You know how when you’re watching the Oscars and stars are stopped on the red carpet and all the journalists are shouting, “who are you wearing?” Well, that’s not curiosity on the part of the reporter, it’s an advertisement. Quite often the gowns and jewels the stars are wearing are borrowed from the designers who created them. Some designers even pay celebrities to wear their stuff. This is an example of non-traditional advertising at its finest. The fashion industry has built up a huge platform for advertising by utilizing celebrities. Designers now see adorning them for big events as part of their advertising budget spent in a non-conventional way.

These campaigns don’t cost the designers a fortune, but they do get the products out there and exposed to a huge number of people. We’re seeing increasing numbers of businesses tossing more and more non-traditional approaches into their marketing mix. One convention-breaking strategy is to launch a Guerilla campaign. 

Guerilla campaigns are marketing campaigns gone wild. They’re often low-cost, unconventional approaches that rely more on time, energy and imagination instead of a huge marketing budget. The key to a campaign like this is to do something unexpected and memorable that engages people, makes them think, and inspires them to share the experience with others.

A good example of a campaign that did all those things is the one by Olla, a Brazilian condom company. They created a campaign that took Facebook by storm. First, they went on Facebook and chose a group of young men. Next, they created profiles for fictitious babies and named them after each of the men, putting “Jr.” after their names. Then they sent the “daddies” a friend request from their sons. The baby’s profile contained a link to the condom company website, reminding them of the importance of birth control.

This was both a stroke of genius and a huge controversy all at once. Plus, it angered the Facebook gods much-ly. People were not happy, but it got them lots of exposure as it went viral. Whether or not you approved of the campaign didn’t matter: you heard the name Olla condoms. A lot. For like, a week!

And here we are still talking about it!

We’re not suggesting that you get involved with breaking rules and/or (omg) laws or anything, but breaking convention is definitely on the table. As long as it’s not dangerous, illegal, or offensive, go for it! Smash conventions with your Giant Sledgehammer of Cleverness!

Ahem.

(Sorry. We get really fired up when we think about it.)

While guerrilla marketing has in the past been associated with more extreme tactics (the term tracing its roots to guerrilla warfare), it’s becoming synonymous with unconventional or non-traditional marketing campaigns. So, you can still be a guerrilla—and you don’t have to go the route of the Olla condom people.

You can do stuff like…

• Organize a flash mob. Let’s say you own a Jazzercise studio and you want to find a unique way to show people how cool and fun Jazzin’ can be!  Get your best students together and head over to the mall to dance your little tootsies off! Nothing gets attention quite like a flash mob, so make sure you’ve got something that identifies your studio or the message will be lost. You’ll just be a bunch of folks in spandex dancing in front of Bed, Bath & Beyond. Nappytabs would be so proud of you! 

• Put a picture or an ad in an unexpected place. We’ve all seen billboards and bus shelters, but what about placing an ad in an alternative context?  For example, what if you were hiking on a snowy mountain and out of nowhere, you saw a sign for warm underwear?  It would be totally weird and you’d take a picture of it and show it to your friends, right? For more examples, do a Google search for “guerilla marketing campaigns.”  We even put a link to Google in there, so really you have no excuse not to.

Like we’ve said before, doing the unexpected is a great way to get noticed and create a memorable experience.  We’re actually considering doing a GLAD WORKS flash mob where we all show up somewhere together and do an interpretive dance of the web design process. Dressed as guerillas.  In dresses. 

Just…because.