Our client, Halliday Homes – a manufacturer of custom engineered homes – was the primary sponsor for a project with high-school students. Under the guidance of Halliday, 15 students would build an Envirohome – one of only 3 build in the province of Ontario that year.
As the primary sponsor, Halliday was responsible for more than project management, training and construction – the company was also responsible for the marketing of the project. Marketing involved two key thrusts:
We recommended a ‘blog (web log) as the ideal online marketing vehicle for the project. Its low cost suited the volunteer/sponsorship nature of the project. Its chronological nature was ideal for keeping a running journal of the project’s progress.
Set up the blog for Halliday and provided training for them to maintain the blog independently.
Set up an associated online photo album, allowing Halliday to maintain a comprehensive gallery of photos of the project in addition to the select photos highlighted in journal entries on the blog.
The Envir07 Blog has served as a reference tool for media interested in covering the project.
“It is a much better communication tool than the phone by itself,” says Andre Danis, General Manager at Halliday Homes. “If I catch the media – or the media catches me – in a rush, in a bad mood, or on an absent-minded day, the opportunity is easily messed up over the phone. Instead, I can point them to the blog, they can review it at their leisure, think about how it fits in with their agendas, and go from there. It has been a key tool in helping media understand the project and decide to run stories about it.”
Media coverage included CBC Television, The Ottawa Citizen, local newspapers, and others.
Special interest groups also followed the project through the blog, and used it to forward links and updates to other interest groups.
The blog served to create a community of interest among the school board, students, teachers, parents, associations, and special interest groups.
The blog served as a benefit to other project sponsors, who received billing as such on a special page of the blog. Reciprocal link campaigns helped to generate mutual benefit between the project and the sponsors.
The blog was a valuable resource for other schools and school boards to look at how to market their own project properly.
The blog serves as a “keepsake” memory for the students, teachers and sponsors involved.
We helped set up the Envir07 Blog which helped Halliday Homes advertise the project to media, sponsors and the public.
