New year, new marketing ideas!

Natalie Keuroghlian, Marketing Manager for Gewiss UK, makes some suggestions for high impact marketing for electrical wholesalers in 2020.

Gewiss is turning 50 in 2020 and it feels like a momentous year, so we want everyone we work with to succeed. As our key channel, we take a great interest in and work closely with many wholesalers, whether it is our area account managers visiting customers face-to-face with product news and sales initiatives, or supporting our wholesale network with marketing activities.

2019 was a busy and productive year, we improved our service to wholesalers, introducing a dedicated UK stock service for next day delivery and improved our service offering in other ways, including a new quick service providing customised, assembled distribution boards. On the marketing side, we continued to provide data, content and images for product catalogues helped to enhance contractor events at the trade counter and supplied new eye-catching, quality point of sale materials.

Based on feedback and experience of working with wholesalers on mutual marketing activities, we offer a few tips you may not have thought of to boost your sales in 2020.

Social media benefits

The electrical industry is getting more connected on digital media, we fully embrace the online conversations we have with wholesalers and electrical contractors, and relish seeing where contractors are installing our products, is invaluable market feedback for us and helps boost our mutual customer base.

Consider setting up a Twitter account – it is a great platform for conversations, news, product feedback and events with your suppliers and customers. We have had some great conversations with professional electrical contractors who are rightfully proud of their electrical installations and have tagged Gewiss UK to demonstrate that they are using quality products and have found the products a pleasure to install.

Encourage your customers to post photos and comments of their installations and tag the manufacturer and yourselves, it could result in a productive relationship. The end customer does not always want to be mentioned, so contractors do need to get their customer’s agreement, or use images that are not customer specific.

Electrical wholesalers also tag Gewiss when they are running special offers of our products, or if they’ve received a substantial delivery of products in Gewiss branded packaging. We will share and like for wider distribution of the post.

Linkedin is where industry managers and sales people will see your news, and Facebook hosts some useful electrician’s forums, which are enlightening in terms of the reality of contractors’ pain points, and perhaps you have a solution you can put forward. Have a look at the online platforms your suppliers are using and piggyback on their posts. Keep it positive.

Surprisingly few wholesale branches have social media accounts, which means they can’t be tagged by manufacturers, and therefore may be missing out on additional exposure and conversations. Why not set up an account and differentiate your company?

Sprucing up your bricks and mortar premises 

From zero presence in electrical wholesale trade counters a few years ago, aside from seeing GEWISS branding on our product packaging, Gewiss UK has now built its brand presence in wholesalers with an evolving raft of point of sale (POS) materials.

We now have POS boards for our best-selling plugs and sockets and rotary isolator switches in over 200 wholesalers. These act as our sales people when we are not there! The aim is to remind buyers that they need these bread and butter items, and why not pick them up while they are at the trade counter? It also gives them a chance to look at the product up close, and get an idea of the size, quality and benefits of the product.

We know through discussions with wholesalers that many have limited space at the trade counter, so we moved from large point of sale boards to half size 40mm wide boards. Our display boards have an integrated bracket to fit straight onto slatwalls, and are totally lightweight so they won’t damage the slatwall.

Still stuck for space? The simplest point of sale branding you can get is a header board, ask manufacturers for these, the most popular size is 50 x 20mm, but we can offer a custom size version. Then arrange your Gewiss products on hooks below – our IEC 309 HP plugs and sockets come in blister packs for example, that fit onto hooks.

Alternatively ask us for a Gewiss dumpbin – they’re bright orange and stand out in a good way. They don’t have an enormous footprint, which is another benefit and they’re great for those spontaneous customer purchases.

Hosting a calibration day? Why not contact a few manufacturers (including GEWISS!) to enhance the day with product news and demos, not to mention refreshments and giveaways for your customers.

MR BOXEE DISPENSERS FOR FASTER FLOW OF JUNCTION BOXES

In 2019 we dispatched our new point of purchase to new stockists of our 44CE range of watertight junction boxes, to improve the flow of these fast moving boxes and sell through stock for wholesalers. Now we are looking to extend this fun dispenser to additional wholesalers. We run social media competitions, offering electrical contractors a monthly prize for posting images of their installations, and will extend a similar activity into 2020 to keep the buzz going.

To compliment this activity, we have created stress cubes known as Mr Boxee and give these free to wholesalers as a fun giveaway for customers. When it comes to favourite giveaways, we have always been asked for pens, pens and more pens! And of course, we have plenty, so don’t hesitate to ask your area account manager for some.

Don’t delay, contact Gewiss UK to find out more about enhancing your marketing activities in 2020: T: 01954 712 757 E: marketing@gewiss.co.uk