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Greetings once more - your favourite supplemental GAD fest is back again, taunting you with prizes you probably won't win like a carrot in front of a donkey. If you didn't love it, you wouldn't keep coming back.
Something a little different this time, in that this competition actually requires you to think a little rather than splatter your 'artistic' daubings on a banner :) What we'd like you to do is come up with some ways in which Special Reserve could promote themselves effectively. Bear in mind we haven't exactly got the backing of the Sultan of Brunei, we'd like you to drop us a few ideas on how best to get across the fact that Special Reserve are cheap, reliable and have a wide product range.
This could be improvements to ways we currently run things, new product ranges you think would appeal to our customers (bear in mind we currently sell rather a lot of stuff - see left sidestrip), new exciting ways to advertise our existing offers or just any ideas that have been floating round your head. Is there some range of products you just can't get hold of that would be perfect for us to sell? Let us know!
Post your ideas in this thread and we'll announce a winner at around the end of February, let's say the 27th. The best suggestions will win whatever prizes we give them, most probably yer standard £25/£50 GAD prize.
(And before anyone brings it up, yes we do think about this stuff ourselves, but we wanted to see what you lot think as well. So button it!)
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And the winner is..... phi11ip, for the following suggestion:
"Here's an idea, and if carried out correctly could be very beneficial. I've got a nice example too just to prove to you just how beneficial it is. www.staghosting.com was a free hosting service set up last year with the intention of boosting the ratings of a a few sites belonging to a company, one of these sites was www.actiondays.co.uk. Basically, unlike your free hosting, this hosting only offered hosting to domain names, you get 200MB disk space and 4 Gig bandwidth a month, you can upload from any connection unlike Freeola. So basically the company which has nothing to do with hosting has just set up a hosting site, sounds stupid doesn't it? What the requirements of this free hosting are though is that you must display a couple of small text links on your site, on mine you can see them on the links section on the side of the page. Google counts each link as a 'vote' and increases the pagerank of the site in question meaning that it shows up higher in searches, I see you've got 'cheap games' pretty much sorted but you don't show up anywhere when 'PS2 games' is typed in. If people were to display these text links on their sites it would soon make you appear high up on the search results. www.actiondays.co.uk was absolutely nowhere when it started, it had a low pagerank and didn't appear on searches. Have a look now though and you'll see that searching for 'corporate event' on Google.com returns the site as number 2 out of 6,500,000. Think about it. You've already got the hosting capabilities, all it would require is a server and someone to monitor the sites every now and then to make sure the links are there."
Congratulations and well done to everyone who entered.
Something a little different this time, in that this competition actually requires you to think a little rather than splatter your 'artistic' daubings on a banner :) What we'd like you to do is come up with some ways in which Special Reserve could promote themselves effectively. Bear in mind we haven't exactly got the backing of the Sultan of Brunei, we'd like you to drop us a few ideas on how best to get across the fact that Special Reserve are cheap, reliable and have a wide product range.
This could be improvements to ways we currently run things, new product ranges you think would appeal to our customers (bear in mind we currently sell rather a lot of stuff - see left sidestrip), new exciting ways to advertise our existing offers or just any ideas that have been floating round your head. Is there some range of products you just can't get hold of that would be perfect for us to sell? Let us know!
Post your ideas in this thread and we'll announce a winner at around the end of February, let's say the 27th. The best suggestions will win whatever prizes we give them, most probably yer standard £25/£50 GAD prize.
(And before anyone brings it up, yes we do think about this stuff ourselves, but we wanted to see what you lot think as well. So button it!)
---------------------------------------------------------
And the winner is..... phi11ip, for the following suggestion:
"Here's an idea, and if carried out correctly could be very beneficial. I've got a nice example too just to prove to you just how beneficial it is. www.staghosting.com was a free hosting service set up last year with the intention of boosting the ratings of a a few sites belonging to a company, one of these sites was www.actiondays.co.uk. Basically, unlike your free hosting, this hosting only offered hosting to domain names, you get 200MB disk space and 4 Gig bandwidth a month, you can upload from any connection unlike Freeola. So basically the company which has nothing to do with hosting has just set up a hosting site, sounds stupid doesn't it? What the requirements of this free hosting are though is that you must display a couple of small text links on your site, on mine you can see them on the links section on the side of the page. Google counts each link as a 'vote' and increases the pagerank of the site in question meaning that it shows up higher in searches, I see you've got 'cheap games' pretty much sorted but you don't show up anywhere when 'PS2 games' is typed in. If people were to display these text links on their sites it would soon make you appear high up on the search results. www.actiondays.co.uk was absolutely nowhere when it started, it had a low pagerank and didn't appear on searches. Have a look now though and you'll see that searching for 'corporate event' on Google.com returns the site as number 2 out of 6,500,000. Think about it. You've already got the hosting capabilities, all it would require is a server and someone to monitor the sites every now and then to make sure the links are there."
Congratulations and well done to everyone who entered.
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Nice one phi11ip, good suggestion!
But will you be using this idea AB1000?
But will you be using this idea AB1000?
Hmmm.
Okay.
Top marks to Phil for suggesting staghosting to me though.
Okay.
Top marks to Phil for suggesting staghosting to me though.
And the winner is..... phi11ip, for the following suggestion:
"Here's an idea, and if carried out correctly could be very beneficial. I've got a nice example too just to prove to you just how beneficial it is.
www.staghosting.com was a free hosting service set up last year with the
intention of boosting the ratings of a a few sites belonging to a company,
one of these sites was www.actiondays.co.uk. Basically, unlike your free
hosting, this hosting only offered hosting to domain names, you get 200MB
disk space and 4 Gig bandwidth a month, you can upload from any connection
unlike Freeola. So basically the company which has nothing to do with
hosting has just set up a hosting site, sounds stupid doesn't it? What the
requirements of this free hosting are though is that you must display a
couple of small text links on your site, on mine you can see them on the
links section on the side of the page. Google counts each link as a 'vote'
and increases the pagerank of the site in question meaning that it shows up
higher in searches, I see you've got 'cheap games' pretty much sorted but
you don't show up anywhere when 'PS2 games' is typed in. If people were to
display these text links on their sites it would soon make you appear high
up on the search results. www.actiondays.co.uk was absolutely nowhere when
it started, it had a low pagerank and didn't appear on searches. Have a look now though and you'll see that searching for 'corporate event' on Google.com returns the site as number 2 out of 6,500,000. Think about it. You've already got the hosting capabilities, all it would require is a server and someone to monitor the sites every now and then to make sure the links are there."
Congratulations and well done to everyone who entered.
"Here's an idea, and if carried out correctly could be very beneficial. I've got a nice example too just to prove to you just how beneficial it is.
www.staghosting.com was a free hosting service set up last year with the
intention of boosting the ratings of a a few sites belonging to a company,
one of these sites was www.actiondays.co.uk. Basically, unlike your free
hosting, this hosting only offered hosting to domain names, you get 200MB
disk space and 4 Gig bandwidth a month, you can upload from any connection
unlike Freeola. So basically the company which has nothing to do with
hosting has just set up a hosting site, sounds stupid doesn't it? What the
requirements of this free hosting are though is that you must display a
couple of small text links on your site, on mine you can see them on the
links section on the side of the page. Google counts each link as a 'vote'
and increases the pagerank of the site in question meaning that it shows up
higher in searches, I see you've got 'cheap games' pretty much sorted but
you don't show up anywhere when 'PS2 games' is typed in. If people were to
display these text links on their sites it would soon make you appear high
up on the search results. www.actiondays.co.uk was absolutely nowhere when
it started, it had a low pagerank and didn't appear on searches. Have a look now though and you'll see that searching for 'corporate event' on Google.com returns the site as number 2 out of 6,500,000. Think about it. You've already got the hosting capabilities, all it would require is a server and someone to monitor the sites every now and then to make sure the links are there."
Congratulations and well done to everyone who entered.
Doesn't really matter if it's already finished, another game to add to my collection isn;t going to go very far, I just got my loan, if I wanted a new game, I'd buy one, but I bought a PS2 linux kit instead :D
Erm, the competition finished over a month ago.
yeah good suggestions, loads of their stores are in odd towns like egham and sawbridgeworth which aren't student towns. Due to us being the people with most wasted money to freetime ratio and the most loving technology surely this is a good target area. I know they aren't looking for "new shop crap" but surely stores in areas with large quantities of young people is a good idea.
then as you say promotion through unions can be a major tool.
if shops isn't an issue, sponsor an event or two, in some students union, get your name about.
then as you say promotion through unions can be a major tool.
if shops isn't an issue, sponsor an event or two, in some students union, get your name about.
Well, I suppose all of the great advertising campaigns of all time have had a kick ass slogan, that's where you should be aiming your intelect at.
I'm not going to claim to be a marketing guru, but a quick look at some of the most successful campaigns and the biggest companies of all time go for a catchphrase, take note, who hasn't heard of:
Budwiser: Wasssssup!
EA Sports: It's in the game!
McDonalds: I'm lovin' it!
Nokia: Connecting People!
Some quick examples for this time of night. Anyway, the company lacks some serious advertising clout which would automatically register in people's noggins that this is an advert for Special Reserve, before they are told it's for Special Reserve. If people don't know before one viewing of an advert that's what it's advertising, they should never be allowed to forget.
So, simply, what you need to do is some serious brand placement strategies which scream of attracting attention.
So, without any further hassle, what you need is something which doesn't associate the company as being cheap, cheap = less quality or more problems with customer support, why on earth do you think Game are so expensive yet so successful? Everyone knows what they sell, Games, funnily enough, and everyone knows that give something 14 days, keep the reciept and you can change it, people will pay for that service, because they know that the company aren't just trying to offload cheap crap which they wont take back.
The next thing you need to do is some student union competitions. How many unis now run games courses? How many uni's now have games consoles/arcade in their unions? Very close to all :D
Student memberships with a further discount for the poor beggars on full price titles and hardware (something which game doesn't offer is discounted hardware to students), the occasional contest in a students union and some web based email sent out asking people to sign up to the SR weekly news email.
Which is what my main idea will be, revamping the SR news email, because basically it is crap.
We want, html newsletters. We want actual information about the game industry, and some special offers you are running, which all link to a comprehensive website community, which you already have if you hadn't noticed :D So, my big idea is to improve your email newsletter, and annoy the hell out of uni students and offer them a special student membership to the site. Students love cheap gadgets, you have loads, students would love cheap hardware console/PC, and I'm sure you could accomodate a little bit of discount for the sake of drunken midnight orders of games, just because the student loans of £1000 per payment are blown on hobbies within a few weeks of everyone getting them :D
I'm not going to claim to be a marketing guru, but a quick look at some of the most successful campaigns and the biggest companies of all time go for a catchphrase, take note, who hasn't heard of:
Budwiser: Wasssssup!
EA Sports: It's in the game!
McDonalds: I'm lovin' it!
Nokia: Connecting People!
Some quick examples for this time of night. Anyway, the company lacks some serious advertising clout which would automatically register in people's noggins that this is an advert for Special Reserve, before they are told it's for Special Reserve. If people don't know before one viewing of an advert that's what it's advertising, they should never be allowed to forget.
So, simply, what you need to do is some serious brand placement strategies which scream of attracting attention.
So, without any further hassle, what you need is something which doesn't associate the company as being cheap, cheap = less quality or more problems with customer support, why on earth do you think Game are so expensive yet so successful? Everyone knows what they sell, Games, funnily enough, and everyone knows that give something 14 days, keep the reciept and you can change it, people will pay for that service, because they know that the company aren't just trying to offload cheap crap which they wont take back.
The next thing you need to do is some student union competitions. How many unis now run games courses? How many uni's now have games consoles/arcade in their unions? Very close to all :D
Student memberships with a further discount for the poor beggars on full price titles and hardware (something which game doesn't offer is discounted hardware to students), the occasional contest in a students union and some web based email sent out asking people to sign up to the SR weekly news email.
Which is what my main idea will be, revamping the SR news email, because basically it is crap.
We want, html newsletters. We want actual information about the game industry, and some special offers you are running, which all link to a comprehensive website community, which you already have if you hadn't noticed :D So, my big idea is to improve your email newsletter, and annoy the hell out of uni students and offer them a special student membership to the site. Students love cheap gadgets, you have loads, students would love cheap hardware console/PC, and I'm sure you could accomodate a little bit of discount for the sake of drunken midnight orders of games, just because the student loans of £1000 per payment are blown on hobbies within a few weeks of everyone getting them :D
Hurrry up u lazy clods
*notices that i wont win*
mhr
*notices that i wont win*
mhr
Who is the winner,who is the winner?!I want to know,I want to know!PLLLEEESSSEEE.
Its been over a month now. :(
I probably won't win though.
I probably won't win though.
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