Contrary to the claim of Ralph Waldo Emerson that if you
build a better mousetrap the world will beat a path to your
door, for anyone in business, letting the world know about
your mousetraps presents a fundamental, neverending
challenge. Here are some original tactics people have used
to get the word out to the press or the public.
When Joann Stoutenburgh launched her typing service in
Antelope, California, she bought a vanity license plate for
her car that read "TYPNG4U," and had a plate frame created
with her telephone number on it. One day a man followed her
several blocks and asked for her business card. He was a
lawyer, desperate for someone to replace his current word
processing person. Not only did he become her first long-
term client, he referred her to several other lawyers
needing secretarial help.
Advertising consultant Hal Pawluk of Covina, California, had
a client who wanted to give out software samples on a small
budget. Since a mass mailing or a disk insert in a magazine
weren't feasible, Pawluk created an ad with a bold arrow
pointing at the binding and copy that said, "If your copy of
our demo isn't here, call ___-____." No one found a disk
there, and the phones rang off the hook, Pawluk says.
Lee Harris, a graphic designer in St. Louis, Missouri, heard
about some defective children's shoes available at a bargain
price, bought a few and sent one wrapped in a gift box to
potential clients with a card that read, "Just trying to get
a foot in the door." It worked well, according to a local
admirer of Lee Harris.
Along the same lines was a stunt radio producer and
copywriter Steve Biddle pulled after trying unsuccessfully
to get the attention of the promotion manager of his local
newspaper. "We recorded our presentation, put the unlabeled
cassette into a cassette player and that into a little
wicker gondola hanging from a helium balloon about three
feet in diameter with a big red sticker on it that said,
'Play me.'" That afternoon, after a courier service
delivered the balloon, we got a call, and for the next year
or so we produced all their radio spots."
Silvana Clark of Bellingham, Washington, taught her springer
spaniel Sherman a few unusual tricks and mailed out promo-
tional kits about him to television producers along with a
stamped reply postcard with three options in a checklist:
Yes! I'm interested in having Sherman on my show; Not sure
if Sherman fits the show format; and Sorry, Sherman's cute,
but not for us. Anyone who checked off options #1 or #2 got
a quick followup. But Clark also followed up with group #3 a
few months later with a picture postcard of the dog. One
producer who eventually invited Sherman on told Clark, "You
wore me out with your persistence, but I'm glad you did!"
In her book, Taming the Marketing Jungle, Silvana Clark
mentions a house cleaning company competing with three
others in its area. One of the companies, called Fresh as a
Daisy, made itself more memorable than the others by leaving
behind a trademark gift in every house it cleaned: a vase
with three daisies on the kitchen table. "We've had more
people call and tell us they've heard about us because of
those daisies," said the owner. "We don't have to do any
other form of advertising, since we began leaving the
flowers."
In How to Drive Your Competition Crazy, Guy Kawasaki cites a
California contractor, required by law to guarantee its work
for twelve full months, that turns that into an advantage by
calling customers eleven months after an installation to see
if they need any repairs before the warranty expires. "The
calls generate a small amount of warranty work and a huge
amount of new work and referrals," Kawasaki remarks.
Copyright 1998 Marcia Yudkin. All rights
reserved
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