Question

Topic: Advertising/PR

Need Help Establishing New Ride Along Program

Posted by MarketingNinja on 4/5/2011 at 12:26 PM ET 500 Points
We are a B2C promotional products company who sells and ships over 250,000 products per year directly to the dorm rooms of our customers.

These are not the average college students. Our customers have more money to spend, and more time on their hands than most.

We are looking for companies who would like to reach these customers at this level with product samples, palm cards, stickers, ping pong balls, etc as ride alongs.

We are looking for both pay-per-insert sponsorships and affiliate offers.

Because of the level of trust and respect we have with our client base, we will only take companies who we consider to be a great match. In addition, we want to make sure that any company we work with generates a positive ROI by associating with us.

Does anybody have suggestions on how to:

1) Reach the decision makers of larger corporations who would be looking for such an opportunity?

2) Find a broker in order to get this program off to a fast start?

3) Find a company who implements affiliate programs for situations like this?

Thank you for your help!
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RESPONSES

  • Posted on 4/6/2011 at 6:53 AM Accepted
    My first reaction is that the students would be a great market for companies selling information products -- just one example would be test preparation services (GMATs, GREs, LSATs).

    I don´t know if playing the China card in either direction could make sense for you. One direction would be to find Chinese businesses that wanted to tap into an upwardly mobile western youth market. The lifetime value of a young customer is very attractive for products which have high loyalty factors, or high switching costs.

    The other direction would be to find a JV partner to replicate your successful business model in China for its own upscale student market. Granted the upscale segment is small, but it is certainly growing rapidly.

    For both directions consider firms such as www.alibaba.com This E-commerce platform was founded in 1999 by Jack Ma, an English teacher, who is now worth, according to Forbes, about $1.6 billion. Regards, James Hamilton
  • Posted by mgoodman on 4/10/2011 at 9:26 PM Accepted
    Just a quick observation: Affiliate programs don't usually work all by themselves. You have to first demonstrate that you have a solid business that will appeal to your target audience. Only then will people want to be affiliates.

    An affiliate program is not a substitute for growing the business yourself. It's a way to extend your reach once you've established the business and the marketing program's effectiveness.

    You'll still have to market to prospective affiliates, as they have many options and won't necessarily think of you first.

    And once you're there, you might consider Commission Junction (www.cj.com).
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