Saturday, February 9, 2008

College WOM and new media




Businesses are not the only ones using buzz marketing techniques to drive sales; in fact some colleges are doing it as well. Ithaca college, which happens to be my alma mater, has initiated a word of mouth marketing plan to gain awareness about a new dining hall service. The service, called myDtxt, invites students and faculty add their cell phone numbers to get discounts, coupons, and other promotional deals via a text message. To gain awareness and sign ups, the marketing department is handing out sign up cards and talking about the new program at every dining hall event plus have sent out notifications in the college email newsletter Intercom. They also plan to text a free coupon for a pizza to the first forty sing ups to get students to get pumped up and generate buzz around campus. This approach follows suit of many of the common word of mouth marketing techniques. Give out free stuff and let people spread the word. As far as text messaging goes, the cost is about two cents and the message has a 92% retention rate, meaning 92% of those who received the text remember the message. I will post back an update on how the program is going in a month or so.

2 comments:

Pietro said...

This was in my draft box and I thought I posted it days ago.. I know it says I posted twice on one day but that is not the case.

Kim Gregson said...

no it is the case -you posted 2 times on one day. So 5 points. We talked in class about making sure to publish.

Good post, current

I'd suggest changing the don pietro - you're going to promote the blog to professionals in the field and you might want to establish a relationship with them