2. Times have changed. We no longer have a marketing diet of just paper based ad-
vertising, or even radio shots. Newspapers, magazines and the like are not read
as much. Flyers are readily thrown away or ignored. Posters are just an occasional
reminder.
More and more time is spent on the internet. Services and goods are being sourced,
or the very least researched on the net. Hours more are spent watching video on
websites, let alone the time spent on social media sites, networking, photo and
video sharing sites, music based platforms and so on.
What follows are a series of ideas to move things along in these hard times.
Is it time to change the way
you market your busi-
ness, your venue.
There are options availbale
to you
In-venue
marketing
A large number of venues, pubs, nightclubs, bars and similar have screens in the
venue. These can be small or large. They may be used for TV programming, be it the
football, various other sporting events or something else entirely. They may be used
as part of the ongoing entertainment provided. Why not use them in the downtime?
Why not have something displayed, something running when they are not being
deliberately used for an event?

3. The uses of in-venue screens are manifold:
- advertising drinks promotions
- events listings
- wider advertisements of things in venue and elsewhere.
Above and beyond the above using prepared DVD’s or another feed those screens could be used
as promotional tools benefiting the venue directly, the pub chain and other venues and events
directly related.
This could include footage of previous events, artists appearing in the future, those who have
already appeared, 3rd party paid advertising, vox pops, advertising venues or pubs locally within
the chain or group.
Website and online video
Where the venue or the chain has a website, video can be directly embedded or links pro-
vided to another host, for example, youtube. This could include a wide variety of content:
- introductions
- staff and management messages
- retrospectives of events
- listings of events
- promotional content on services, offers and the like
- walk rounds or tours of the venue or various of those within the chain
- good cause messages.

4. Social media
campaigns
A lot of the time on the internet is now based around the use of social network-
ing sites. These are increasingly used by businesses as part of their marketing mix.
Venues are no different, or at least should be no different. Usefully they can be
quite cost and time effective if the strategy and campaign are sensibly worked out
and kept up.
As always you have to have a plan … cunning or not.
You will need to decide what you want to get out of such a campaign. The mix
of sites or just one platform can then be decided upon. From that basis you can
organise what the content needs to be and a timetable for making sure it is up to
date, accurate, informative, entertaining and pleasant.
A common mix of sites would include a facebook page, a youtube channel, possibly
a photo sharing site, perhaps a micro-blog or a full blog. It might be an option to
include a music sharing platform.
Usefully, most of these can be inter-connected making the whole a little less effort.

5. From your facebook page you can inform your fans of events, news about the venue generally,
promotions, offers, show photos of events and generally of the venue, share video of all that
goes on, get feedback from your customers, acquire new potential customers and events.
A youtube channel could be connected to your facebook page. Such a video sharing site (there
are others, including Vimeo), can host larger and better quality footage and so is useful in cer-
tain circumstances.
A micro-blog such a twitter or tumblr could give you the opportunity to update throughout the
day and further create a new audience, making you more approachable, as well, to your regu-
lars.
Flickr is a good photo-sharing site. It has to remembered, though, that platforms such as face-
book also have the capacity for photo uploads.
In the entertainment world a useful alternative is myspace. It has recently re-launched re-em-
phasising its old roots in music and entertainment. It also has the capacity to share video, pho-
tos, graphics and music.

6. Content
As we all know your promotional content says a lot about the
whole operation of a venue. Spelling mistakes, bad graphics,
bad printing all detract from the overall appearance of the
brand. This is it – it is all part and parcel of the general brand-
ing of the venue. A brand with a bad or below par face gets
ignored.
A few simple rules to get over this:
1. when you are posting on social media, make it polite, bad mouthing
people, even if they deserve it, it does not look good, if needs be just ig-
nore them
2. make sure what you post is accurate and up to date, nobody like being
mislead or messed about
3. uploads of photos and video, keep it clean … I don’t really need to
say why do I? It is best to keep it within the bounds of decency, unless, of
course, you are an ‘adult’ venue or similar. If it is funny and just about within
the boundaries then make a choice, but be careful, yes, it might go viral
but then again …
4. if you can do it yourself, do so, but have others look at
your work, they may see something you don’t. As with text
having a proof-reader has its advantages and its uses. Pho-
tos and video may look good to you but unless you have
experience or know what you are doing can look seriously
amateur to others
5. if you are unsure about what you are doing, whether it is
content creation or sorting out a strategy or campaign for
your social media, ask someone else, someone who has a
suitable background, ask a professional

7. 6. don’t overdo it or under do it, if you make a plan, if you establish a time-
table, keep to it, people will tend to look for stuff, content, news, statements
at particular times if they have been uploaded or renewed previously ac-
cording to a timetable. Such promotional campaigns are there to help give
your brand an identity on top of what you do in your general operations.
These efforts are there to give you a market presence. There one minute and
not the next is not going to help. When you make the plan, be careful, don’t
get over excited
7. make it interesting, you don’t earn much off a customer who is fast
asleep, you won’t earn much off a customer who thinks the place or the
event is boring,
8. be friendly and approachable, the gruff and grouchy landlord is not very
welcoming
Get in touch if you would like help with any of the above.
We can help not only with things such as the video, photo
or graphic content. We can also help with creating strate-
gies and campaigns for the above. We can do this directly,
by teaching others, or via teaching aids, tips, hints. For any
of this sign up via the links below
www.futurhoodav.co.uk
futurhood@gmail.com
For other business services:
f4mmedia@gmail.com
coming soon
- Second steps … business video, from basics on-
wards
Already available
- First steps, the basics of video and social media for
businesses
- Video and social media for the music world