5 ways for shopping malls to boost their tenants creativelyWith Covid-19 making the current shopping centre environment harder than ever for shops to keep their doors open, shopping mall marketing teams, together with events agencies, are creating new and unique ways to involve tenants in their marketing strategies. Tenant promotion videos using a particular holiday or special dateCreate a social media video surrounding a particular holiday while involving tenants who offer the perfect gift linked with that holiday. Portray the journey of a shopper as they spend the day in the mall showcasing their top picks of the season. Use this opportunity to promote different stores for different holidays including Father’s Day, Valentine’s Day, Easter and more. Get creative with various storylines such as ‘The cool kid’s guide to X shopping centre’ or ‘A mom's day out’. Shoppers are engaging with their social media now more than ever and marketing teams are needing to create ways to bring shoppers back into the mall. Interactive storefrontsVacant stores are on the rise and it's a leasing managers nightmare to keep these stores from looking empty. Instead of incurring the expense of vinyling the stores up, use this as an opportunity to showcase a scene. The scene could be related to anything, whether it be Easter, Christmas, Valentine’s Day and the list goes on. Use tenants to sponsor various elements. Bring on an events agency to pull this together, style the shop fronts (a very underestimated but hugely time-intensive job) and perhaps throw in some live actors behind the glass to really give your shoppers a reason to stop and stare. A perfectly covid safe experience for shoppers of all ages to enjoy. Take it a step further and add a competition element to this experience. Get shoppers to spot an item, snap a selfie or notice something unique. Don't forget to showcase where the sponsored items can be purchased by clearly marking who the sponsoring tenants are. Spend and win is here to stayPlace your twist on the classic spend-and-win campaign with these out-of-the-box options that provide massive opportunities for tenant involvement This can be done in several ways:
Free branding opportunitiesLink up an activation with a tenant who can sponsor the product or get involved in some way. Provide them with free branding opportunities including banners, signage or logos without too much spend from their end. Involve coffee shops or bakeries to set up pop up stands or ‘waiting zones’ outside the activation or hand out vouchers to help bring foot traffic to their stores. Media dropsUse tenants to get involved in sponsoring products which are sent to social media influencers to promote on their various platforms. Using an activations/events agency to assist with the sourcing and communication of the appropriate influencers to your shopper target market (this is a make or break) packing and couriering of boxes.
About the authorAmanda Rabinowitz-Muller is the director and founder of [[https://www.jellybeanworld.co.za JellyBean Concept Events]]. An award-winning events agency, specialising in creative mall experiences for some of the major shopping centres in South Africa. Founded in 2012, this agency brings interaction and shopper experience to the forefront of their offering. Recently walking away with five awards at the 2020 SACSC Footprint Awards they are leaders in innovation in the creative mall space. |