Digital Marketing in Northern Ireland: High Street Marketing Case Study 2014
Social Media marketing is a relatively new approach to help gain more customers. Its clever use of age old, time tested techniques modified using some digital wizardry to hit targeted consumers, has now become one of the cheapest and most powerful marketing tools companies have in their armoury.
Are all the high Streets in Northern Ireland are raking in the rewards?
Not yet!
We began suspecting that lots businesses on the high street were still not embracing ‘new era marketing’ at all. So we decided to conduct our own case study.
Chosen town? Bangor, County Down, Northern Ireland.
Why? Just. We had to pick a town and besides, our office is here so nothing personal Bangor. You rule. Whoop whoop.
We chose 131 shops; most from the high street, main street, surrounding roads and the Ballyholme area in May 2014.
Out of the 131 businesses:
31 are on Twitter: But only 2 were still actively in use.
91 are on Facebook: 29 of which had not been used recently, and a further 7 had profile accounts. (it is against Facebook’s business T&Cs to have a profile for business, which I will be discussing in our next blog).
3 are on google+: Not being actively used
79 have websites: 52 do not. Many of the websites are slow loading and outdated. Almost all of them are not very smartphone compatible, yet over half of all searches online in Norn Iron are done on smartphones.
Many email addresses would even be hard for computer savvy customers to find.
Are we falling behind Ireland and the mainland?
Based on our findings, it does suggest we are. In contrast, it also shows many shops are trying to adapt, opening accounts with the best of intentions, sometimes along with their new websites, only to leave them unloved due to the day-to-day running of the business, which should always come first. Or they witnessed no difference, so just stopped using the accounts. Digital marketing, when used correctly, will ALWAYS gain positive results. Marketers use all sorts of tricks to bring in customers, like the QR code (see our other blog post on the QR code).
A lot of independent shop owners these days have too many worries on their shoulders and feel safe concerning themselves mainly in what goes on within their four walls.
More importantly, not many shop owners can afford a digital strategy, or pay for a company like Ginger Basket Media to design one and run it for them. It can seem too much of a gamble for tradesmen and women who are unsure of its results, to invest in such a new concept.
Rates can be high. Staff are not cheap. Each staff member has hidden costs. Each shop has hidden costs.
What will happen when more competitors creep up, using clever combinations of digital and traditional marketing and begin renting shops to sell the same products as offline businesses?
I am sure shops owners will evolve by finding a tailored path of their own, perhaps aided in the future by a ‘now we have no choice’ mind-set. Or maybe the internet will implode, shut itself down and we will go bust instead. :-O
No matter what, our towns just would not be the same without the High Street.
We are always free for a non-sales chat with any shop owner over a coffee.
Oh, and if anyone out there who has a talent for social media knows any shop owners who could do with a few tips….. show them.
Let’s begin the Digital Revolution of Northern Ireland!
