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Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Thinking Outside the Box

In the wonderful world of marketing it helps to think outside of the box. After all, just about everything you can conceive of has been tried in one form or another and to avoid the same old thing, we have to get creative. We have to take what we know works and figure out how to present it in a NEW way. This is a never ending battle and one of the reasons corporations spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on marketing strategies. While browsing the web and researching sign strategy, I ran across an article that nearly knocked me out of my seat. Not only was this "outside the box", it was bold, daring and (believe it or not) a community service.

Dan O'Connor, a real estate investor who spends his spare time
developing cutting edge systems to help other real estate investors, decided to launch a fairly peculiar marketing strategy not too long ago. He termed this "Operation Bandit Sign Traffic". As everyone who is familiar with bandit signs (yard signs) knows, it has become illegal to place signs at most intersections. But what if the signs were placed at the intersections in a way that completely looped around the laws? Is there actually a way to do that without getting into trouble or fined? Obviously so. Mr. O'Connor jumped through the loops when he hired homeless people who were panhandling the intersections to hold his signs. Basically, he put the homeless people to work and gained an advertising advantage all in one surprising sweep. Not only that, but the media got involved when Mr. O'Connor called to inform them of his intention to employ the homeless as a community service project for the day.

It appears that Mr. O'Connor's bold strategy was a huge success. He was able to net $37,000 in profit in 10 days, attract 5 qualified tenant buyers, get his company name on peoples lips, gainfully employ a large population of homeless people in a day AND gain recognition through the media. Flabbergasted, I stared at the screen of my computer, blinked a few times to ensure my eyes were working properly, then silently congratulated his ability to think THAT far outside of the box. I can honestly say that, in all my years of reading and researching marketing ideas and strategies, I would never have dreamed of anything like this. Just goes to show what thinking outside of the box can accomplish!

If you are interested in reading more about "Operation Bandit Sign Traffic", click here.

As always, thanks for stopping by!

Gwynn

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