Promotional Products | Kyle Chowning

Back in November 2008, Starbucks launched a new “membership rewards” program called Starbucks Gold. Basically, it’s a card that costs $25 a year and gives you 10% off most everyday purchases as well as a free drink for registering and one on your birthday. Oh, and you get this nifty little black card with a gold cup in the middle (see image to the left).

Given that I do marketing for a living, I thought I would dive into the idea of the Starbucks card and see what impact it is having on Starbucks. Here’s what I found.

The idea is brilliant for Starbucks

Starbucks gets $25 a year for people to carry around a card that gives them 10% off. If you do the math, that means you need to spend $250/year to breakeven; which equates to 1.2 purchases a week at an average of $4, for an entire year. Unless you’re a die-hard fan, that is not likely. However, after doing some research for this post, apparently, I under estimate the number of people that really love Starbucks. [Read more...]

Marketing Initiative #1

Today, the first Motiveight marketing initiative to get new business arrived at the offices of 18 prospects; some known, some are a totally random attempt to try to get the attention of a prospect customer. It is my hope that I’ll get at least four solid leads on new business or orders. That would bring a 25% response rate, which is unheard of in most businesses.

The effort was to send out a reminder to “spring forward” on Saturday night (Daylight savings time starts on Sunday at 2am). To creatively do so, we sent out a white box with a brass slinky inside with a message that read: