5 Easy Steps to Hitting Sports Bar Marketing Plan Pay Dirt

The most successful bars, restaurants, and nightclubs invest in marketing tactics that drive immediate engagement — that is, tactics that fill the seats with customers ready to spend money. These value-driven strategies are the cornerstones of a bulletproof bar marketing plan. But with so many marketing options out there, what are the real building blocks of an effective bar marketing plan? What are the nonnegotiables of a bar marketing plan that can mean serious pay dirt?

In this article, we'll give you a list of the most fruitful marketing activities leveraged by the most successful sports bars. As a recognized leader in text message marketing for bars and nightclubs, we know what it takes to attract regular customers right away. Use the expert insights in this article to maximize your chances for bar marketing success.

5 Tips to Hit Sports Bar Marketing Plan Pay Dirt Right Away

Check out these proven and cost-effective tips, tactics, and strategies to maximize your sports bar marketing effectiveness and get customers lining up.

1. Identify the Sports Events that Interest Your Customers

Start by identifying the sports events that interest your customers most. When you have a better understanding of your customers' preferences, you can match those preferences with the right marketing messages. To successfully gauge your customers' interests, we recommend sending a text-based poll or survey. In this scenario, you can use a keyword and short code to send out the following message:

Which event do you enjoy watching the most? To vote, text 'BASKETBALL, FOOTBALL, SOCCER, HOCKEY, or BASEBALL' to 858585.

The best part is that most text message marketing providers make it easy to segment contacts based on customers' inputs. The most successful text message marketers use contact segmentation to send relevant advertisements, promotions, and marketing messages that align with contacts' interests.

2. Create a 12-Month Calendar

Try building a 12-month marketing calendar. Use this calendar as an opportunity to outline major holidays, offers, and food and drink promotions. A clearly organized and articulated events calendar helps to make sure that your team knows what's happening and when it's happening. Additionally, it'll help to make sure that you deploy timely and relevant marketing promotions and offers.

The most popular holidays and events worth considering are The Super Bowl, The Rose Bowl, The Stanley Cup Finals, Indianapolis 500, Daytona 500, March Madness, UEFA Champions League Finals, and The World Series Championship. When paired with a food or drink special, these events are a massive hit for any bar.

3. Get the Right Marketing Tools

Next, be sure to invest in the right marketing tools. Unfortunately, over-investing in ineffective marketing tools can waste precious time while you have bills to pay. With a limited marketing budget and rent due, you need to be super cognizant of your marketing investments. In our experience as a renowned text messaging provider, we know that text marketing is a proven and results-driven marketing tool used by the world's most successful sports bars, restaurants, and nightclubs. Additionally, you might consider investing in the following marketing tools and channels:

• Customer Resource Management (CRM) Software
• Content Management System (CMS)
• Email Marketing Software
• Social Media Management Tools

4. Build Your Customer List

After you've invested in the right marketing tools, it's time to use those tools to build your list of marketing contacts. There are a few methods for accomplishing this task including adding marketing sign-up forms to your website and social media accounts. Make sure that these sign-up forms "pop" visually and clearly state what subscribers will receive. Some savvy text message marketers will even promote their keyword and short code via offline sources such as printed collateral, signage, and more. This is a great way to get prospects and customers opted-in quickly.

5. Promote Events and Drink Specials

Finally, go out of your way to promote events and drink specials. As a best practice, consider sending out a marketing message one week before the event starts and again a few hours before the event starts. Additionally, it's a good idea to only text during daytime hours, so be aware of when your contacts are awake. If it's a multi-day special, it's always a good idea to deploy marketing messages one or two days into the event. Additionally, be sure to create plenty of printed material to post inside your bar and handout during other weekly events.

Invest in Marketing That Works

Following these sports bar marketing plan steps will, with some certainty, position you and your business for sustained marketing success. As a leading text message marketing provider, we know what it takes to succeed in the bar, restaurant, and nightclub industry and we know that mass texting is a proven and cost-effective marketing channel designed to drive increased brand awareness and customer engagement.

The fact is, the world's most successful businesses use text message marketing to inspire exciting and engaging digital interactions with customers. To kickstart your text message marketing program, we recommend downloading our free guide.

The 8-Step Roadmap to Master Text Message Marketing will give you all the information you need to create an actionable and results-driven text marketing plan. Following these eight steps doesn't necessarily guarantee text marketing success, but it will certainly point you and your business in the right direction.