Dealers and Vendors Make The Most of Of Being Stuck in New Orleans

When the icy weather shutdown most of New Orleans, PCG staff members and thousands of NADA attendees had some tough choices to make. Some attendees decided to rent a car and drive to their homes. Other NADA attendees left New Orleans on Monday, which resulted in very light exhibit hall traffic for exhibitors. A large contingent, hoping that their flights would not be cancelled, stayed the course, and got stuck in New Orleans.

So, on Monday night when I found out that my Tuesday morning flight to Monterrey Mexico was cancelled, I decided to make the most of my flight cancellation. If you don't know me well, I was very upset about disappointing a client. The cancellation prevented me from being onsite for our consulting project.

Knowing that other industry folks were in the same situation, I started posting on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn to see if there was interest in having a Digital Marketing Roundtable. The responses started to arrive and at 8:00 am on Tuesday morning, Carrie booked the meeting room, food, and A/V at the Hyatt Regency New Orleans.

Social media was very effective is connecting my target audience with this opportunity.

The Dealer and Vendor Community Respond

Arnold Tijerina was one of the first to respond and offer to spread the word. Layton Judd reached out to me on LinkedIn. The buzz was staring and when we kicked off the meeting at 1:00 PM, the room was packed.

By acting quickly and leveraging the power of social media, the idea was transformed into reality. The meeting was a great success as everyone engaged, shared ideas, took notes, and walked away with a smile.

We decided to nickname the meeting "The PCG Freeze Out" with the Twitter hashtag of #PCGFO, because a group of passionate people made the most of the situations and turned New Orleans lemons into lemonade.

Actually, it went from lemonade to wine, but that another story all together!

Round Two Today

Today, on Wednesday January 29th, we will be holding the meeting once again from 10:00 am - 3:00 pm. I am hoping to catch a 5:30 pm flight to Monterrey today. If you know of someone who is stuck in New Orleans, have them come out to the Hyatt Regency, 2nd Floor, Room: Bolden 5. Call them and encourage them to attend.

Are You Storm Proofed?

Taking action and looking for opportunities, when adversity strikes, can be applied to the dealer community as well. When hail storms, ice storms, or bad weather threaten car sales, are you prepared to act? Do you have PRE-BUILT Adwords and Social Media advertising campaigns, on pause, that can be activated in seconds to reach local consumers with a relevant offer?

Did you know that it can take up to 48 hours to get NEW banner ads or video pre-roll segments approved by Google?

There are many part of the US that have regular periods of hail so why don't dealers have a "Hail Storm" ad campaign all loaded up, approved by Google, and paused until they need it? Why are we not pre-planning some of these annual cycles in weather, holidays, and events to be ready to act.

Take a minute to discuss with your digital marketing agency how you can prepare for the next "weather" opportunity....