As the home of the Dubai World Cup, the world’s richest horserace, Dubai Racing Club had a bit of a dilemna; how can they harness the immense interest they receive for that one big race day into an a sustainable, thriving business opportunity.

AGORA was tasked with an important project: Create a stand-alone identity that would promote Dubai Racing Club’s conference & banqueting facilities while taking advantage of it’s established brand values. We knew first hand that Dubai Racing Club offers conference and banqueting facilities in a retreat – like atmosphere with 5-star catering, world-class business services and the added value of combining race nights within any given program of events. That’s the first rule of experiential marketing; experience the brand from the customer’s perspective. The rest is made easy once these insights are achieved.

So we put our business hat on. And in so doing, devised a comprehensive, integrated campaign across all the brand touchpoints. The home of the world’s richest horserace effectively became the home of many-a-business-conference.

10,000.

That was the extra number of partigoers that the organisers of the Dubai World Cup, the world’s richest horse race,  wanted to enter partizone 2008. No easy task, considering that was on top of the 45,000 people that attended the year before.

Our scholastic experience taught us that it was 10 times more expensive to get a new customer than it was to grow current ones. Luckily, we’re also good at math. We tapped into the eager race-going socialites that attended the Dubai World Cup. Everyone wanted a great party. So we gave out CD mixed by our partizone DJ. We placed key messages at key venues, related to the general vibe. In short we built it, and they came. Sales went through the roof. Good thing, as we seemed to have brought the roof down. After all, growing attendance by 10,000 was no easy matter. So we when the party ended and the receipts added up, we were surprised to know that we exceeded the target by 4,000. And that’s when the celebrations heated up.

Touchpoints. We explained the concept in simple terms.

Every interaction someone has with your brand is considered a touchpoint. Every touchpoint leaves a lasting impression, whether positive or negative. That impression will ultimately affect your sales, whether positively or negatively, whether 1st person or 3rd party. Make sure your brand touchpoints are covered and thought through.

So, naturally, we were brought on board to help Essential Community Management manage much more than the community associations, but each and every touchpoint. And, many years later, we’re still on that board. Touché.

Events catering to the media can be intimidating. When reporters are arriving from all corners of the globe specifically to report about your progress, intimidating could be a slight understatement. Luckily, that’s our middle name. That’s what happens when you become a brand touchpoint maestro. Each touchpoint naturally carries the brand message.

We set about developing a comprehensive communications strategy, whereby each reporter was catered to individually. Each touchpoint they encountered was specific, serving a purpose around a common vision; Pre-event, Event, Post-event. The strategy paid. 5 busloads of reporters left with smiles on their faces. After reading their reports, our client began to walk around with a perma smile.

In the end, the job is never done but we showed that by thinking through your brand touchpoints, you send a message that can be heard across the globe. Or read with a smile on your face.