Training Your Audience

I'm sure a number of you have heard about Groupon, the online coupon service.  If you haven't you've probably heard of the spinoffs of the basic idea . . . the service offers a deep discount on a selected product.  The discount is only active if a certain number of people purchase the coupon in advance.

When it works (and in places like Chicago it works pretty well) a business can be hit with an onslaught of new customers.  That sounds like a good thing, except sometimes it isn't.

Check out this article about the side effects of such mass discounting strategies.  One part of the article really stood out to me.  An owner of a restaurant (Mr. Gibbs) talks about the behavior of some who used the online coupon.

"We just don't get the kind of customer that we want to come back," said Gibbs "It's a lot of people that come once for the discount, nobody tips, and they're all trying to squeeze it into the exact dollar amount."

Nobody tips.

That's the part that stuck with me.  Giving a tip at a restaurant is a very common thing.  Over the decades we have been trained to give a tip for almost any level of restaurant service.  Not tipping is generally considered bad social behavior.

But by offering a mass discount, the restaurant owner ended up attracting an audience that has a different sort of training . . . they are trained to get the deal.  Period.  The goal is ALWAYS to get as much as possible while spending as little as they can. 

I'm pretty sure the restaurant owner just wanted the bodies, he didn't want the behavior . . . but you can't really separate one from the other.  If you tell people to act a certain way, that's what you get.

By your actions you can train your audience to be generous (with you and with each other) or you can turn them into bargain hunters.  That's a particularly important thing for the arts to remember because we aren't designed to win a "get the most for the least" battle with our audience. 

We need our audience to be generous with their money, their time (in terms of volunteering) and their voice ( in terms of spreading the word about what we do).

I don't think those behaviors vibe with frequently discounting our tickets, paintings, musical downloads, etc.

Audiences respond in the way we teach them to respond.  Be very careful to avoid strategies (pricing and otherwise) that could create audience behavior that you don't want.

 

Comments

[Don Hall]

Excellent!

Further, be aware that marketing to everyone is counterproductive to your current audience's experience. More is not necessarily better. It's just more.

[Rachel Ciprotti]

Well, the place that mentioned nobody tipping was a bagel place, not a sit-down restaurant. I think that makes a big difference.

Personally, I always tip at coffee/doughnut/take-out places, but many people don't. It's not unusual.

Also, if these businesses had put a cap on the number of coupons available, most of their problems would have been solved right there.

[Ty Unglebower]

I think that more IS better, if it is more for the correct reasons. Giving away half-price tickets may or may not be the best way to attract a bigger crowd. But educating, sharing, reaching out to potential audiences, helping them understand what you do, making them feel that they are a bit more welcome to interact personally with the institution in question...THAT can increase the more productive kind of interest. That's where social media comes in.

[Adam]

Rachel,

I'm not positive on this but I believe that Groupon sets the cap (or at least the min. number of people that need to purchase) not the owner . . . but I could be wrong.

Ty,

We agree on the educational role of social media but that assumes that you have a group of people that want the education. What the Groupon experience often gives you is people that want a deal, not those who want to learn more. But I think Don Hall's caution about the pursuit of "more audience" is warranted.

[Eric Ziegenhagen]

Adam, did the one-day sale last winter work for you? Seemed at the time like a fair discount and a good deal. If it were a regular thing, I think I would be trained, better or worse, to anticipate it and buy then.

[Adam]

Eric,

It did. And that's why I'm not doing it again. It worked too well and I didn't want to create the habit. Plus if you do it every year, it stops being special. Also the structure of last season worked well with the one week sale idea. For various boring reasons, that's not the case this year.