Marketing Question & Sources

[Dr. Haunt Chamber of Fear]

Out of the large professional haunted houses who uses coupons as a marketing tool?

How many coupons do you distribute a year and how much do you pay?

We get 500,000 for $4,000 with tax 2.6 inch by 11 inch black and white double sided.

Do you think coupons are more effective then billboards?

[Jim Warfield]

Our place is small and my ticket seller has too much to do already to fart around with coupons .
If they want to be here they will have already usually declared themselves during the hassle of the 2 to 3 hours drive to get here.
Some smart-azzes drove three hours to get here then began hassling me for a discount. I told them it was a shame they wasted all that time and effort and now weren't going to see my place because they were too cheap to spend that one extra dollar.(reg. admission)
Guess what? They paid and went in.
Whata concept!
The huge majority of people forget what they paid to see the place anyway because I spend so much time once they are in the house trying to impress them.
Then there were the hayrack of idiots who all had "internet coupons" "Good at any Haunted House"!
If the day ever comes that I can take a scrap of paper and scribble on it "$100.oo bill" and someone will accept it to cancell my debts, then I will accept those blank bogus coupons, Sure. Why not?
Coupons and discounts travel within the world of unnecesarry bullshit that I don't have time for.
I have a wine cellar here not a whine cellar!
"NEXT!" "Please step aside if you are not feeling like paying full ticket price, let a real patron through!"

[monsterwax]

We use coupons for $1 off, just because that way the paper advertisement has value and they are less likely to toss it. Getting them out in the hands of those who want and use them is the tough part. I find costume shops are a good location for them though.

We also offer internet coupons for $1 off, and get hundreds of them back each year. (And those cost us nothing, as the customer downloads and prints it.) If they know the website then they are not drive bys and deserve an added incentive. In fact, they are usually repeat costumers. One could argue we are giving money away since many of those people would have come anyway. However, I don't mind providing loyal customers a discount as I certainly appreciate their repeat business. In fact, we DEPEND on repeat business. Well over 50% (more like 60-70%) of our customers are repeaters, and they often bring newbees. So anything we can do to say thanks is well worth it.

Bill boards are good for creating a buzz if you can afford them. People often can't remember the dates and addresses or phone numbers on them though. That's where coupons and paper ads come in handy. All our newspaper ads are also coupons. That way we can see how well each source works and if they are worth the expense. If I had to choose between coupons or billboards, I would choose coupons-- but newspaper and internet coupons cost nothing extra to distribute, while other glossy coupons take trips to pass out or drop off. If you're doing 40,000 of them, jeeze-- that's a LOT of extra work.

What you do not want to do is stick coupons near your haunt, as people who walk up will use them and you are giving away money. That may seem very obvious, but sometimes you have a staff person who thinks it's a great idea to stick a pile of them near the door. (Duh!)

I hope that helps. Good luck.

[screamsofnight]

What about doing a billboard, or putting up paper flyers(costs less) and saying on it, $1 off if you bring a canned food item. Your going green(using less paper then coupons) and helping people in the holiday season. Just my opinion.Kyle

[Jim Warfield]

You could break that employee of stacking coupons beside your front door.
Just take whatever his month's pay would be, get it in one's and have him stack that next to the door.
"I was just trying to help YOU out!"