Regardless of the industry, educating buyers is of utmost importance in moving them along in the buyer’s journey. In the foodservice industry, this practice of educating buyers is arguably more personal than any other industry.
Valuable content is a vehicle for companies like manufacturers’ reps to bring these potential customers right to their test kitchens to better inform them on foodservice equipment solutions. But what happens when traditional marketing strategies are leaving these test kitchens half-full?
Learn more about one rep who combined video and automation in their inbound marketing strategy to maximize their test kitchen attendance.
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The Rep
Pro-Pacific is a foodservice equipment manufacturers’ rep headquartered in Kirkland, Washington, serving customers in Washington, Oregon, Alaska, Idaho, and Montana. Pro-Pacific supports all foodservice market segments and provides training and testing of their equipment lines in their test kitchen. This allows their customers the ability to analyze the features of specific cooking appliances in an interactive setting before making a buying or specification decision.
The Challenge
As with most reps around the country, Pro-Pacific is tasked with filling seats at live demonstrations for equipment lines they represent. Their goal is not only to fill seats, but fill seats with qualified people who are interested in the products Pro-Pacific is showcasing.
Their past marketing efforts for these monthly and quarterly events focused on email marketing and direct calling, starting in January of 2017. By June, registration numbers were tailing off. In response, Pro-Pacific decided to make a change in their marketing strategy in order to reverse the trend.
What They Did
Video
Pro-Pacific harnessed the power of video to take the next step in marketing their demonstration events. Using their own resources, they filmed past events including shots of their executive chef, Chef Wade, demonstrating equipment and up-close shots of food. Just using iMovie and an iPhone, Pro-Pacific was able to create a short, minute-long trailer video to highlight what attendees can expect at these monthly events.
Email
Once the video was created, Pro-Pacific had to decide the best way to implement the newly-published trailer. Several email best practices were put into use to maximize the impact. For starters, they included the word “video” in the subject title. According to HubSpot, using the word “video” in an email subject line boosts open rates by 19% and click-through rates by 65%. The next step in the email marketing strategy was adding a video thumbnail, rather than an image, to the body of the email. Wistia tests show that compared to a linked image, a clickable video thumbnail generates an increase in clicks by over 20%.
Landing Page
Once the visitors clicked on the video thumbnail in the email, it took them directly to the event’s registration landing page. This is where the video resided. Aligning with best practices, this video was ideal for a landing page – it was short and provided the audience an up-close look at what they could expect by registering for the event using the form on the page.
Automation
Automation tools, like workflows, are the next logical step in this process. Using HubSpot, Pro-Pacific is able to automatically enroll attendees in SmartLists and set the attendees up with continuous touches as they move along the buyer’s journey, from qualified lead to eventual customer. Now, Pro-Pacific can follow up with the registered guests through nurturing campaigns with targeted email marketing, combined with old fashioned direct calling for an extra personal touch.
Ready to see what happened and how Pro-Pacific increased attendance numbers with these campaigns?