Tech CPR

Give your entry a distinctive title using 12 words or less
Try The Future TODAY! Outdoor Virtual Reality

Describe the event or activity - what did you do?
We took our Early developer kit Oculus Rift into the town centre to allow the public a chance to try out the Future. A nice little set up, new signs and lots of lights and sounds, oh, and a few scare pranks! The laughter and screams created a real buzz and brought plenty of people to try the technology.

Why did you do it? What were your aims?
Something different, one of our directors has worked on the market for 16 years, so he knows the attraction that it can be. Our aim was simple, get our name to more people in the local community while having a fun day at the same time. The feedback was really good, the people enjoyed it, the market even invited us back as it created a huge amount of attention!

Who / what types of customers were you trying to appeal to?
Our aim was to attract all customers, young and old, tried and enjoyed the technology. We are not known for gaming equipment so our  hope was that we could attract more 'gamers' to come and chat to us, and on the whole we believe this worked. Out side of computers we do mobile phones, tablets, game consoles and more so leaflets were given to all.

Describe any marketing or publicity created to promote the event
The only marketing we did was on facebook, We were unsure on the build up to the event what would happen, or if the technology would perform flawlessly. We had generic reach into the 100s and paid for reach of thousands, we also had established local businesses and market traders plugging the event.

How effective was it at prompting comment and creating enquiry?
All 3 directors were present on the day, and very often was speaking to, and advising potential customers. We made several new business contacts, one of which (so far) turned into a customer. New enquiries and visits to the website have increased significantly. Feedback was great on the day, and feedback from Market personal and management was excellent.

Any additional information ...
We took a risk, we closed the shop on a Saturday, we did advertise a little and we went to market with a lot of expensive equipment. 2 of us went into it with trepidation and didn't really know what to expect. However the idea of doing something different in Chesterfield was interesting so we took the plunge. There are a lot of good Repair companies around us, we needed to stick out and we believe it worked.