2:50 — Cale Johnson introduces Doe-Anderson’s Todd Spencer.
2:51 — Agency Doe-Anderson has a 40 year relationship with Maker’s Mark and Todd is speaking about their Maker’s Mark ambassador program. This is a great example of a niche product that really engages with its target audience.
2:53 — Traditional marketing had companies speak to many to reach one. Today, we speak to one to reach many.
2:54 — Guiding Principals:
1. Always treat our customers as friends.
2. Consumers own the brands and they wanted to reinforce their ownership. They actually put 30 names on every barrel and have way for those people to talk to each other about their barrels.
3. Tell our friends exactly what we want them to do.
4. Be interesting and people will talk about it. For example, they created a fake Maker’s Mark vending machine with the message “You Wish” on it.
5. Everyone in the organization must play a role and embrace the mission.
6. Exceeding expectations is a full time job.
7. Surprise and delight is more powerful then a reward.
8. A peek inside the tent creates the conversation.
9. You have to keep it special. It is human nature to want things that seem hard to get.
10. You can’t be halfway in the game
3:05 — For 50 years, Maker’s Mark made one product and many ambassadors were asking for variations. They didn’t know what to do as they didn’t really believe in brand extensions. So, they created a product called Maker’s Mark 46 and decided to put it into the marketplace.
3:07 — It took 8 years to deliver 25,000 cases of Makers Mark and it took 8 weeks to deliver 25,000 cases of Maker’s Mark 46. Amazingly, they didn’t spend any money on advertising to sell those 25,000 cases.
3:09 — For example, they invited 500 (100+ accepted) people to their distillery to sample the new product. Those people went home and made blog posts, etc. This helped to drive awareness and demand for Maker’s Mark 46.
David: This was a very well done presentation that showed Maker’s Marks’ clear results by developing creative ways to engage their audience.
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