Comfortable environment and search for "your own people": how to create a community experience "Tamaki"

The pandemic forces us to look for new forms of interaction with partners, teaches us how to approach the search for "our own people" in a new way. Andrey Belyanin, founder, CEO of the Tamaki Group of companies (one of the top 3 manufacturers and suppliers of products for Japanese and pan-Asian cuisine for the HoReCa segment), tells how to take up the formation of a community around the brand in a crisis, where to start.

Doing for others, doing for yourself

Trust in the modern world is part of a business strategy. It would be more accurate to say that a trusting relationship is a business: if you are believed, it has a positive effect on sales, increases LTV (Lifetime Value — the lifetime value of the client). How to achieve this? There are different ways, one of them is the formation of a community. 

Today, this is a real trend that many are following or trying to follow. The clearest example of the successful formation of a community is the case of Apple, a company that has built an entire universe around its brand. 

A similar story with BMW and Nike, IKEA and Ray-Ban. Companies producing products of these brands are in close contact with consumers. Our experience in this field is the educational project "Tamaki Sushi Academy", which from a series of webinars has grown into a full-fledged community for HoReCa market participants and allowed us to significantly replenish the list of clients.

How the "Academy" was originally arranged

The "Academy", which started in the summer of 2020, at the height of the pandemic, did not arise from scratch. Back in the pre-crisis times, our company paid great attention to external communications: open tastings of its own products were held, master classes for chefs were actively organized. In the context of the pandemic, all projects of this kind were put on pause.

It was necessary to urgently look for new forms of interaction. It was decided to launch a series of training webinars. In fact, this is the same communication with our audience, only in an online format. This is how the project began.

The training course consists of seven free webinars. The duration of one master class is 60 minutes, they are conducted by famous chefs.

Structurally, the master class consists of several headings. Each category ends with a demonstration of the cost of the dish in rubles by ingredients. This allows the cook to estimate the budget, determine for himself the margin on the finished product. A bonus to the actual master class are books with recipes, as well as technological maps with detailed descriptions of dishes and illustrations.

During the first year of its existence, more than 15,000 chefs, chefs, restaurant owners, suppliers became participants of the academy. That's a lot. And this confirmed the correctness of the chosen concept, approach, relevance and powerful effect of the formation of "their" environment.

The case is collective: how it all started

We spent almost six months developing and preparing for the launch. In March-April, during the first weeks of the pandemic in Russia, when it became clear that reality was changing dramatically, we began discussing the future project, prescribing the structure of master classes. The work was collective: having prepared headings for webinars, we asked our employees to come up with names for them.

The discussion took place in a general chat, all ideas and proposals were put forward and considered there. We approved the most suitable options, including the names of the project, by voting. Such involvement allows each employee to feel a sense of belonging, to consider the "Academy" and his brainchild, too.

The project was a completely new experience for all of us, so we had to master different skills, expand professional opportunities: we learned how to write scripts, the subtleties of targeting, control over the live broadcast and conduct webinars themselves, studied the best practices of the infobusiness, creating a library of master classes, chatbots to automate communication with the audience.

In parallel with the preparation of webinars, there was a search for new people - also in an online format, via Skype.

Who were we targeting

First of all, for beginners who, with the help of webinars, get the opportunity to quickly enter this profession, and for practicing cooks - for growth, for obtaining new knowledge and skills. The Academy is of interest both for management, who can improve the qualifications of their employees with our help, and for distributors who are immersed in the subtleties of the product they work with.

The geography of the Academy's participants is the widest: from Kaliningrad to Vladivostok. During the first year, 15,231 people registered and trained in the project. The audience increases by 800 people every month.

The reach to the webinar is 43%, a very high indicator, which made us understand that we are on the right track. The webinar immediately gave feedback: almost 100 restaurateurs and brand chefs expressed their desire to cooperate with us.

I can say that the Academy project has become very profitable for us. We evaluate the effectiveness based on commercial requests that come to us after each master class. We are talking about new institutions with which we have not cooperated before. All of them, interested in webinars, eventually want to receive and study our catalog, price list and products.

Webinars or already something more

Now preparations are underway for the launch of the second season of the Academy, the premiere master class is scheduled for February. And for us it is very valuable that the project has gone beyond the educational.

During the development of the Academy, we saw that the participants want to communicate with each other. And we realized that our project could become a platform for the community. Now we are moving in this direction - we are forming a community assembly point, a chatbot that will become the link of all activities.

In addition, the participants of the Academy will be able to interact through their own chat, where we and the experts will also be present. This will allow us to clearly understand the needs of our target audience and respond to them quickly. And this is the key to the success of any business.

Would you like to join our community?

Register at the Temaki Sushi Academy and follow our events!