Introduction
Ocean Room on the edge of Sydney’s most prestigious location offers delectable cuisine that combines fresh seafood with exciting flavour combinations from Japan and the Mediterranean. A high-energy kitchen, a very cool vibe and Chef Raita Noda, a true master makes Ocean Room one cool dining experience – Raita creates a series of Japanese and Mediterranean-inspired dishes ranging from an excellent flame-seared kingfi sh carpaccio to steamed lobster; a wall stacked to the ceiling with beautifully lit tanks displaying the bounty of the ocean completes an oceanic vista, second to none.
Ocean Room does however have one key issue; it is located adjacent to its well established and popular sibling, Wild Fire Restaurant. In this exchange, Ocean Room came off second best and its reputation suffered while peak dining periods showed less than full capacity. Lunch dining periods in particular were slow for Ocean Room; in addition, Ocean Room like many restaurants suffered the feast and famine situation where summer dining was enthusiastically taken up by patron while winter traffic was sporadic and low.
The Challenge
The challenge for the Wildfire Group, owners of both restaurants was in establishing a reputation for Ocean Room and filling tables while not cannibalising Wildfire’s regular audience. In addition, Ocean Room sought to avoid the feast and famine situation it and other restaurants were experiencing.
As a prestigious restaurant, there were also concerns that a focus on response and filling seats would compromise the restaurant’s brand status with existing clients.
Zoogle Interactive was asked to address these concerns with a comprehensive marketing campaign; the Zoogle Interactive response included several brand response components to:
- Make the target audience aware of the Ocean Room brand promise
- Overcome the feast and famine situation
- Fill the difficult to fill lunch time slot
- Generate publicity for the Ocean Room
The challenge also included the creation of:
- Brand Imagery
- Monthly Email Campaigns
- Invitations
- Mail
The Process
Zoogle Interactive took a three pronged strategy to deliver on Ocean Room’s objectives:
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We placed a high emphasis on delivering high response, true-to-brand communications including email campaigns
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Cross marketing Ocean Room with other like-minded clients within a true-to-brand, response driven framework
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Use of PR as a support mechanism to association marketing and response marketing; PR itself provides credibility in the media and further, allows Ocean Room to have coverage amongst the target audience each and every week.
Response Driven Marketing
All Zoogle Interactive marketing campaigns have the objective of generating response and are designed to elicit response; Zoogle Interactive however placed special emphasis on encouraging people into the Ocean Room restaurant. Email offers and email marketing were primarily utilised for this purpose as the existing opt-in Ocean Room database could be segmented by location and other personal information; using this information, Zoogle Interactive was able to tailor offers for unique segments in conjunction with the client. Exquisite imagery reflecting the Ocean Room reduced the owner’s issues over brand dilution in these emails.
Marketing by Association
Zoogle Interactive has a number of prestige clients including the Ocean Room, Oroton and Italia Motori – distributors of Ferrari and Maserati. In addition, Zoogle Interactive looks after Global1 Training, a company focused on human potential and growth. There are obvious synergies between these types of companies and Zoogle Interactive has leveraged these synergies for mutual advantage by all participants.An excellent tool for Sandersons Mercedes, the Zcontrol website enables them to constantly update their stock of used cars and Zmail gives them channels to communicate with and inform current and prospective clients of new and pre-owned vehicles.
For example: Zoogle Interactive was aiding its client Italia Motori promote the Shell World of Ferrari held at Circular Quay and saw the opportunity to prompt the audience to attend the Ocean Room.
While promoting Global1 Training Speaker, John De Martini for an Italia Motori Event, Zoogle Interactive used this opportunity to promote both Ocean Room and other like-minded clients. Zoogle Interactive developed an invitation for high end consumers to experience a unique dining event at the Ocean Room – one that would provide these discerning consumers with something they have not experienced previously.
Publicity Activities
Ocean Room and Zoogle Interactive both held significant media public relations databases and had the opportunity to generate signifi cant media coverage if Zoogle Interactive could generate innovative ideas to involve the press. A primary concern with the Ocean Room database was its integrity and the segmentation. While we were eager to make use of a signifi cant database of contacts, we are also wary of “spamming” these valuable contacts. Rather than call each and every media contact, Zoogle Interactive took a novel approach of inviting the media for a cooking session with Chef Raita Noda.
The Result
Dedicated campaign planning and strategies identifying audiences and the most appropriate channels for response aided Ocean Room’s marketing efforts. Zoogle Interactive placed great emphasis on:
- Matching propositions with key target groups and segments
- Offering propositions to audiences to entice them to trial Ocean Room
- Understanding the components required for repeat purchases
- Matching delivery channels with audiences and propositions