Being a small business, you need to be creative in getting the most out of every penny of your marketing budget. And with the more challenging environment in which small businesses competes head to head with each other on daily basis, owners and managers’ back are pushed against the wall – they need to be creative in using their publicity budget, or else…
Well, as we all know it, there are some great marketing stunts born out of creativity – some of them are simply outrageous and plain weird, but what’s important is the return-on-investment; are their stunts working out well? Some do, some don’t.
But perhaps these publicity stunts can give you an idea or two on how being different can give you the best ROI:
12 Outrageous Small Business Publicity Stunts
Some of these businesses used promotions that exceeded expectations. Other businesses made headlines and were soon forgotten, and others were unmitigated calamities. But whatever the case, all these businesses deserve credit for trying to do something a little different. How about Half.com’s outrageous publicity stunt back in 1999 done by paying the city of Halfway, Ore. $100,000 to change its name to Half.com for one year?
Small Businesses Boost Sales – Thanks to Reality TV
Turning small business owners into stars has become a winning formula for television producers, but some businesses featured in them are cashing in, too. Sales explode after just a few episodes air, transforming these nearly unknown small businesses into household names. Their income from doing the show may be going up with the ratings.
Creative Advertising for Bootstrapped Startups
James Caan can show you how embracing the Internet can give you the best publicity value for your money. Mr. Caan shares a success story of how Unibubble, a social network for university students, bootstraps their way to great publicity by riding on the viral and infamous Harlem Shake. Using Facebook event, Unibubble invite people to dance the Harlem Shake, while making sure Unibubble brand was captured on film. More than 1,500 people turned up and the video posted on YouTube has successfully getting more than 80,000 views. The Unibubble website enjoys 7-fold traffic increase and 3-fold in new user registration.
Memorable, Creative, and Weird Publicity Stunts
This old but still relevant blog post by Small Biz Bee can give you some ideas on how some famous brands made the headlines using their creative (and weird) publicity.
9 Bootstrapping Ideas for Small Business Publicity
Neil Patel of Quick Sprout wrote a great post last year, showing you how 9 businesses and individual are successfully getting free publicity. For example, you can learn how Oliver Beale wrote Sir Richard Branson a 6-page letter describing Virgin’s awful in-flight meal – a letter that later went viral on the Internet and get Mr. Branson to eventually called Beale and offered him a job as Virgin Airlines food tester.
The Top 10 Most Remarkable Marketing Campaigns
Marta Kagan of HubSpot compiled a list of 10 most remarkable marketing campaigns you can learn from. The blog post talks in details, explaining what made each campaign so remarkable. The slideshare is a worth sharing, too!
So, there you go – some remarkably outrageous small business publicity stunts that actually win people’s attention. ‘Care to share yours?
Photo credits:
– http://www.elmundo.es/navegante/2000/01/21/half.com.html
– http://www.michaeltotten.com/archives/2005/06/
