Our small business customers that own entertainment centers vary in size, location, and industry (ie. trampoline park vs roller skating rink).
Competition can creep in even when you think that your business is untouchable or that another business isn’t in your industry so it’s not competition. However, we see local competition cross over into different industries all the time! A local hotel could be competing with coworking spaces to book their meeting rooms, or a bowling center could be competing with a sports bar down the street that just expanded their craft beer menu. #SmallBizProblems
While everyone is talking about Pokemon Go, I wanted to touch on something that most people aren’t talking about right now: search engines and content marketing.
Ranking in search engines for terms like “bowling in Austin, Texas” can seem like an easy achievement if you’re one of the popular centers in the area. If you have already checked that box off, great! But what about other terms that customers are searching for like, “fun things to do near me” or “best birthday parties for kids in Austin, Texas“?
Being found for these terms can help scoop up opportunities that may have otherwise gone to your competition in your industry or one that crosses over.
Identifying Search Opportunities – Auditing Your Entertainment Center
Do you journal about your business? Next time you have a staff meeting, have someone keep notes for interesting requests that they’ve received from customers. Someone might call in and ask, “do you host weddings?” and want to rent out your center, or someone might ask a manager if you can host their after prom party at your theme park.
Your customers have more than likely dropped hints throughout the week of big sales opportunities. Imagine how many more opportunities you could stir up if you were found for those search terms in Google!
If you begin to hear questions from customers that make you say, “I’d love to do that for customers!“, then it’s time to starting creating ways for them to quickly and easily find you for that business opportunity!
Create the Content, and Promote, Promote, Promote!
Search engines rely heavily on valuable content. Hundreds of things factor into what Google considers “valuable”, but adding content that solves a problem or answers a question better than the competition is a great place to start!
According to Party Center Software, around 50% of parties using their service are booked on a mobile device. We know their software (and recommend it), and think that number could be even higher if your customers could easily find your business online. That means you need to make it easy for parents to go to Google, search for “birthday parties near me“, and find your center! Written content is a great place to start!
We often use blogs as a way to create relevant content that entertainment centers can use to be found in search engines, share in email campaigns, post on Facebook, or use in paid advertising campaigns to educate their customers. Video is extremely effective, but written content provides your business with a very strong foundation that can be used on many different devices in different situations.
Real Life Example of Capturing Low Hanging Search Opportunities
Here’s how you could use search engines, social media and fresh content together to promote a private event rental next prom season (your sales team is going to love you if you stir up these leads!):
- Create a landing page on your website about Prom After Parties and Rental opportunities.
- Write a few blog posts that might answer a few questions related to after prom parties at your center. For example, you could write posts about “Safe Places in Austin for After Prom” or “5 Fun Ways to Make Lasting Memories After Prom”. If your content can educate, entertain, and edify, then it can also convert!1 and 2 will help with the search engines, but then you can also use 3 and 4 to push the campaign even further!
- Create an ad on Facebook targeting moms and dads of kids 16-18 years old in your area, and send them to the landing page about Prom After Parties.
- Educate your customers that are signed up for your newsletters about the opportunity to rent out your facility or host a prom lock-in
The world of content marketing can help you gain that extra edge that most small businesses and entertainment centers often skip over. When it comes to Internet marketing, the amount of misinformation and distraction due to new social media channels often leaves massive opportunities for businesses that are paying attention to the low hanging fruit. Grab it while you can, and establish authority before your competition figures it out first.
