Unlocking the Unlimited Potential of Co-Marketing

By Chris Evans, author, speaker, consultant, Moorpark, Calif. Marketing for your wedding and event business is constantly evolving, which means those of us in this industry have to learn a lot of new strategies, tactics, and terminology, all of the time. One of those words you’ve probably heard is “co-marketing,” which is different from “co-branding.” Regardless of what you’ve heard, co-marketing is just a form of relationship marketing that can be used in many ways to enhance your business.Co-marketing vs. co-brandingCompanies have been co-branding for years. Nike partnered up with Apple to create the ultimate work-out and music experience. Hershey’s partnered with Betty Crocker to create the chocolatiest brownie ever. These companies combined their products together to create an even more valuable product.Co-marketing is slightly different. It’s the opportunity for two brands to work together on promotional efforts with a co-branded offer. In a co-marketing partnership, both companies promote a piece of content or a product, and share the results of that promotion with each other.Why would you want to do this type of marketing? First of all, your marketing efforts are doubled! Think about the benefits you get from promoting a piece of content or a new product or event. Now, think about the benefits you would get if two companies promoted it through all the levels of connections that everyone has. The bonus is that, through co-marketing, you’re able to reach a brand new audience—one you may not have been able to connect with and engage with on your own.Co-marketing produces 
collaborative resultsTake this example into consideration. Say you’re a wedding jewelry company in Los Angeles. You’ve created beautiful videos that showcase your beautiful pieces, and you promote them to brides online in the hopes that they’ll start following you on social media, subscribe to your blog, and that type of thing. You know of a company, also in Los Angeles, that offers wedding coordination. Wouldn’t it be interesting if you made a video together talking about designing weddings and, potentially, showing bridal jewelry on the coordinator’s current brides? You both get together and create a video, talking about your love of weddings and how the bride would benefit from both of you. Next, both companies promote this video through their social media channels, both of which have different audiences. After, you notice a bump in your social reach, because a whole new audience has gained access to your brand from these videos and their promotion from your co-marketing partner. And that partner sees the same success. Isn’t that wonderful?How else can you co-market?Other ideas may include your social media co-marketing, which can include several levels of outreach, with your products and services targeted specifically toward brides. By mentioning your co-partner’s products or services in status updates and tweets, brides who are actively interested in your brand will be exposed to your partner company and then back at you.Email campaigns help with follow up and follow through. As a wedding professional, it is imperative that you have a follow-up and follow-through system in place so that when you reach out via emails, you have steps in place to be effective. Both partners should work together to craft the right message to validate the new co-marketing idea to your existing leads list base, which in turn helps establish your brand with potential brides-to-be.Event sponsorship is also a great idea. Sponsoring an event, dinner, or party at a conference can help attract more contacts than if done by one company alone. Co-marketing at this event opens so many topics for discussion and sales leads that you wouldn’t have on your own.Remember, networking outreach is a great way to learn who in this industry would be a great "co-marketer," for you and your business. It’s important to keep selling your brand in all that you do. It opens up a bright new day with unlimited possibilities!