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Hope springs eternal…

Hope springs eternal…

Isn’t that how it goes at the old ballgame?

For everyone around here, tomorrow, the Milwaukee Brewers will capture most of the media attention with their Home Opener against divisional foe, the St. Louis Cardinals. Starting right-hander Jhoulys Chacin will be squaring off against the Cards righty Miles Mikolas.

I write that as if I know who these guys are. Truth is, I don’t.

Don’t get me wrong, I know baseball and love the game, even played it in college — but I don’t follow it like I used to when I was a card collecting kid. Heck, I didn’t find out about Brewers MVP Christian Yelich until August of last year, when he, and the Brew Crew went on a tear to get into the playoffs.

At today’s game, the Brewers owner, Mark Attanasio, will have his sons sing the national anthem, Bernie Brewer and the Racing Sausages will be there… and all fans who are in attendance will receive a 2019 magnetic schedule. Oh, and guess what, they can interact with the team on social media using #ThisIsMyCrew and #BrewersOpener. That’s 40,000+ fans coming to a game to eat hot dogs, drink beer and buy merchandise… and share their experience with friends in person and on social media.

And then, 40,000 more will do it another 80 times this season.

(Perhaps there’s a reason why Mike Trout just signed a $426,500,000 deal with the Angels.)

So what does all of this have to do with you and your business?

We get so busy in our day-to-day affairs, that business can turn into a real grind. Not only for us as owners, but for our employees and our customers, too. There is no “down-season” and the churn to drive new prospects into customers and customers into brand ambassadors can lose its luster. It’s then that you hit a plateau and your work gets hard… really really fast.

In short, your business begins to burn out.

Have a Home Opener – every year.

New product launches, new websites, and even the next trade show can give us a lift to broadcast a new message and help fire up the team. But did you ever think to actually create a “Home Opener” for your business — to set a real date, each year, to “open up” your business, your products or services, to your adoring fans (and their friends)? This is not to change your brand, but to enhance your brand. Like major league teams, it’s time to show your excitement to your fans that you have new talent to add to the vets in your line-up.

The easiest thought is an actual open house — to call in your best customers (and their friends) to re-new their interest in what you have to offer them. However, it could also simply mean establishing a digital launch of new creative work, new product offerings, introductions of new employees, vendor partners or associations that have improved your business. I guarantee you that you have business assets that have not been exposed to your customer base…

Have new certifications to show off or awards that you’ve collected? Taken pictures of your facility, products or people? Gone through your catalog? You could launch a new social campaign and drive traffic to a new landing page, complete with plenty of freebies — all for the price of admission — an email address. How about a dealer contest of some kind or advancing a new promotion?

Now is the time!

Don’t worry about being perfect. The real trick is you have just given yourself license to “brag” about your business to any and all simply because you created a Home Opener event… but it feels less like bragging and more like letting your team simply take the field. So here’s your chance to dust off your spikes, put a little rosin on the mound and show off your Major League stuff.

Know what? People pay good money to see that.