Summary: a) Place Mobile Fan Club signs in your customer flow, right in the places where your fans look. b) Create interactivity using text-in contests and other ideas to spark true engagement and therefore, sign-ups and sales.

The Story:

I recently visited Psycho Donuts to see how our mobile fan club was faring with its customers. Sign-ups weren’t yet what we had hoped for, despite the wonderfully creative signage plastered all over the place (disclaimer: Signs were in place for just a few days so perhaps my expectations were a wee bit high

I brought a clipboard, a customer questionnaire, my eyes and my two (big) ears. It was a busy Saturday morning and the store was hopping – an ideal environment to observe the store’s fans.

After an hour of watching, listening, and conversing with customers, I learned that few people even saw the signs, despite their perceived prominence by me. Why? Well, the store is a visual delight for the eyes, with gorgeous, mouth-watering donuts and artwork all over the place competing for the attention of the store’s fans.

I watched what patrons did in the store. In order they:

1. wait on line (if there is a line) and gaze at the artwork on the walls
2. Peer intently at the donuts in the donut case
3. Look at the cashier while paying
4. Then leave with a bag or a box, with a few sitting down at the four counter stools.

Nowhere in this flow were our signs scrutinized. So I learned mobile fan club promotions need to be in the flow of where customers look. Once we realized this, Jordan and I began brainstorming all kinds of interesting placements: stickers on boxes, place cards in the donut case, being on the menu, etc. Not precisely rocket science, but then again, lots of little ideas become…The Tipping Point where lots of little things can make a big difference.

I also observed our sign is very promotional: Sign up, get specials. That’s ok and important. But Jordan has done an amazing job of grafting entertainment with donuts. So the store has great artwork by local artists, an Ad-Libs contest, a padded cell, and of course, those eye-popping donuts.

So, Jordan and I asked What if…we had a “Vote for your favorite donut” sign next to each donut in the donut case, where each vote is an entry into a contest to win artwork every X months? Or turning the paper Psycho-Libs game into an instant text-version? I could go on, but you get it: use the phone’s interactivity to power a higher level of customer engagement.

As I left Psycho Donuts Saturday morning, I felt like the time spent in the store, “in the trenches”, was time well-spent. As usual, there’s no substitution for getting out there and being on the front lines. And Jordan and I have an emerging plan to gobble up Mobile Fans.

In a future post I’ll let you know how it turns out.