Phase 2: Announce Availability

Phase 2 of Namaste India! comprises the General Recruitment and Awareness Stage.

PHASE 2:

1. Create a Facebook Events Page
2. Facebook and Twitter Awareness
3. Email Blast

And I'm happy to say that...we're live, ticking, and well on our way to gaining traction!


Preliminary Goals for Social
Social is all about awareness. But seeing as I'm in the business of advertising, I'm always thinking in the back of my mind, how can we increase likes? How can we ensure click throughs? How can we bring our users on a journey to keep them within the proper track-lines so that they're not just interested in Namaste India, but remain engaged with our Room to Read NYC Chapter page and eventually go external to seek more information about RTR via the main website?

My preliminary goals for building our exposure on Facebook were:

• Increase likes 
• Increase engagement and conversation
• Establish credibility for FB page as primary source of information on local efforts

While I would rather live within a designated, differentiated space, I did omit the thought of launching a separate Namaste India tab on the main page so as not to detract from the larger chapter effort as a whole, as well as to not detract from the "official" global blog that was launched by the Zurich chapter (www.namasteindiaroomtoread.blogspot.com). 

Create a Facebook Event Page
The purpose of the Event Page is obviously to track participating studios, registration information and any additional updates leading up to the event. The challenge has been to get people to actually join the event to follow the news, hence why I originally would have liked to have a separate landing page in lieu of an events page...because the constant "declines" are slightly discouraging and constantly makes me rethink how to keep people engaged.

 

Facebook and Twitter Awareness
With that said, the page is up and running and tweets are flying!

Visit us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/events/239171872860187/

Follow us on Twitter: (BRB on this one...Twitter page is being weird and won't register the URL)

Send out an Email Blast

Okay, so the one problem with this event is that there was very little time to set things up. Ideally, we should have engaged the NY corporate office much earlier to help do pre-event press. Though the NY office normally does not get too involved with the marketing efforts of local chapter events, this being our first global launch of a worldwide fundraiser has legs and an obvious potential to be a really great big deal. Nevertheless, we will be doing heavy post-event press with the office.

In the meantime, we satisfied ourselves with a chapter email blast to our Room to Read List-Serve. 

Phase 2: We're Live on Facebook!

...And we're live on Facebook!

Part one of Phase 2 consists of creating a Facebook Events Page and beginning Facebook awareness to help direct attention towards participating studios, registration information, volunteer opportunities...and just simply to begin conversation surrounding the event.

This is the General Recruitment and Awareness Stage. At the most basic level I've created an events page for the event, and invited fellow New Yorkers and people who might know dedicated yogis, from my Facebook friends list. My one criticism I have about this is that people tend to decline events on Facebook.

What I really wanted to create was a separate landing page within the RTR NY Chapter Facebook page, but a team member brought up a good point, that for events like this, to take away from the main chapter landing page may be detrimental to the brand. And in speaking to studios during the recruitment phase, some have even been confused as to whether Namaste India was the organization or the product/brand. So, point taken. I'm still a fan of keeping things separated, but even I'm finding that there is truth in what was suggested; it's definitely easier to generate excitement on the main page and direct to an Events page since the dedicated following is on the main page, and people seem to decline the events page. Good learnings.

So how do I get people's attention and get them to "Join" my event even though they might not be attending classes? How do I create a following so that I have a database of Namaste India -specific folks so I can utilize them as a listserve to blast updates and news to?

I take over the main landing page.

Muahaha.

No really..actually, I think this might be slightly obnoxious and maybe frowned upon for trumping other posts or events with my takeover, but it was some what of an accidental find. I have not yet converted to Timeline on Facebook and in poking around trying to figure out how to post more information about the event on the main wall, I discovered a delightful little button called "highlight."

Hence what started as a decent, forgivable small square box to the left of the timeline turned into....this:

.......Win!

Namaste India!

A month since my last post, I've kicked this charity benefit into gear. I'm documenting the process here since we're on an ambitious timeline and this is my first side project that I have fully implemented a thorough marketing plan from start to finish. It's great to know that at the end of the day, I am still an advertiser at heart and I will always approach things with a marketing eye. For the next two weeks, I'll be tracking progress and learnings.

The Situation
....was nil. I was tasked as new program chair to lay the groundwork for an up and coming global yoga day event with my only source of information a world away in Zurich, Switzerland, and only accessible on a blogspot blog. In a nutshell, the event is a one day, worldwide benefit in which studios across the world donate time, space, and teachers to offer up yoga sessions on a donation basis. All proceeds go to Room to Read's Girl's Education Program with the aim of raising $37,500 US dollars to place 150 girls in India in school. This is our first year launching something of this scale, and quite frankly, a bit of free for all.

It being a global event, the Switzerland chapter has let us run free with ideas and ways in which we can tailor the event to our own likings and needs. Customizable is great, but initial structure is necessary. Switzerland did a great job launching initial forms and ideas, but here's where I decided to get nitty gritty.

Keep in mind the below has been revised since the first go-round, due to the sudden realization that a week or two has gone by and suddenly I've lost time and am looking at the final two weeks before the event is launched.

Abbreviated Marketing plan:

NY Launch

• Announce availability
• Claim credibility
• Generate awareness, interest and buzz
• Sustain excitement and branding beyond launch

 Overall goal: Announce local availability of global event while creating excitement and surrounding conversation, and securing big players to establish credibility and wider participant base

Global Financial goal: $37,500
Local Financial goal: $1000 min.
Studio Financial goals: set individually

For the next two weeks, I plan to utilize our broad social media mix to deploy 5 key phases:

• Fast Start - Phase 1 and Phase 2 (week of 5/28)
• Strong Sustain - Phase 3 and Phase 4 (Weeks of 5/28-6/4)
• Last Chance - Phase 5 (Week of 6/11)

 Phase 1: Finalize Participating Studios
After a month of brushing up on my cold calling and figuring out different language approaches to bring in prospective sponsors, I went from straight sell, service speak, and finally landed on exclusive invitation. It seemed that studios responded best to teaser emails, a testament to simple and straight to the point advertising instead of infomercials. Which is a challenge to translate to an effort like Namaste India, when you not only have to build credibility for an event that has never been launched, while educating your prospective sponsor about the brand of the charity as a whole.

I'm happy to say that we've finalized five wonderful studios who are dedicating their time and efforts to our cause.

This week, we need to finalize studio information--class times, instructors, registration systems, styles, teacher bios and any other additional fundraising opportunities.

Bigger Than Yourself

There are always moments that you remember in life, and then there are moments that purely stick out in your mind. And it always seems to be the smallest, most minute detail. Like remembering a field of roses but distinctly remembering the one, single, thriving thorn on a half wilted flower. In my yesteryears of high school, serving as a yearbook editor, I was arranging senior ads when I spotted one that read, "Always remember, be God-fearing." 

I have always been a proponent of being God-loving, and not God-fearing. I still ponder that ad from time to time, wondering why it is that someone would choose to value a religion with values of fear instead of values of love. And I honestly believe that religion would not seem so fanatical  if the fishermen of the world drive forth more messages of celestial love instead of doomed fates and raptures. I have conscientiously chosen to abide by a rule to love life and not fear it, to live with mistakes and make them happily, for where you fault in one aspect of your life you make up another time. 

It was not until this year that I think I truly have understood how possible God, life, everything, can be both feared and loved, and how fear can be selected first. I recently was appointed as the new program chair for the New York chapter of a very large and successful global charity. I never know why I am compelled to serve in leadership roles for things I know very little about, but I defer to the thrill and the challenge as a probable reason. As Empire of the Sun has so poignantly put it, we are always running for the thrill of it, always searching for the thrill of it. Oh, my life mantra. 

Our charity is global but our efforts are local. Upcoming events include a huge gala benefit and a Namaste, India global yoga day to help fundraise for children's education programs around the world. And yesterday I was faced with the daunting task of trying to figure out how many t-shirts to bulk order for an event not yet planned, with a body count not yet known, and a marketing plan not yet created. I felt lost and panicky, guilt-ridden with fear that perhaps someone would sniff out the fake in me and realize that I have no idea what I'm doing. But I made one suggestion and was congratulated for "big thinking", and I patted myself on the back for taking one step at a time. Any movement is movement, any input is gold. 

I have also been taking pole classes for the past 2.5 years and recently have begun to master upside down leg switches, marleys, butterflies and the like that I've been hammering after for months now, the like that could cause me to throttle to the ground and break my neck if I'm not careful. As I reach another level every week and push my abilities, I always tip a mental hat to my past self circa 2009 when I picked up the phone and called the studio to sign up. A phase of emotional hard time, a simple flicker of willpower, and a flash of fear has culminated in being able to celebrate my anniversary of being on the pole year after year, day after day. The pole in my room is hardly a sexual nod, it is a souvenir of overcoming human nervousness and in celebration of being female and strong enough to hold myself up--both physically and emotionally. 

I savor fear now, because I realize how far it has gotten me. And in the spirit of Easter and Good Friday, I'm  understanding that to be God-fearing is just as fine as being God-loving, for the fear is not meant to indicate God's wrath, but fear of the unknown. Fear of where God may lead us in the times we need him the most, fear of where to turn for the next three days when God leaves us until rising again on Easter Sunday, fear of how to actually be the success and the leader we claim to be, fear of how to be responsible. But all of that fear drives a thrill that turns into love, turns into passion, turns into something so incredibly productive that you might just remember these moments in your life. And if you're lucky they'll stick out forever because of that one simple detail that you decided to act upon.