Marketing is said to be composed of the four P's: product, price, placement, and promotion. I've always worked as a part of large independent teams that include other department managers that handle the first three P's. In casinos, Slot Directors and Table Games Managers all select the product, the price, and the placement of the games. In television, the Programming department selects the product and the placement, and the price falls largely to the Sales department. Therefore my area of focus and expertise in Marketing has consistently been Promotion.
I credit this to the fact that I've largely joined businesses in established industries, with existing and intense competition, and concerns like market share, margin and efficiency, and incrementing revenue from both established and new business segments. The tempo of my work has involved consistent promotion of a steady offering of services with a monthly rotation of mail and promotions, semi-annual major events and promotions, regular launches of new games and features, and occasional launches of major features and expansions. The roller coaster of Growth Marketing for startups and the benefit of speculative funding is foreign to me as a result.
Outbound
Advertising
My traditional media buying experience is first-hand with direct buying experience from account representatives. It spans nearly ten years and includes television via local cable, extensive sports radio advertising, billboard and bus skin placements, print and magazine buys, and online display and directory listing buys.
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Press & P.R.
Although most of my experience is with companies that have larger parent organizations that have handled overall large-scale press release and outreach operations, I have handled direct press releases and P.R. campaign management in the outlets of enthusiast outlets such as the Colorado Gambler and online listings such as the CityVoter.com A-List competetion.
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Direct Mail Design
I have the kind of thorough soup-to-nuts familiarity with the quirks and requirements of designing for direct mail applications that only comes with experience in the casino industry (or, arguably, a mail house itself). Full-color, single-color, folded pieces, perforated pieces, foil-printing, bar-coded coupons, postcards and more are all within my area of experience.
WORK SAMPLES:
Database Targeting
The prettiest direct mail piece in the world is nothing but pulp if it isn't sent to the right people. My skills with data mining extend to thorough knowledge of SQL and include various reporting programs like Tableau, SSRS, and Crystal Reports, as well as USPS policies and requirements. With direct reporting access to our in-house CRM data, I have extensive experience building mail lists with well-considered formulation. I also have experience buying acquisition lists, mailing Every Door Direct, even using automated trigger-based direct mail.
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Digital Outbound
A brick-and-mortar business with a rich and active direct mail program does not approach digital outbound the same way an online storefront would. Nonetheless the appeal of a wider reach at lower cost and a measurable funnel for conversion necessitates deploying email, SMS, and other digital methods as "an essential part of the mix." As mobile continues to dominate, this type of outreach is being augmented by work with partner companies creating native apps, and digital outreach through populating notifcations and message on the app, and enabling automated message triggering through geofencing and other live-data triggers.
The bulk of real-world experience I have with digital outbound, however, will be email. Using promotions to aggressively populate my list, and ensuring regular database queries capture new emails from our CRM, I email a list triple what we touch with direct mail. Email formats and templates I have used are overseen by corporate desgn standards.
EXAMPLE:
Inbound
Contests & Sweepstakes
Casino marketing in a competitive environment involves regular drawings and other sweepstakes-style promotions. I have extensive experience in designing fair and secure "game show" technique contests, developing database processes and front-end interfaces for virtual drawing functions directly from CRM with animated displays, personally hosting and running complex promotional productions, and campaigning and promoting for headlining sweepstakes like car drawings and large cash prize promotions while maintaining compliance and cross-promotional partner relations.
The current calendar of promotions at my present employer will reflect my most recent set of promo designs, built in collaboration with the rest of the management team. Examples of past promotional work are not publicly available, but can be provided upon request.
EXAMPLES:
Content & Web Site
With a heavy rotation of promotions and drawings, so much of the "content" added to a casino web site is promotional copy and therefore doesn't really qualify as content marketing in the modern sense. All the same tools are used, including CMS's with which I am familiar like Typo3 and Wordpress. Plus, my ability with these tools is greatly enhanced by strong knowledge of base HTML and CSS. But the level and aim of the engagement is different from what content marketing has become. Since I am curious to try new endeavors in marketing, have a background that includes creative, and am motivated to find new ways to drive traffic, interest, and brand engagement I have attempted more traditional content marketing with written articles in a blog format. Since the property's content marketing initiative is presently disused, these articles are unpublished on company outlets and I am presenting them on my own site.
EXAMPLES:
Pay–Per–Click
In the pay-per-click arena, search advertising would more closely fit with the inbound category while display would seem to slot better in outbound. With the majority of my PPC experience in search advertising, I'm showcasing it as an inbound technique. I've worked with Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising (in a limited approval business segment requiring evidence of licensing) as well as the Wordstream intermediary platform. I've built and managed full funnels for both the hotel segment and the casino segment, measuring down to full ROI via direct offer measurement. Of course, PPC examples are both live and variable, dependent on long-developed sets of secret keywords, and proven only with results in proprietary numbers, therefore the best example of this work to which I can link you is an active landing page for a freeplay offer ad for New Members.
LANDING PAGE EXAMPLE:
Social Media & Community
Managing the social media component for a singular business entity across many years has been an interesting process of adopting new platforms and abandoning them when the audience does, knowing when to spend money in Paid Social for certain goals and when to contract that spending to focus on other avenues, and dialing in a consistent flow of engaging content with a professional yet personable approach to direct and community interactions.
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Relationship Marketing & Events
Casino marketing was always ahead of most industries in the activities of hosting and player development. Driving in-store trips to property with exclusive events and promotions that appeal to the most valuable of the customer base is brand bread and butter. Managing and measuring this relationship marketing, and finding ways to merge and align its activity with the burgeoning tools and outreaches in the digital space, is key to future success. But none of it goes anywhere without the skilled personal touch.
Although the selection of examples of this work and these events spans years, none of which are posted and publicly available. I'd be happy to demonstrate examples upon request.
Shannon Keel
General Manager at Grand Sierra Resort
December 12, 2020, Shannon managed Dana directly
Dana is a talented, smart, creative, problem solver and a team player. Rarely do you find a strong analytical, systems minded IT professional who is also a great marketer! I very much enjoyed working with Dana. He was a true asset to our company. I have every reason to believe Dana would be an impactful marketing leader in any organization.
