Some people don’t realise it but having a mascot for your marketing program can actually do wonders. While some people will scoff at the idea of having a costumed character standing around, it has been proven many times over that having a relatable mascot that customers can connect to increases the success of your marketing programs. The key to making sure that your mascot is successful rather than a mockery is creating a mascot that connects with the people and the spirit of your company. If you are still doubtful about what a mascot can do for your company, here are a few ways that a good mascot can help.
Connecting to Your Audience
As many marketing professionals will agree, connecting with your audience is one of the keys to succeeding in your marketing program. If you are able to connect to your target demographic and communicate your message, there’s a very good chance that they will either spread the word or come support your business themselves. A good mascot can directly help out with this. With a relatable mascot that your customers can connect with, you will be able to bring life into your company. From going to conventions with your character costume to advertise your business to simply having an online presence, there are many different ways that a good mascot can connect with your audience.
Being a Symbol of Your Company
In many more ways, a mascot can embody the spirit of your company that people will remember. If your mascot is peppy and energetic, there’s a good chance that people will view your business as equally energetic and peppy. If your mascot is snarky, snide, and amusing online, then there’s a good chance that your customers will think that your company is equally as savvy and support your business. Doing this will not only help you keep hold of your current customers, but it will also make sure that you can draw in prospective customers with the personality of your mascot.
Being a Cost-Effective Marketing Strategy
While at their core mascots are a marketing strategy, this doesn’t mean that you have to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars into the project. Setting up a popular mascot can be incredibly inexpensive to begin and maintain. From having a mascot on social media to spread personality and word about your business to having a fun and unique character costume design, there are plenty of ways that you can save money on your mascot. In the end, your mascot will better your business through profits and luring prospective customers in.
Developing a Positive Impact
Of course, a mascot wouldn’t be a particularly good mascot if it was spreading negativity all around. In fact, it would probably end up damaging your business’s reputation if your mascot was this way. Instead, one of the best things that a mascot could do for your business is make a positive impact. Not only can having a positive mascot do good things for the employees at your business but it can also spread positivity to the people who look at your business as well. For instance, you can create a story for your mascot and thus for your business, drawing people in with positivity and furthering your reputation.
Putting Value Into Social Media
The rising trend of different brands having an online presence isn’t just a fad anymore. It has become a legitimate way for businesses to market themselves, spread the word about their businesses, and even converse with both returning and new customers. With as many different platforms online as there are, there is no reason why your mascot shouldn’t be present on at least one of them. Choosing to go with an online presence will help your business out significantly, especially when it comes to spreading the word to new customers.
Creating Goodies with the Mascot
Mascots don’t have to be life-size characters of your creation. Depending on what your mascot is, it could easily be a small little coin bank that someone keeps in his or her house to a bobblehead that sits on the dashboard of his or her car. To spread the word about your business and also create that connection with your customers, creating merchandise and goodies for your mascot is a great way to help your business improve and it will also increase the reputation of the mascot itself. Just remember to make the goodies decent quality or else it can reflect poorly on your business.
Making Your Business Stand Out
If you want to make sure that you stand out from your competitors, one of the best things that you can do for your business is to invest the time and money into creating a wonderful character costume for your business. Not only will it help your business succeed in all the different ways listed above but it will also put you leagues above your rival businesses that do not have mascots nearly as clever or as successful as your own. This will also help you out significantly when you are trying to market your services.
Creating an Emotional Connection
Another benefit to having a relatable mascot for your business is fostering an emotional connection with your customers. People — humans — are pack animals by nature. We bond with others, we stick together, and we also pick up animals along the way as our pets. Consider how ingrained it is in people to connect to others, especially people who are easy to relate to. It would make sense that a relatable mascot can forge an emotional connection to the customers it advertises to. This is just one more of the many ways that a good mascot can support your business and your customers.
Bringing Life to Your Business
There have been plenty of times where people find themselves stuck in traffic, bored out of their minds. During this time, these people often look around at the city surrounding them. If your mascot, lively and energetic as you want it to be, is there to entertain onlookers and attract attention to your business, it could very well bring in the people who are stuck in the traffic jam. At the very least, those people will remember your business’s name and that is what matters for you.
With as many different ways as there are for your mascot to breathe new life into your business, it is up to you to create that mascot and design it to be the perfect character costume that proclaims the name of your business.
