Your BEST Advertising Tactic?
Engage Your Employees in Casino Promotions!
Did you miss Raving’s Indian Gaming National Marketing Conference in San Diego this past January? Sorry that we missed you!
In my session, I shared a year’s worth of tactics for getting frontline employees excited about your promotions. Why? Because it’s one of the most effective ways to get your employees talking to your guests about them, which means that you don’t have to rely solely on customers remembering what they read in your newsletter four weeks ago or looking at property signage.
Employees hate to be the last to know about what’s going on in the casino. They like to be prepared to answer guests’ questions. And, thanks to TITO and other technology that limits the need for team members to talk to guests, giving them fodder to start interesting conversations with guests (and other employees) is a much-needed service and sales tool (and can be a way to boost tips!). Letting employees know your marketing goals and providing interactive opportunities to get involved (and rewarded) can “buy” you an entire sales force for getting the word out about your promotions.
To get you started, here are a few of my favorites that you can put into action, STAT!
SHOW & TELL: Whenever possible, put your giveaways into the hands of your frontline employees as samples. A few years ago, I had a client in Louisiana conducting their first threshold Earn & Get promo, giving away Mardi Gras-themed, bejeweled trinket boxes in exchange for earned points (proven very effective at driving visits and gaming revenue). By 1:00 PM on the first day, they had only given away 10 gifts, which surprised me. A look at the floor revealed only one sign at the players club and no display of the items, which meant that guests had to remember the promotion from a newsletter sent weeks before. By putting a trinket box in the hand of every security guard at every entrance, guests could see and touch the item, and be reminded of how many points they needed to earn that day. Within hours, several hundred gifts were earned and retrieved by players.
TEAM COMPETITIONS: Guests love interactive promotions! Most casinos have slot tournaments, but how about sports competitions? To get employees involved, the week before the player competition, we invited every department to send a team of employees to play in a contest. A few hours were designated, total scores were compared, and the winning team received a trophy and a pizza party for their department. You can bet that when the guests played, employees were talking about how much fun the competition was!
COOPERATIVE & COMPETITIVE CRAFTING: From Holiday Decorating Contests (which department can create the best Christmas tree, Gingerbread House, or Halloween pumpkin) to themed competitions (the most creative Mardi Gras shoebox float or hobby horse for your guest Live Horse Race), your team members love to design, build, and compete! Let the players vote on the results (one vote per club member), and you’ve got an interactive program that engages your employees and your guests. They’ll be talking about it for weeks.
