Winter Sampling - Increase Trial While Your Competitors are Hibernating

Handit2 Winter Sampling - Increase Trial While Your Competitors are Hibernating

As the winter approaches many brands go into hibernation with their sampling execution; the brand team is content to wait out the cold weather while they plan their experiential sampling activities for next summer. While this is an understandable phenomenon, we encourage you to think about venue-based sampling as an innovative way to increase trial of your brand in venues that are in some cases at their busiest during the winter months.  With fewer people on vacation and fewer people outside, venue-based sampling during the winter months maximizes your reach in an environment with a roof overhead that is sheltered from the harsh elements outside.
Here are some examples of prime winter sampling opportunities with the Handit2 Network:

Fitness Enthusiasts - With New Year’s resolutions ringing in their ears, many consumers flock to health clubs, dance centers, martial arts centers, and ‘boot camps’ during the winter months.  Take advantage of this natural influx of new faces by sampling your product in fitness-oriented venues while the temperatures are low outside.

Moms - Daycares, preschools, and schools are back to the routine after the holidays, making them a prime location for winter sampling.  If your target is the mom of very young children, births keep happening regardless of the season!  Locations such as birth centers, childbirth classes, and OB-GYNs are great places to reach pre- and post-natal moms during the winter months.

Seniors - Senior centers, senior activities (typically at rec centers or community centers), country clubs, and retirement communities all provide fantastic opportunities for brands to reach seniors while they are recreating.  During the winter months a larger percent of senior activities happen in the ‘sun belt’ including Florida, Arizona, and southern California.

Pet Owners - Pets are adopted, boarded, and cared for all year including the winter months.  Winter sampling at kennels, veterinarians, pet hospitals and pet groomers provide a unique opportunity to reach pet owners at the moment they are taking care of their pet.

Women - Yoga centers, pilates centers, hair salons and spas all provide targeted, busy winter environments for sampling.

Men - Barber shops, health clubs, racquet clubs, and ‘medical offices for males’ (such as urology) provide unique opportunities for brands to reach men during the winter months.

If you are interested in increasing trial of your brand this coming winter let us know by replying to this email, or calling us at 303-532-4437

Out-of-Store Sampling to Drive In-Store Sales: It’s All About Your Geotargeting Strategy

Marketers have a variety of sampling tactics available (both offline and online) to drive awareness and trial of a new consumer product. Perhaps the most common sampling tactic is a sample handed to a consumer in the aisle of a big box grocery store, manned by a temporary worker paid by the hour.  While there are clearly advantages to this sort of in-store sampling (namely consumer access to the cash register to buy the product), there are lots of shortcomings too:

• In-store sampling is expensive
• The worker representing your brand is typically an unknown stranger who may not represent your product effectively
• The demographics in the store are all over the board (i.e. not targeted)
• There are consumers in-store trolling for free stuff (ANY sample) who put an anchor on your ROI analysis, making it much harder for the effort to payout

Venue-based sampling drives in-store sales with attributes that directly contrast with the in-store concerns listed above:

• It’s less expensive
• The worker representing your brand is typically the business owner or manager who has a pre-existing relationship with her customers.  She opted-in to receive the samples and is participating in the program because she likes your product and is willing to endorse it (not because she is being paid)
• The demographics of the venue are highly targetable
• The customers at these venues are not sample trolls; they are ordinary consumers going about their day who appreciate receiving an unexpected sample from a familiar face

Geotargeting is the special sauce that makes our venue-based sampling programs worth comparing to other sampling tactics.  Let’s say you represent a brand targeting seniors that is only sold at Target.  Our strategy could entail targeting sampling venues where seniors congregate (such as senior centers and retirement communities).  We would recommend that only senior venues that are located within 0-2 miles of Target locations nationwide would be eligible to participate.  Signage, samples and coupons displayed/distributed in the senior facilities would emphasize that the product is available at Target, sending the right consumer to the right store at the right time to buy the product.
To explore how geotargeted venue-based sampling could work for you brand, review our one-pager, reply to this email or call me at 303-674-0651.

Handit2 Network Launches Venue-Based Sampling in Canada

The Handit2 Network has expanded it's venue-based sampling services to Canada.  Some quick facts about venue-based sampling in Canada:

• With 35.4 million citizens, the Canadian market is about 1/9th the size of the USA's 318.5 million. (Source) 
• Two-thirds of all Canadians live within 60 miles (100 km) of the US border (Source)
• Canadian venue counts for some of our more popular sampling channels in the USA include the following:
  
  • 25,000 hair salons
  • 11,000 daycare centers and preschools
  • 7,000 massage therapists
  • 3,000 barber shops
  • 3,000 health clubs
  • 3,000 nail salons
  • 2,500 rec centers
  • 2,200 senior centers and senior living facilities
  • 2,000 colleges
  • 2,000 tanning salons
  • 2,000 spas
  • 1,800 dance studios
  • 1,500 martial arts studios
  • 1,000 summer camps
• Venue-based sampling in Canada is open to food, beverage, and beauty products.  Note that drug sampling is not legal in Canada (Source)

For information about sampling your brand to a customized, targeted group of consumers in Canada, reply to this email or call me at 303-674-0651.

Handit2 Network Launches 'Hand it to Stoners'

The Handit2 Network (based in Colorado), is launching a new sampling channel leveraging its geographic proximity to a quickly growing consumer segment, marijuana dispensary customers.

Our new Hand it to Stoners channel provides brands with targeted access to consumers who enjoy cannabis. They are an ideal demographic for sampling munchies. "We sell as many snacks as we do cannabis" says owner John Vangrow of The Pot Shop in Denver. "Sampling munchies would reach my customers right at the moment of need."

Colorado is home to more than 500 medical marijuana dispensaries and 150 retail stores, with more opening every month. Washington State is the 2nd state to legalize recreational marijuana with retail stores opening later this year. Projected recreation marijuana sales in Colorado alone are expected to reach $578 million in 2014 per Bloomberg.

Is there any demographic we can't reach? For information about sampling your brand to a customized, targeted group of consumers, visit our website.

7 Ways to Measure Product Sampling Success

How do you measure the effectiveness of your sampling efforts? Here are 7 strategies:

1. Compare sampling spend to purchase activity at retailers. By identifying retailers near sampling venues (the 'test' group) and tracking sales from week -2 to week 10 (week zero being the sampling campaign), sales lift attributed to a sampling promotion can be measured by comparing 'test group' sales against a 'control group' of retailers (stores where sampling is not happening nearby).
2. Measure change in overall baseline sales. While a product sampling promotion will likely show a localized lift in sales in the areas where the sampling took place, a national sampling program that precedes an overall upward trend in baseline sales is typically a strong indicator of sampling success. 
3. Measure coupon redemption. For a sampling promotion that includes coupons, measuring how many coupons were redeemed hints at sampling program effectiveness. Coupons adhered, polybagged, or otherwise bundled with a sample generally enjoy dramatically higher redemption rates than coupons distributed loosely (i.e. separate from the sample).
4. Estimate purchase conversion via consumer surveys. Reaching out directly to consumers at the onset of the sampling promotion and then again 8 to 12 weeks after the promotion to ask about purchase activity is effective when sales data is unavailable or difficult to analyze. Surveys are typically collected by phone and/or by email.
5. Analyze earned media performance engagement and traffic. Activity on social media doesn't necessarily translate to a purchase, but it does demonstrate brand awareness and interest. 
6. Collect feedback from consumers. A high percentage of positive feedback indicates the product was well-received and now these consumers are more knowledgeable about the product being sampled. 
7. Collect feedback from venue staff. A significant advantage to distributing samples in a venue-based sampling model is gaining the ability to collect feedback from venue staff. Positive feedback from venue staff is a strong indicator of sampling success since staff has an 'umbrella' view and can often speak for many consumers at once.

How do you measure sampling success?