Is Your Brand Ready to #OptOutside? How to Follow REI’s Bold Leap into Customer-Centric Marketing

For many retailers, the day known as Black Friday has become one of the most important dates on their calendar. Last year, shoppers in the US spent just over $9 billion on the day after Thanksgiving, counting for a sizable percentage of many stores’ holiday sales. This is why it was so surprising when outdoor equipment retailer, REI, announced that they would be closing all 143 of their stores this Black Friday and encouraging their employees and customers to #OptOutside instead. It remains to be seen if this bold move on the part of REI will make a dent in the company’s sales over the entire holiday period or if they will make up the difference elsewhere. What we do already know is that the early reactions to this decision have been extremely positive and there are some valuable lessons to be learned from this campaign from REI.

Customer-centric marketing is still marketing.

Make no mistake about it, this decision by REI is marketing. They have an entire section of their website dedicated to this #OptOutside idea and they are encouraging others to join them and to “tell the world.” A company does not take these steps for a simple announcement of a change in store hours. You go to these lengths for a marketing campaign. The fact that this is a marketing campaign should in no way take away from what REI is doing with this idea. They are voluntarily skipping out on one of the biggest shopping days of the year in order to do something that will benefit their people. Not only are they losing out on the sales from that day, but they are paying their employees to head outside! So this day is costing the company in a number of ways. Yes, this is marketing, but that does not also mean it is not an amazing and honest decision by this company. Marketing does not need to be a shady or deceptive thing, it simply needs to shine a light on your company. If you can do that while also doing something positive, that is a win-win situation.

Stay true to your ideals.

The main reason why this campaign from REI is so perfect is because it is absolutely in line with the company’s overall ideals. This idea makes sense coming from REI in a way that it would not if it was being done by Wal-Mart. That is not a knock on Wal-Mart, it is just the simple truth that this kind of a campaign would not be on brand for that retailer, while it is for REI. When planning your own campaigns, remember to remain true to your company’s ideals and mission. No one likes marketing that feels disingenuous, so by being true to who you are, your efforts have a much better chance of being well received.

Make the hard decisions.

On-brand or not, this decision could not have been an easy one for REI to make. There is no way to deny the fact that they will lose sales by closing the store on Black Friday. Still, they made the hard choice to follow through with this initiative anyway. That is an important lesson. Doing something new and unexpected is rarely easy. Sometimes it can be really, really hard. If you have thought through your plan and decided that it is the right direction for your company, you will need to make that hard decision and press forward. Depending on the structure of your company, making hard choices may require buy in from multiple people. Have these discussions and evaluate all the angles, but in the end, do not allow a hard decision to prevent you from making the right decision.

Do the opposite of your competition.

REI’s decision to shut their doors on Black Friday is so surprising because it is the exact opposite of what other stores are doing. Other companies are expanding their hours of operation, with many of them opening on Thanksgiving to get a jump on the shopping frenzy. A company that stands up and decides to take the exact opposite approach of what everyone else is doing gets noticed. When planning your own marketing or promotional ideas, look to what your competitors are doing and think about how you could turn the entire situation on its head. Dare to be wildly different and take the opportunity to show the world how you are different from your competition and why that should matter to them. Taking a unique approach can be incredibly powerful, especially in the world of the Web where everyone seems to be playing a game of “monkey see, monkey do” and just rehashing the same old campaigns and approaches over and over. If you want to break that mold, you can start by moving in the opposite direction of everyone else.

Tell the world.

The best marketing idea in the world will fail if you do not share that idea with the world. You need to promote your campaign so it reaches your customers and potential customers. In the case of REI, they didn’t just put a small sign on the doors of their stores to let customers know about their Black Friday plans. They shot videos, made a website, and created a whole campaign around their #OptOutside hash tag. When planning your marketing campaigns, be sure that you couple a great idea with a strategy to communicate it effectively. REI has done this perfectly and the incredibly positive reception they have received from people fed up with the ridiculousness of Black Friday has helped propel this campaign even further. All the while, people are talking about REI in a powerful and positive light. Yes the company may lose some sales on Black Friday, but what they are gaining in terms of public perception and promotion is priceless!

Have a plan.

In addition to communicating what you are doing with the world, you should also have a plan to capitalize on the results. REI is not stupid, they know that the business will still come and I fully expect them to run sales the rest of that Black Friday weekend. People who appreciate what the company has done for their employees and customers may make it a point to shop with them that weekend as a show of support. In the end, the company may even make up those lost Black Friday sales that weekend or over the course of the holidays. This has to be part of their ultimate plan – to do something positive and different while also positioning it in such a way that they will be able to recover anything that may have been lost. It’s a great plan for all involved.

In summary

REI took a bold stand in their efforts to break away from what every other retailer is doing with their Black Friday promotions. Instead of fighting for attention on that crazy shopping day, they have decided to take a different route. Because they stayed true to their ideals, made some tough decisions, and were unafraid to shake things up and be different, they are the store that people are talking about leading up to Black Friday, which is interesting since they are the only ones who will be closed that day.

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The "No Duhs" of Social Media

Ah social media. The latest golden goose to grace our world with promises of untold riches, a slimmer waistline and the perfect tan. The one every girl wants to go home with and every dude wants to be. The prom queen, the rock star and the cult leader all in one. Getting the picture yet? If you listen to the hype, social media is the answer to all that ails you and your company. It will increase your sales, touches and impressions by 800%...if only we could figure out how it all works. Truth be told, so much of what’s happening in social media is simply the infiltration of the same sheisty individuals who have previously occupied the world of infomercials and used car lots. If I had a dollar for every time that a “social media expert” followed me on Twitter, I wouldn’t have written this article, since I’d be chilling in Hawaii as the youngest retiree in the islands. But I’m not, so here we are. Given the omnipresence of social media these days, surely there’s something to it, right? The answer is yes, but it’s often light-years away from the hype and hyperbole. So how do you drill down to the real benefits of social media? You get back to basics. Hence the “no duhs.” There aren’t any quick fixes to make social media work for you. That’s why I don’t consider myself an expert in the field. I’m a social media grunt. I get in the trenches and get the work done, and that’s ultimately where you’ll find success. Without any further ado, the “no duhs” of your social media strategy:

Know your purpose

Before you ever set foot in the shared space of social media, you absolutely have to establish why you’re doing it:

• What’s brought you to this point?
• Do you have a specific product or line of products that you’re trying to sell?
• What’s your brand?
• What’s your mission statement?
• How have you presented yourself in other media up to this point?
• What do you expect to achieve?

Get the idea? Before you spin your wheels creating a Facebook page, setting up a Twitter account, broadcasting via a YouTube channel or utilizing whatever else pops up on the scene in the future, you need to have a good grasp of what you or your company hopes to accomplish. Define your expectations before you take the plunge.

Learn the platforms

Not all social media outlets are created equal. This may be the biggest “no duh” statement of all, but you can’t do the same things on Facebook that you can do on Twitter. You can’t run a YouTube channel the same way you create a music profile on MySpace. Do your homework. Each of these sites is like visiting a new country, or at least driving across the border to a new state. Each one does things just a little bit differently. Not all social media outlets are created equal.For example, I love good southern barbecue. For those of you who know BBQ, you know that I just made a sweeping generalization. What kind of southern BBQ? North Carolina or Kentucky? Western Carolina or Eastern Carolina? The same is true of social media. There are shades and variations of capabilities and opportunities, so you have to know what you’re dealing with before you can properly engage. Learn the culture of each of the various social media platforms. This will help you make good decisions about where to make your presence known and give you the understanding to make your efforts more effective. Facebook might be a great place for you to create a page about your products or services, while Twitter could be a waste of your time unless you have solid, regular bites of news and information to share.

Know your audience

This goes hand-in-hand with familiarizing yourself with the social media platforms and knowing your purpose. In the same way that you need to learn the culture, you also need to learn the language. When I moved to France as a teenager, it was one thing to pick up on the fact that there was a good bus system (culture) but quite another to figure out how to purchase tickets to ride across town (language). Learn who your audience is and how they communicate. Don’t assume that they’ll understand the jargon that you and your coworkers use to discuss your products or services. If you try using that lingo without some form of translation, you’ll end up alienating the very people you want to reach.

Be authentic

Of all the “no duhs,” this is probably the most self-explanatory. Just be real. Be real about your identity as a representative of a company; be real about the products and services that you provide. Don’t oversell or overhype who you are and what you offer. People can see through that, especially in the world of social media. It’s generally very easy to pick up on who’s legit and who’s not.

Be patient

This really gets back to the root of setting expectations. Unless you’re marketing the next iPhone or the next search engine (and good luck with that if you are), chances are you’re not going to have thousands or millions of people beating a path to become your fan on Facebook. It’ll take time for your company ad to get some traction on YouTube. Growing your Twitter following won’t happen overnight, unless you’re Ashton Kutcher. And honestly, does the world need another Ashton? Be realistic, and let your presence on these sites develop organically. Much like the language/country analogy, it takes time to get acclimated to a new culture and to become more effective at communicating according to the social norms of that culture.

Have fun

Admittedly, this final ”no duh” might seem a little goofy. But let’s be honest. Any time someone comes in with plans to formalize a previously underground environment (i.e. big business entering the world of Facebook), there can be a vibe of killing the party. Social media has taken over our lives for one very good reason: It’s fun! Take the time to invest in the lives of others.It’s fun to play silly games that measure your brain capacity versus your friends’. It’s fun to discover a new band or movie that your friends haven't heard about yet. It’s fun to retweet a good joke from a comedian you like. It’s fun (usually) to reconnect with old friends after years of being out of touch. Social media is, at heart, social. It’s meant to connect people. We form and build relationships (whether in person or online) because it brings joy and meaning to our lives, so don’t let the business of doing business via social networking sites rob you of that. Take the time to invest in the lives of others, and the riches that you reap will be far greater than can be measured in balance sheets and ROI calculations. By the way, if you’re just not a very social person, that’s all well and good. But maybe you shouldn’t be the one managing your company’s social media efforts. Seek out those who truly enjoy the medium, and allow them the time and space to explore the various “countries” of social media. Let them learn the languages and the cultures that go with each. Final word? A successful social media strategy depends on good old-fashioned hard work and common sense. Stay alert, and stay engaged.

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