My wife and I recently took a business trip to Las Vegas (For my international readers, Las Vegas, Nevada is the largest city for gambling and entertainment in the United States). While “Vegas” provided an absolutely memorable experience, I realized it has a lot to teach us about how businesses get noticed. Among them were three key marketing insights that stood out to me in a huge way:
If people don’t know about you, you don’t exist
Vegas is one giant LED billboard. You see advertisements everywhere for everything – hotels, shows, restaurants, wedding chapels, and a surprising number of injury attorneys. In Vegas, if you didn’t advertise your business you did not exist. For example, the Fiesta Hotel and Casino was one of those businesses that sat “off the strip”, but because we saw no advertisements for it, it would never have been an option for us to stay there.
On the strip in Vegas, for a small price, you can take your picture with Pikachu, a Minion, Optimus Prime, a Vegas Showgirl, a potbellied Spider-Man, or even a guy dressed like “weed” (yes, that’s legal there too). They put themselves out there for hours on end, because they know if they can’t capture your eyes they don’t have any chance of selling you a picture with them.
In Vegas, there’s such fierce competition for your attention that if you don’t put up a sign, a billboard, some lights, a website, or just show up on the street in costume, no one will find you, and no one will buy what you’re selling.
To get people’s attention, sometimes you need to go a little over the top
In Vegas, you have unlimited options. Whether you’re into gambling, shopping, playing, adventuring, shows, getting married for the third time, or eating, there is no shortage of places to go to get those things. So, to capture your attention, what you find in Vegas are hundreds of thousands of larger than life signs, lights, LED displays, billboards, and other advertisements all leading you in the direction they want you to go. The Bellagio Hotel and Casino has a legendary over-the-top water show that is a must-see location in Vegas. Talk about marketing, the Bellagio’s Water Show attracts a captive audience every 30 minutes.
The lesson in business is that in this day and age, people have a multitude of options for whatever product or service they want to buy. In order to lure your customer away from everyone else, sometimes you need to go a little bigger, brighter, wetter and better so that you stand out as the only option for them.
Recommendation is the most powerful marketing tool
Our trip was built almost entirely on word-of-mouth. My wife and I sat next to a nice gentleman on the plane (Bob, a Vegas Veteran) who suggested an adventure that we never would’ve dreamed of. My wife and I are slight adventure junkies, so when Bob suggested that we take a helicopter into the Grand Canyon…well he had us at “helicopter”. Two days later, when we were finally taking off from the helipad, I was as giddier than a kid at Disney swimming in a pool of chocolate-covered gummy bears with sprinkles! The helicopter speed, the spectacular aerial view from 4000 feet, and the incredibly cinematic landing at the bottom of the Grand Canyon was more than a “bucket list” experience, it was the adventure of a lifetime. How did we discover this? Bob – along with 180 other five stars recommendations on Viator.com.
By the way, Bob was a retired Marine, going to an HVAC conference, and his adventure for the weekend was firing automated weapons.
We hiked Red Rock Canyon, saw a Cirque de Soleil show, went people watching on Freemont Street (old Vegas), walked an indoor replica of Venice, Italy complete with an indoor river navigated by opera-singing gondoliers. We did most of this based on the experiences of other people. It used to be that advertising or clever salesmanship would drive sales – and it still does. But today, other people are the great sellers of products and services. If you don’t believe me ask a little online retailer called Amazon.
Question: What is an example of a unique business insight that you learned in an fun, adventurous, or interesting way? You can leave a comment by clicking here.