Steve Mock of Henderson, Nevada writes:
“I am an uncle who was trying to impress my nieces by making my gifts to them an adventure.
“As a result, I’ve created my own company, Giftventure. It gives children a personalized week-long treasure hunt that comes in the mail.
“At our website at GiftVenture.com, the parents enter a location in their house where they will hide a gift (‘Look in the back of the closet’) We take that information and print out and snail-mail a series of personalized letters from a mythical character such as a dragon, pirate, fairy, Santa Claus, etc.
“The child reads the letters and solves the puzzles which leads him or her to the hidden location where the gift is.
“It takes five minutes for the parents to order, the adventure lasts a week, and the experience for the child lasts a lifetime. They are excited to get mail, amazed it’s from a mythical character, and even more amazed to have everything come true when they find the actual gift.
“How can we spread the word about our service and get some media attention?”
Hi Steve,
What a fun idea and cool business concept. I have a few thoughts on how you can market it:
1. Living in Washington, DC my 1st thought is to contact the Spy Museum. They often do email promotions for kids events related to the ‘spy’ theme and maybe if you send them a sample kit leveraging the super sleuth angle, they can give you a plug.
2. There is somewhat of a tie in with ‘geography’. So can you do a promotion with a map company, a GPS company or a kids software company that sells geography software and somehow they can include your product in their packages that are geared towards ‘parents’. Or maybe they can offer a coupon in the package and people can mail in to get a ‘free’ giftventure package but somehow the cost of the product is built in to their product.
3. Contact gymborees, kids yoga centers and such. Can you find a chain organization and offer a free workshop on ‘5 fun offline interactive’ activities to do with your kids and offer your product at a promotional price for sale after the workshop.
4. Also on your site you mention it is a good idea if you are moving to a new house. So why not contact the moving companies and see if they can mail out a coupon when they send people the ‘Getting Started In Your New House Kit’.
Good Luck.
Shonika
You should donate or raffle off a free sample at any (or all!) of the following places:
Private elemetary (and maybe even Middle)schools
Upscale Day camps
Church/ Temple Holiday Fairs
Real Simple magazine
Family Fun magazine
Oprah magazine
Any other family oriented publications
Speak to:
Party Planners
Mom/ child play groups
PTAs and working Moms – this is a great thing for a working mom.
Write an article in your local paper touting a fresh, fun, family oriented, non-electronic gift idea. I am sure there are bloggers out there pushing the ‘unplugged’ child – this could mesh with them. And even if you use e-mail vs snail mail, it is still more ‘unplugged’ than a video game.
While my kids are now a bit too old for this, I think it is a really fun idea!
Best wishes!
Kids will be kids, but you, Steve sould like a kid at heart…… so where are kids found? At the library at story hour, at the playground, and kids events.
Work with promoters of these venues to stage a hidden treasure that is found with, none other than, your clues.
Most activities sponsored by parks and recreation centers and libraries and have media coverage. You can tag onto to their press as a sponsor and pass information onto parents at the events in a secret letter for parents.
I would consider running a contest for a video of the most entertaining reaction to your product. Have your customers submit to you or better, upload videos to one of the online services (youtube, blip.tv, revver, or other) and select the best one. I am partial to Brightcove and Splashcast that allow your customers to upload videos to your account directly (Brightcove enables you to filter the videos) and display the uploaded videos in a multi-channel player.
Heck you could do this on a weekly or monthly basis. I am willing to bet you would get some submissions that would rival America’s Funniest Home videos and these could spread word about you like wild fire.
Just my thoughts,
John
Hi Steve
What a great business idea. Many magazines feature “gift guides” in December; august is the time of year to pitch them. Run a Cision search for contacts for gift giving guides as they’ll have someone whose whole job is this task; I have done this before with some luck. I’d also suggest you start with some local press, such as your local business journal and your local paper (business section). Small stories can sometimes be a springboard to bigger national stories. You might consider contacting anchors at your local TV stations and offering a free sample to them for their own kids. You can find bios of anchors on most TV station web sites, so you can target the ones with kids (many share personal info like that). I’d recommend you ensure your Web site has been optimized (SEO) so anyone who googles to get gift ideas for kids will find you. Finally, you might offer a partnership with other businesses that want to reach parents and kids too – such as waterparks. Could you do an adventure where the final “prize” is a trip to a local amusement park or waterpark? If so, you may be able to piggyback on their PR and promotional efforts, and that would make a cool business story! Good luck
Hi Steve –
Great gift idea – I already forwarded a link to your site to all my friends who have kids/grandkids – we are always looking for new, fun ideas.
This may seem obvious, but contact all the major sites where mom’s and grandparents hang out and offer a story about gift giving, a contest, etc. Here are a few ideas: MomsMinivan.com, eons.com, grandparents.com, 2young2retire.com, boomerwomenspeak.com – at each site – look at their list of links for more ideas of sites to contact.
First thing he needs to do is proofread his website. After just a few seconds on the website, I found a typo (no “t” in Christmas in the “gift ideas” section) and couldn’t help but wonder if the treasure maps would be sloppy too. I don’t mean that to sound harsh, but your website should be an example of your best, most creative, most careful work since it’s the first impression many customers will have.
Shonika’sSheri’s idea about targeting gift guides is fabulous.Save hours and hours of research time by subscribing to The Gift List. It gives you contact information for dozens of gift list sections and topics that the the print and electronic media are planning. Go to https://publicityhound.com/blog/giftlist and take a test drive. You’ll find it on the right-hand side, on top of the sun.
I have heard rave reviews about this subscription service. I know Amy Bates Stumpf who owns the company and I recommend it.
Steve,
I either wish my step-sons were younger, or that you figure out a version for the rest of us “older kids” someday!
My suggestion is how about adding to some of the great ideas you’ve gotten so far by including a live character appearance? They could lead some or all of the sample adventure, or at least attract attention to the event site.
The costumes wouldn’t have to be elaborate necessarily, just representational enough so the kids will recognize the character when the mailer comes. Also, if you’ve sent some packages in the area already, maybe you could send special invitations to meet the characters in person to spur re-orders.
I bet kids would fall in love with Fay, or want to hang out with Percy in a heart beat, and then beg their parents for the chance to get a Giftventure in the future.
Also, since many kids are internet savy already at the upper end of your age group, recommendations from the kids themselves could be zipping around in no time.
Cheryl Pickett
http://www.publishinganswers.com
Piggy-back on the Harry Potter craze, e.g., “Thank you for your application to Hogwarts Academy. While we’re processing your application, here’s a gift that will test your magical thinking.”
Could get a lot of media from that, I’m sure.
_____
Shel Horowitz, copywriter and award-winning author of five marketing books Blogging on the intersections of ethics, marketing, media, sustainability, and politics: http://www.principledprofit.com/good-business-blog/
What a cute idea! I found your product when I was doing some research online tonight for Personalized Santa Letters. The popularity of personalzied gifts for children is one I know about first hand, for some of the most popular gifts I have given to my own children and my nieces and nephews have been personalized items. You seem to have already generated a lot of presence, according to your website, but, if you are still seeking more publicity, you might consider writing a HubPage article on your product and promoting it that way.
I think my Hub article is linked through my name, above, so if you would like to see what I am talking about, please check out article on Santa Letters!
Oh, I’ve bookmarked your site..looks like a future gift I’ll be giving!
Annie