December 2019 - owlhurst.com

Goodbye 2019. Hello 2020!

December 11, 2019
by Mark

This year it’s going to big, very big! Emerald Resort & Casino’s New Year’s Eve Party is set to be the ultimate experience as the clock counts down to 2020.

“We’re looking forward to saying goodbye to 2019 and celebrating 2020 with a party of epic proportions,” says Tanuja Gangabishun, Marketing Executive at Emerald Resort & Casino. “Visitors to the Resort and the Vaal will not want to miss this, it’s going to be off the hook!”

Featuring South Africa’s hottest DJs like DJ PH, MS Cosmo, DJ Euphonik and Classic Tank, these entertainers will be counting the revellers down to 2020 with an absolutely banging party at the Emerald Arena. Supporting acts include Brown Skin, Ricardo Da Costa and DJ London.

Reminisce about the year that 2019 was with a mate or two and then kick 2020 off with a bang!

Emerald Resort & Casino’s New Year’s Eve Party

Date: 31 December 2019

Time: 19:00

Venue: Emerald Arena

Price: R250 VIP or R150pp General admission at Computicket

“Party it up like never before because this New Year’s Eve is sorted!” concludes Tanuja.

For all up to date information on events, promotions and happenings at Emerald Resort & Casino, visitors are encouraged to stay close to their Facebook and Twitter pages, or guests can visit www.emeraldcasino.co.za for more information on any of the events mentioned here.

Emerald Resort & Casino is a licensed gambling venue. Winners know when to stop. Only persons over 18 are permitted to gamble. National Problem Gambling Counselling Toll Free Helpline 0800 006 008.

Emerald Resort & Casino.

Tel: 016 982 8000

Website www.emeraldcasino.co.za

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Emerald.Resort.Casino

Twitter: https://twitter.com/emerald_resort

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/emerald-resort-&-casino/

Emerald awarded handsomely

December 6, 2019
by Mark

Hard work pays off for Emerald Resort & Casino! The Resort walked away with multiple awards at the recent 2019 Vaal Explorers Award ceremony.

The annual Vaal Explorer Awards presentation is focused on stakeholders who have worked hard in making their various establishments a success, attracting visitors delivering on service excellence, and being recognised as the best in their field.

“We’re honoured to have been awarded numerous accolades across many of the categories,” says Tanuja Gangabishun, Marketing Executive at Emerald Resort & Casino. “What makes these awards even more special is that it is the local Vaal residents that vote and we are humbled by their voice of approval.”

Emerald Resort & Casino received the following awards:

1. Leisure Activity: Gold Award – Aquadome

2. Adventure Activity: Silver Award – Animal World

3. Accommodation – Hotels – Gold Award

4. Accommodation Lodges – Bronze Award – Emerald Bush Lodges

5. Accommodation – Self-Catering – Bronze Award – River Resort Chalets

6. Wedding Venues Capacity 250+ – Silver Award

7. Conference & Function Venues Capacity 250+ – Silver Award

Of special mention is the Individual accolade which was awarded to Resort Director, Mark Hands. The Gold Award is presented to ‘bridge builders’ with an emphasis on connecting and supporting tourism establishments and tourism in the greater Vaal river region.

Says Hands: “I find myself humbled and proud of everyone at Emerald Resort & Casino and what they have achieved in the past twelve months.

I would also like to take this opportunity to congratulate Klippies Kritzinger, CEO of the Golden Triangle Chamber of Commerce and Jaco Verwey for their respective awards on the evening too. The Resort has worked closely with them throughout the year and appreciates their ongoing support.

Each one of us at the Resort is committed to providing every visitor to our Resort and dynamic region the absolute best in service, accommodation, food and leisure activities.”

Emerald Resort & Casino is a licensed gambling venue. Winners know when to stop. Only persons over 18 are permitted to gamble. National Problem Gambling Counselling Toll Free Helpline 0800 006 008.

Emerald Resort & Casino.

Tel: 016 982 8000

Website www.emeraldcasino.co.za

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Emerald.Resort.Casino

Twitter: https://twitter.com/emerald_resort

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/emerald-resort-&-casino/

The real value of Paid Search and tracking the consumer journey

December 4, 2019
by Mark

In the digital world, it’s a given that Paid Search advertising is important, but only a few industries, except the finance and eRetail sectors, are capturing the true value this channel has to offer. Most brands are missing a trick by not tracking the full customer journey says Michael King, Managing Director of Reprise Digital, an IPG Mediabrands company.

So how can it be possible that insurance brands invest 30% plus of their entire marketing budget on this channel? Simply put, it’s what companies call a P-Factor or Profitability Factor. This is a simple profitability equation that allows brands to measure the value of a sale over time. Let’s use car insurance as an example – If I’m insurance company A and I spend R5 000 on Google Ads today, I’ll most likely generate quite a few visitors to my website who will either complete a quote online or want to talk to a sales advisor.

As a result of the quotes generated, I may sign up a new client who would hypothetically insure their vehicle at a monthly premium of R1 000. At a glance you might say that this channel is loss-making as the amount of adspend far outweighs the sale value, but the inverse is actually true. Car Insurance is a service that consumers sign up for on a monthly basis which means that as Insurer A, the company will be generating revenue from the initial sale over a long period of time. This is where P-Factor comes in. This equation helps us understand how long our new customer will need to stay insured with us before we cover the initial R5K adspend.

Ad Spend divided by initial sales value = P-Factor. So, R5 000/R1 000 = a P-Factor of 5. This means that our new client will need to stay insured with the brand for five months before it “breaks even” on advertising spend. If we then incorporate the fact that the average insured person stays with their insurer for 12-18 months, the profitability conversation very quickly changes to a positive one. In this example the company would be making money from our new client for anything between 7 – 13 months.

Every industry is of course different with their own unique challenges but the learning for marketers has to be that the future for brands is not only tracking a customer’s journey online until the sale is complete, but tracking the customer for the entire time that they’re associated with your brand.

Reprise Digital SA DNA

Reprise is a digital-first agency, and everything we do is rooted in understanding how consumers interact across apps, sites, IOT-devices, bots, search engines, and social platforms. We uncover your audience based upon their digital fingerprints – and build a media approach to help transform your business digitally. Reprise has the ability to fuse smart digital approaches for our media agency partners in smart and sophisticated ways.

On branded weddings and the point of saturation

December 4, 2019
by Mark

Andile Qokweni, Business Unit Manager at The MediaShop

On Friday the 8^th of November a common man like you and me was spotted proposing to a woman at a KFC. I’m sure when he played this scenario in his head, he had very little idea how this proposal would actually change his life in the short term. The man was recorded on camera and his actions were very quickly shared on social media.

The initial response to this noble action was very negative – one person on Twitter ranted: “SA men are broke they even propose at KFC…They have absolutely no class, I mean who proposes at KFC?? #KFCProposal”. But here was an opportunity for the brand to turn negative sentiment to positive because love is inherently free, it cannot be bought, sold or traded, even though the initial sentiment alluded to the fact that in modern times there’s a value associated to love.

As soon as KFC saw the opportunity to reinforce some of these “love” principles, the video went viral and a nationwide search for the couple began with South African social media going into overdrive to find Nonhlanhla Soldaat and Hector Mkansi, the country’s newest sweethearts. Engagement offers went through the roof as KFC gave consumers incentive to help them find this couple.

McDonalds responded as the brand which “loves things”, offering an all-expenses paid trip to Cape Town for the Toni Braxton concert. Standard Bank offered to clear the couple’s debt – if they are Standard Bank customers. Audi offered the couple luxurious transport to their wedding destination. Puma offered clothing, Huawei gave the couple phones to take pictures on their honeymoon. KroneMCC would also ensure the newly-weds are toasted with some fine sparkling wine and many, many more brands got in on the action.

South Africans were now calling it ‘their wedding’ and by the end of the day 30 brands had come forward to offer an additional experience for what had started as a negative tweet about proposing at KFC. So it’s clear, brands can mobilise and put aside rivalry or competition and do what is seen to be right by consumers and the general public.

This is where I’m going to flip the script a bit – at what point did this reach saturation? Was it after the tenth brand got involved, or was it after the third bank made an offer? Or maybe after the fifth FMCG brand offered the couple food? Don’t get me wrong, I would love the country and all its blue chip brands tripping over themselves to make my wedding a success but as a marketer I did take a step back and ask some tough questions.

If I was a victim of the recent KZN hurricane and storms for example, would I not expect these brands to offer the same level of support for me and why that couple for that matter? Many South Africans will tie the knot as this is wedding season after all, so why are brands not lining up to assist them?

If we refer back to The MediaShop’s Media Landscape series where Maggie Pronto, Isla Prentis and I looked at what type of content works, we touched on the importance of relevance of content produced by brands for consumption and we arrived at five key things, which distinguish great content.

Move At The Speed Of Culture
Be distinctive
Offer an experience
Embed your purpose
Invest appropriately

KFC, as the brand to really bring all of this together, lived up to the principles above but in my opinion many of the other brands just wanted to jump onto the bandwagon. KFC identified the need to turn this story that begun at one of their stores into a positive legacy. By identifying the opportunity they made it distinctive for their brand, they offered an experience and one could go as far as to say it was embedded into their “Add Hope” initiative even if this was not targeted at kids per say, it still fits into that “bucket”.

At the recent AMASA Awards, one of the judges, Wandisile Nkabinde, mentioned that for brands to be successful it’s not just about arriving, it’s about how you arrive. Julio Rodrigues then went on to say it’s not just about pushing performing metrics all the time, it’s not always about reach, frequency and impressions and this is exactly how I feel about some of the brands that joined the party very late.

It’s not for me to say who those brands are but the only questions that need answering now is “Who is flying me to the wedding and who will pay for my accommodation?”

Breeze launches hot new menu!

December 3, 2019
by Mark

Just in time for the festive season, Breeze, the family friendly restaurant at Emerald Resort & Casino, has launched its brand new menu. Whether you’re a hardcore foodie or someone looking for a relaxed and enjoyable family meal, it’s not to be missed.

“Our new seasonal menu has been designed and constructed by Emerald’s Sous Chef, Tshidiso Tsosane,” says Tanuja Gangabishun, Marketing Executive at Emerald Resort & Casino. “The menu is largely focused and themed to traditional wood oven pizzas and seafood.”

Breeze is Emerald Resort & Casino’s family friendly restaurant and the menu reflects this with something for everyone. Besides the best pizza in town and amazing seafood dishes, the favourites like gourmet burgers, toasties and light meals, together with the kiddies menu are still available.

When asked what his personal favourites are, Chef Tshidiso said, “There are a lot of really excellent meals and dishes to choose from, but if pressed for an answer, my personal favourite is the Seafood Plank, however I’ve had really great reviews from the Mussel Chowder, so that’s one dish that is an absolute must.”

The new menu can be seen on Emerald Resort & Casino’s user-friendly website under the “Restaurants and Bars” tab.

“Set under the extended thatched deck, Breeze specialises in catering for families, large groups and special occasions, with fantastic views over the Vaal River,” concludes Tanuja. “Whether it’s a cocktail or cappuccino, snack or seafood, Breeze is the place to find a fantastic meal this festive season!”

Emerald Resort & Casino is a licensed gambling venue. Winners know when to stop. Only persons over 18 are permitted to gamble. National Problem Gambling Counselling Toll Free Helpline 0800 006 008.

Emerald Resort & Casino.

Tel: 016 982 8000

Website www.emeraldcasino.co.za

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Emerald.Resort.Casino

Twitter: https://twitter.com/emerald_resort

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/emerald-resort-&-casino/