If you are running a business, then you cannot avoid marketing. However, large-scale marketing expenditures are huge and unaffordable for a small business. The best method to save marketing costs is the word-of-mouth publicity, which is also known as guerrilla marketing. It does not require you to spend a lot, as small ideas can lead to larger gains. For example, shooting a casual video and uploading it on YouTube can sometimes be more effective than a high-budget TV ad campaign. Here, we talk about a few of such crazy and wild marketing ideas that effectively worked for the concerned businesses.
‘Month at the Museum’ Contest
A special contest was organized by the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago in order to attract more Web-savvy fans and drive patronage by enhancing its image. For the contest winner, this museum promised a lavish hotel-like stay in its room and a payment of $10,000 for sharing his/her experience on social media platforms. Much more than its expectations, the museum received over 1,500 global entries. The selection process itself led to a doubled Facebook fan base for the museum, talks about it on local radio and television, and mentions of it on national entertainment shows and news. The contest was a huge marketing success.
Walk-In Fridge
Beer-making giant, Heineken tried the idea of playing with a familiar ad campaign by linking it to their other marketing events. They released an innovative video called ‘Walk-In Fridge’ on YouTube that instantly went viral with millions of views. Heineken also continued the ad idea by taking a walk-in fridge to beer festivals and asking people to participate by creating their own parody of the advertisement. Thus, customers created their own videos and uploaded on YouTube. Thus, there were hardly any major costs involved in extending the company’s unique idea and making it successful.
Target Lightshow
Target promoted their apparel lines by conducting a lightshow and exclusive event facing the streets of New York. The idea included more than 60 dancers who performed in patterns on a peppy score through the windows of a hotel. This jazzed-up night show, which was Web-casted, attracted around 3,000 people from the street level and more than 12 million Google hits online.
MINI’s Racing Challenge
For better customer engagement, the British automaker MINI’s chief challenged Porsche North America to a competitive racing stunt. This was all done through a simple YouTube video. While Porsche turned down this challenge, Hyundai took the advantage by back-challenging MINI. These simple efforts by MINI and Hyundai received about half a million video views and led to some wonderful marketing.
Colgate Ice Cream Sticks
In order to promote its products and dental hygiene, Colgate collaborated with a local manufacturer of ice cream. It asked the manufacturer to insert toothbrush-shaped sticks in its bars of ice cream. As children licked down these bars, they saw reminder messages from Colgate regarding dental hygiene. This was something very innovative that gave a good marketing boost to both these companies.
