I replaced the handle cover and was finally done with the faucet repair. I had watched that faucet drip forever and was delighted to have completed the overdue plumbing project. For weeks, the drips, discreet and barely noticeable, had been whispering to me, “fix me, fix me, fix me”. Consistently, I responded in a hushed tone, “not now, not now, not now” because it was always inconvenient to start the repair job.
It wasn’t until I began calculating that hundreds of thousands of drips resulted in hundreds of gallons of billed metered water being drained needlessly into a capacity challenged leach field, that I saw the powerful effects of dripping water. It was time to make the repair.
While a dripping faucet is something to end, a drip marketing system is something you may want to start for your horse business. It’s a way to keep your information in front of your target market in small doses over long periods of time. You already know advertising works best with frequent message delivery rather than intense delivery during a short window.
Sure, it takes a long time to fill a glass of water with a dripping faucet. But if you’re not in a hurry to take a drink, does it matter?
As an example, if you drip market information about your summer riding camp or back to school lesson program over a periods of three to six months in the form of e-mail blasts, post cards and display advertising, your results will be much better than trying to fill a program three weeks before it starts.
When you are under pressure to fill an event with spectators and participants (lessons, camp, horse show, clinic, rodeo, trail ride) the drip method is replaced with the fire hose method. That is the information is no longer dripped but instead, blasted through a four inch hose at one hundred pounds of pressure.
Ever try to fill a glass with water from a fire hose?
The fire hose marketing method is too much, too fast, too late. Its not much different than attempting to load a green horse into a trailer for the very first time when you’re already late in starting out for the horse show.
Keep your marketing program methodical, simple and drip the information into your prospect’s glass.