Marketing and PR 2015-16 competition entry: Diamond Boutique

Raila Bawani, marketing manager of Diamond Boutique, explains why the business should win the marketing and PR category of the Guardian Small Business Showcase competition.

Marketing is at the heart of our business and is responsible for developing effective off and online strategies. Underpinning these strategies is Infusionsoft, a customer relationship management (CRM) system that enables us to automate our marketing and email campaigns based on customer history and preferences. This system is at the forefront of the customer shopping experience.

Campaigns are set up to provide email updates, suggest cross/up selling as well as requesting timely customer reviews and more. In addition to this, the system has excellent plug-ins, which allows us to work with other small businesses. For example the system will send information about special dates to a business that specialises in cards, that in turn will send them out for us.

PR is a very important part of our marketing strategy, and we have had a number of features in popular magazines. Diamond Boutique recently held a competition with Look magazine, in which a lucky winner would receive a lookalike of Cherly Fernandez-Versini’s engagement ring. This has increased enquiries about our custom design service.

Diamond Boutique also recognises the power of bloggers – this is why our social media strategy revolves around them. With regular product mentions and exclusive discount codes we are able to appeal to a younger, more digital audience.

All entries which meet the competition criteria are published and our judging panel select a shortlist of the three for each category. Winners are announced at an awards ceremony in summer 2016.

Marketing and PR 2015-16 competition entry: Diamond Boutique