Markers Mark Ambassador's Club & Creating a VIP Customer Program

I was introduced to Maker's Mark Amabassador Club by my friend Chaz Yoon (LivingProof.com, previously a colleague at eBay). Chaz described it as one of the most unique and compelling "VIP customer" programs. VIP program is a bit of a misnomer... since anyone who registers qualifies as a VIP. But registration alone signifies user activity and allows Makers Mark to continuously engage with fans.

What do ambassadors get?

- To start, their name etched on a barrel of premium whiskey that is aging. Photos during maturation are included. The concept of buying my own personalized whiskey is strange and fun.... and effective. I will certainly buy my own whiskey!

- Access to deals, events and special products (similar to wine clubs)

- A really unique holiday gift... which has to be relatively expensive to create and deliver. It's brilliant.

So how does this apply to you?

1. It doesn't take much to make customers feel special. Just some creativity and fun.

2. VIP programs can apply to more than just your highest spenders.

3. In a world of competition, differentiation comes from product, branding and customer relationships.

Yesterday, Living Social Sold 1.39 Billion Calories Worth of McDonald's Food.

Yesterday Living Social ran a promotion with McDonald's: $13 for 5 Big Macs and 5 large fries. With 15 hours to go, they have already sold ~260,000 deals... which equates to 1.2 million Big Macs. ~35,000 people shared the deal via Facebook (~13%). I remind you: the deal *still* has 15 hours remaining. What's this all mean? Of Big Macs alone, Living Social sold: 763 million calories 44 million grams of fat 60 million grams of carbs and 31 million grams of protein

When you add in the fries, the total dent is: 1.39 billion calories and 76 million grams of fat

Enjoy!

Reebok's Black Friday Promotion

Can you tell that there is a sale?Can you tell it's Black Friday? Even though this is a screenshot from Sunday evening? Fascinating that there is no product displayed whatsoever on the page. The entire page is a promotion for various offers: 20%, 30% and 50% off. I have to imagine the promotion would convert better if product was part creative...

Let's Not Blame Groupon for its Merchants' Mistakes.

I Found the article, Groupon horror: Bakery must make 102,000 cupcakes, via Washington Post Social Reader app (written about here).

The bakery, based in Woodley, received 8,500 requests for a dozen cupcakes, far above the normally 100 it produces a month. Brown suddenly had to make 102,000 cupcakes.

Brown's company only employs eight people, and she had to bring in an outside agency to handle the orders. The temporary agency cost her $19,500, effectively wiping out her year's profits, MSNBC reported.

This is *not* a Groupon horror story. In fact, Groupon did percisely what they are supposed to do: drive immense volume.

Rather, It is a horror story about business mismanagement and the consequences of poor forecasting.

It's a lesson to be learned for all businesses - although this example demonstrates how small / medium businesses can be more dramatically impacted.

Merchandising: Put Your Best Foot Forward.

mer·chan·dis·ing/ˈmərCHənˌdīziNG/Noun: The activity of promoting the sale of goods. It goes without saying that the act of merchandising and promoting should include putting your best material forward (in the web world, that would be "the best optimized, highest converting").

And with that, this is the product details page for American Apparel's basic t-shirt (which I imagine is their best selling product... and is actually a great t-shirt..... you just wouldn't know from this view):

NBA.com Demonstrates Common Oversight of Mobile E-Commerce / Promotion

If you read me regularly, you know that I have a major pet peeve around unoptimized (and often dysfunctional) mobile experiences. So often mobile is treated an extension of the web experience and that results in broken mobile experiences... and since so much of our content consumption is on mobile devices, the lack of attention to the mobile experience is both frustrating and foolish. Great example here from the NBA (who I have had lots of social advice for!):

The NBA has 3,000,000+ Twitter followers.

40% of Twitter's users access the service via mobile (not the web).

The NBA tweets a link to the newest pair of Nike Air Jordan 8.0 shoes:

Great promotion right? When you click on the link, the NBA Store automatically redirects all mobile traffic to a defaulted storefront / homepage. And thus the frustration: 40% of those who clicked the URL, with the hope of arriving on a specific piece of content, had to give up and exit.

Also funny, when you go the URL from your browser, you get another frustrating experience: a totally untargetted promotion (hello Canadian users!):

Amazon's Kindle Lending Club Makes the Already-Affordable Kindle Fire Even More Attractive

In the last month alone, I have purchased three books on the Amazon Kindle store (I use the Kindle app on the iPad)... had Amazon's new Kindle Lending Library program been live, I would have simply purchased the Kindle Fire and considered it an eventual cost-saving: - I've spent $40+ on books over the last month alone - The device itself is $199, now comes with effectively free books... and a gadget with much more

No brainer right? (big caveat: assuming content library is strong - it certainly appears to be)

And that's why Amazon is brilliant: - They changed the tablet landscape through pricing. - They used it, along with other launches, to drive Prime membership and usage. - They are now introducing a new way to deliver / consume books ... which has already happened to music (hello: Turntable.fm, Spotify, Pandora) - And yet again users have to ask if the Apple & iTunes & iBooks experience is worth paying more for than Amazon's (Kindle Fire, Kindle Store, ec)

Groupon's IPO Slideshow

I encourage you to read through Groupon's roadshow presentation that TechCrunch posted today. I find the last two slides most interesting: the future of Groupon as a product and what it means for growth trajectory. From the chart, Groupon clearly is betting that new product (Groupon 2.0) will energize a decelerating growth plan (Groupon 1.0). Groupon 2.0 will focus on the delivering more product, more often and in more targeted ways... and, more importantly (?), driving consumer retention: - retention & rewards - merchant ROI (calculators for ROI & Earnings) - Places and Now! deals - new Deal Types - Merchant Mobile Apps

Amazon's Kindle Fire: Great Product Page, Free Amazon Prime Trial

Amazon's $199 tablet, the Kindle Fire, is now available for pre-order. The product page is really terrific: colorful, informative, fun and all on a single page. It's great:

The Kindle itself is super appealing because of the price point (side track: but low price and being hardware agnostic is why Android has won such tremendous market share. Even if the iPad is a better product - and it may well be - the Fire's price point is so different that they functionality cannot be compared. If shopping for a Toyota Prius, you don't consider quality as compared to a Mercedes sedan).

The smartest bundle and promotion is Amazon's inclusion of 30 days of free Amazon Prime. Brilliant. Their goal is to make the Fire your home shopping device - and what better way to train users of that potential??