THOSE WERE NOT REALLY THE GOOD OLD DAYS AT ALL
Someone brought an old travel brochure into the DRI office last week. It was about scuba diving in the ‘British Caribbean’ and was a classic piece of pre-internet marketing; definitely from a different era.
It would be pretty easy to totally right it off dismissing it as irrelevant in today’s market, but — as old and completely out-dated as it is — it does have something interesting to tell us. Namely, there are so many more options for us to take advantage of now compared to when this antique was printed.
You may be a little antique yourself and remember that back in the early 1990s, when it was printed, about the only option for a dive shop was to print flyers like this one, hand them out or snail-mail them to hundreds of customers — at a considerable cost per unit — and hope a significant few signed up for a trip.
Worth remembering, or learning, that 30 years ago, there were no blogs, online videos, and social media posts to share informative content about scuba diving, and certainly no affiliate programs to build interest with other local retailers. In short, there was no easy way to highlight the benefits of diving, its unique experiences, the adventure it offers, any pertinent safety tips, and no personal stories on social media to help build a sense of community; nothing to share any of the excitement and beauty of diving.
Also, there was no nitrox, way fewer specialty programs, no “technical” diving, no overhead training — like advanced wreck or cavern and cave — and aids like oxygen administration and compressor operator courses were totally off-limits. And nothing to promote rebreathers, DPVs, twinsets or sidemount. Nothing beyond the basics to up-sell and retain customers.
Plus, the brochure mentioned nothing about special events, like equipment workshops, in-store book signings, or show-and-tell nights promoting upcoming trips. (Of course, back then, there was no simple way except perhaps a sign in the store window, to let people know any of this was happening.)
It’s true that the basic rules of marketing are unchanged. It’s still the case that selling everything from a large-screen TV and flat box furniture to a scuba diving course primarily involves identifying your target audience, recognizing what they are looking for, and then targeting your message to appeal to them. And in the diving world we all understand that another constant is that if your local diving is focused on tropical reefs and big pelagic wildlife, your message (and the courses and equipment you push) will not be the same as the shop within an hour’s drive of fantastic wooden wrecks preserved by four-degree freshwater. All that and perhaps that dive trips to exotic destinations have a universal appeal, and hopefully always will.
You may not be taking full advantage of all of the online and associated marketing strategies available in 2024.
You may not use smart apps and CRM software to regularly engage your customers.
And you may not have learned to adjust your approach based on feedback and results from previous marketing efforts — easily captured by a whole raft of online tools — but we are sure that you have a much easier time of it when a four-colour printed brochure was all there was!
We’re not suggesting marketing is easy today, but it is a whole lot easier than in the good old days.
