Page 112 - 100 Great Marketing Ideas (100 Great Ideas)

52 HELP YOUR ALLIES TO
HELP YOU

In many business situations, you will have allies. These are
companies that sell to the same target audience, but do not compete
directly with you. For example, people who read the local paper
obviously live locally and are therefore within your catchment area;
having the local paper on your side would be a good thing.

Sometimes it is possible to operate on a larger scale—especially if
you have a large number of possible allies.

The idea

When Tate Modern (the London art gallery) opened its doors it
needed to attract the kind of audience that would enjoy modern art,
and especially the kind of avant-garde exhibits that Tate Modern was
planning to show.

Tate Modern’s marketing team developed a profile of the type of
person they thought would be in their target group (always an
excellent starting point for any marketing activity). This included
the type of restaurant they were likely to patronize, the type of coffee
shop they would prefer, and the type of bar they would drink in—
not businesses that would compete directly with an art gallery, but
ones that would attract a similar audience.

Tate Modern arranged to supply Tate-branded chopsticks to Japanese
restaurant chain Wagamama, and 6 million Tate-branded disposable
coffee cups to the Coffee Republic coffee shop chain. Finally, the
gallery supplied Tate Modern-branded beer to the fashionable
Mash restaurant.

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