Should I Copy Marketing Ideas? – DSP 236

There’s so many inspiring and creative float centers out there, many of who keep coming up with ingenious new ways to get the word out for their centers.

What’s the protocol for borrowing marketing ideas like this? How does proximity factor into it?

Graham and Derek break down the nuances of marketing strategies and where to pull from and what to avoid. It’s all about etiquette.

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Transcription of this episode… (in case you prefer reading)

Graham: All right. Hello everyone. We are once again joined by Derek.

Derek: Oh yeah.

Graham: Who does a lot of marketing for us over at Float On, and is also one of the heads of Float Tank Solutions. Ashkahn is taking a little break from podcasting to spend some more time working on the upcoming Float Conference in August.

Today’s question is centered around some marketing, which is “another center in my town did a cool social media campaign.” Awesome. “How do I do something like they did without seeming like I’m just copying them?” The old copycat syndrome.

Derek: Don’t copy them.

Graham: Well, don’t rip off people’s brilliant ideas and pass them off as your own, yeah. That’s pretty much how you do that.

Derek: And that’s it for today.

Graham: Yeah, I guess any initial thoughts on that one? Because obviously, you do, you see all kinds of things that other businesses are doing. The world is, I don’t know. In normal business, it feels like if you see a bar that has a clever A-frame outside of it, and then you steal that idea, it’s like whatever. There’s a million bars around and stuff. In the world of floating, it being so small and tight-knit, I feel like there’s this bigger barrier to just being able to immediately take and use someone else’s idea without feeling a little bad about it.

Derek: And taking something from somebody in your own town definitely is a bigger no-no than let’s say somebody across the country that you liked their idea and you just reached out to them to go, “Hey that was really cool. Do you mind if I do something similar?” I think that’s perfectly fine because the only people who are gonna notice are the people in the float industry who follow everybody’s Facebook page anyways. I think in that realm, it’s okay to do something like that, but if somebody in your town did something awesome. You’re like, “Damn I wish I would have had that idea,” what do you do? I think you might want to take a step back and see where they got that idea. Chances are if it’s something cool on social media, they probably got that idea from a business that was not floating related. Maybe they saw a bar going, “That’s pretty clever. How can I wrap that into my floating business?” That’s probably why you thought it was cool is because it was so cool, they saw it passed around the internet and they go, “I’ll try to bend that to my business.”

That’s where a lot of the coolness factor comes from, is that kind of, memetic, this is really nice. I want to share it with others.

Graham: That’s a good point. It is very likely in fact that the great idea that you saw in your hometown was not actually original when that center did it.

Derek: Pretty much.

Graham: I would still say, I mean I always skip to asking for permission. If you see something cool, there’s no harm in just emailing the folks in there and being like, “Hey I thought that was really cool. Do you mind if I steal that?”

Derek: We don’t really have any details in this question on what was the cool thing, but I mean if there is something that’s a differentiating factor about your center that you can spin into this modified rip-off, then maybe do that. What sets your center apart from theirs? Maybe you do something very similar to what they did, but then put your own flavor on it. Not a direct image-for-image, wording-for-wording copy, but make it your own.

Graham: Right. Let’s just assume for the sake of simplicity that it’s some kind of free float giveaway motivated by comments of some sort. That’s the kind of social media thing that they’re doing just to make it more concrete. In this case, you’re saying, well maybe figure out something that ties directly into the things you’re trying to accomplish with your specific center that ties into the giveaway or maybe figure out if it was like, “Hey comment with your own float story about how floating’s changes your life and we’ll give away some free floats.” Maybe you, on the other hand, say, “We’ll do this other thing, and leave some comments about you doing it, and we’ll be giving away free floats.” It doesn’t need to be just a direct almost point-for-point copy of what you were watching.

Derek: And you can often use that great idea as a jumping off point to make something better perhaps. You can take those elements and then wrap more elements into it. Let’s look at the giveaway idea. The giveaway idea is probably not the example of that awesome thing I want to copy. If it was something like that, and then you turned it into a scavenger hunt in your town, whereas the previous float center just did a, oh like my page and 10 people out of 100 will win a float, or something like that. Why don’t you say, “Like this page to follow details for upcoming things to look for in the town, and when you find those things, then you can turn them in for a free float.” So maybe taking the idea of a giveaway and adding more elements to it is how you play off of the other center’s idea and then make it your own, and better.

Graham: Sure. It’s almost like a cover song, or something, at that point. Sure, you’re using the chords and lyrics that someone else came up with, but it’s totally in your own style and might not even ultimately be recognizable as the same song when it comes out the other end.

Derek: An extra long tribute to that middle section of the song.

Graham: I mean, yeah if you don’t want to offend the other center in town, there’s A) figuring out if they even came up with the idea originally, B) just asking them for permission, C) changing the idea enough that it’s not a direct copy, in which case they can’t really be offended.

Derek: And if they had a great idea, great. Let them have that great idea. Work of your own great ideas. I mean, do that. Follow other influential small businesses in your town that somehow got buzz even though they don’t have a big budget. See if you can, again, spin it towards something floating, or even better, other businesses outside of your town. Start following small businesses all around to see what everybody’s doing to try and get the word out, and see something that inspires you, and go forward.

Graham: That is very true. Don’t have one idea. Just because you saw something cool that happened to be done in your town, doesn’t mean that’s the only marketing idea. If you spent an hour going out and just perusing other, not even float centers, but just other businesses, Facebook pages, and social media pages, and kept a little notebook handy, you’d probably come up with a couple dozen ideas just in that short time that you might want to implement in your own business.

Derek: And marketers have something called a swipe file, where they see something that’s awesome but they don’t know how to quite incorporate it. They put it into their swipe file. I’m swiping this idea. I’m gonna basically, when I come down to, all right let’s brainstorm a campaign. They start going through that file. I like elements of that. I like elements of that. I like the size of that font. I like that layout. I like that webpage design. Then they put it together in their own voice, their own brand, and their own uniqueness and come up with their own campaign that other people thought was great. It’s just like a compilation of the greatest hits, to continue to music metaphor, to create an album versus creating a whole album of your own.

Graham: That’s great. I really appreciate extended analogies.

Derek: I’m not even musically inclined. Coming with the musical references.

Graham: But you know what an album is.

Derek: Yes, CDs, LPs, or something like that.

Graham: All right. Anything else to add on this one?

Derek: No, I do like that fact that they are watching what people are doing and are aware of good ideas and trying to find inspiration, and that they should just keep searching. Things will come.

Graham: Cool. Well, thanks for the question. For any of you out there who have questions of your own, head on over to FloatTankSolutions.com. That’s our website. There’s lots of other cool stuff there too. But FloatTankSolutions.com/podcast is where you can send in your own questions that we’ll answer, just like this, if not better. Thanks everyone. Bye.

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