various channels that you feel are beneficial to your company and within your budget. Ie. Print, online, radio, tv, word-of-mouth, flyers, etc...  The more places that potential clients see your name the more buyer confidence you will build.  Additionally, by trying various methods of advertising it will help you discover which types work best for your business. Tracking the response to your advertising is as simple as asking “How did you hear about us” and entering it into a log of some sort.  This will help you to plan your advertising budget each year so that you can get the best return on your investment.

Consistency is key, any successful trainer or rider knows this is how goals are achieved.  

An Olympic level rider doesn’t reach that level by casual riding, it’s through a program of intense training and competing.  This concept holds true as well for companies that see a strong return on their advertising dollars.  They have a program that involves consistency to build awareness of their brand in the market.  Just like learning to post to the trot, it takes a bit to become familiar with feeling the rhythm of the gait and to build the muscles needed to sustain it.   However, after consistent practice it becomes second nature.  Consumers gain recognition and confidence in a brand through repeated exposure to it as well.  So when the time comes that they need a product or service such as yours, they’ll know what to do.

This is not to say that companies must have a huge budget for advertising.  Determine your budget and then try to spread it out over as long a time period as possible.  

There are a lot of ways to parallel the riding world with the advertising world.  This will be one of the major ways that I discuss marketing in my blog, through relating the two worlds. I’m no advertising guru, I actually hate the term guru.  I think anyone who calls themselves a guru thinks that they know it all. It’s arrogant.  The advertising world is always evolving and there are always going to be new and interesting ways to promote.  Similarly anyone, worth their salt, who is involved with horses, knows that you never stop learning.  Horses always have something new to teach us and humble us.

My intention with this blog is to hopefully be of assistance to those horse lovers who have combined their passion with their occupation.  Maybe some of my experience can help you convey your message to others that are passionate about these magnificent animals.