Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Need Marketing Ideas

[Diane Simpson (dqs]

>We are in a rural area with extensive fields and woods on our land.
>We're close to a college town and the interstate.  House prices are in the
>middle to upper middle class range.  Also, Brunswick is an area that is
>attracting retired people.

>We're looking for further marketing ideas.  Any help would be greatly
>appreciated!
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Chris, is Two Echo cohousing the group that used to be Cumberland
Cohousing? I checked out the Cohousing Network web pages and Cumberland
Cohousing was the only cohousing project I saw near Brunswick. If this is
indeed one and the same, then several things come to mind:

1) All of your recruitment efforts so far appear to have been fairly local.
You mentioned distributing flyers, putting announcements in local papers,
getting booths at local fairs, letters to the editor, investigating
realtors, getting articles written in local papers, running real estate ads
(presumably in local papers) and having regular info meetings and site
walks. You mentioned that Brunswick seems to be a popular area for retired
folks, but it doesn't seem like your marketing materials are sucessfully
reaching this target audience. I can't imagine retired people looking at a
web site. You might think about writing a "pitch letter" to a national
magazine for retired people asking them if they would be interested in
writing about a new wrinkle in retirement living--one that offers both
community and privacy. First check out the magazines you are thinking of
writing to at the local library and find out what editor or journalist
covers the lifestyle beat. Then write them a letter, and follow it up with
a phone call about a week later. Keep a rolodex or some kind of file
indicating who you're contacted, how receptive to the idea they were, and
any other clues you get from whoever you talk to. For instance: if the
editor tells you the journalist who covers that kind of story has gone on a
three-week fishing vacation, make a note of that, and in the next pitch
letter you send or in the next phone call you make mention the great
fishing in Brunswick Maine.

2) I didn't see any mention of jobs or how large the nearby cities are.
(Again, I hope I have the right cohousing site) Although Brunswick may be a
very attractive place to live, I think that a) because you're not
attracting enough people locally you may have to reach farther, and b)
people from further away will need more explanatory text about the
surrounding locality.

3) You mentioned being close to a college town. Have you done any
educational type promotions at the university simply explaining the
cohousing concept to people? David Mandel has a great slide show about
Southside Park if you need and example of something already built. I
realize it's much more urban than Brunswick, but it explains the group
design process very well and shows how cohousing takes shape over a period
of time.

4) Who is your target audience? You mentioned retired folks, but it also
seems that Brunswick is almost like a nature preserve. If you could define
your target audience very precisely and rent a couple of mailing lists and
cross-reference them, you'd have yourself the makings of a successful
direct-marketing campaign. Let's say you think your community appeals to
retired people who are into nature. (This is a hypothetical example--I have
no idea what your advertising budget is) You might think about renting a
mailing list for a publication for retired people. Then you would also get
the mailing list for a nature club. If you wrote a brochure to appeal
precisely to this audience and sent it out only to the names that appeared
on both lists, you would have an excellent chance of landing some good
prospects.

5) Cross-marketing offers are very big in the marketing biz, but at the
moment I can't think of how this would apply to a cohousing project. Will
you be involved in any way in buying food from a local farm cooperative
that would give you a mention in their advertising? Are you using or buying
anything from any business who you think would mention you in their
advertising?

That's all I can think of for now...I'll write again later if any brilliant
coho marketing ideas come to mind.

                                  ------Diane:.>

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      @@@@              Diane Simpson  dqs [at] world.std.com
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