Product Tie-In

Our agency is located midway between Philadelphia and Atlantic City. Right now we're in the throws of a potential World Series championship. If you are reading this today, October 27, 2008, there's a really good chance that the Philadelphia Phillies will be the champs come 11pm tonight.

Many brilliant business owners have capitalized on the buzz of the World Series. I am amazed at the creativity, and from a marketers point of view, their business ingenuity. Our local Fox news station has jumped on the bandwagon and at every telecast we see bakers who are selling Phillies' red cupcakes, office workers who are all dressed in red, and cheesesteak stands who have colored the orange/yellow Cheese Whiz to a bright blood red. I also enjoy the politicians who get in on the publicity bonanza... "if we lose we'll send you Philadelphia soft pretzels and if we win you'll send us Cuban sandwiches."

How can your business earn some valuable publicity with sports, holidays, and other cultural events that appeal to the masses? Here's a tip... the more bizarre, the better. Do you know of a unique way to cook a turkey? Does someone at your office look like one of the presidential candidates? Is there a special way you can tie-in your product with the Super Bowl XLIII? It will take place in Tampa, Fl., on February 1, 2009. The official blue and green logo represents the blue waterways and green landscape of the Sunshine state. The tagline is "Believe in Now". I can see many tie-ins already!

Go Phillies!

Shocking Soccer Support by Some Sassy SoB's

Talk about consumers driving the market, necessity being the mother of invention, and audacious viral marketing campaigns taking foot... you ain't seen nothing until you've seen the perfect storm of all three whipped up by the "Sons of Ben," or SoB's, if you will.

The Philadelphia-based organization are rabid fans of Major League Soccer and are so fanatical they've even attracted the attention of Sports Illustrated. And like all good fans, a large contingent can be seen loudly supporting their team at every away match. Well, they're all away matches. Why? 'Cause they don't actually, have a team in Philly.

Gotta give these guys credit. Jerry Seinfeld famously quipped that with the frequent team-changes that professional athletes make, when you get right down to it, fans are "mostly rooting for laundry." This phantom Philadelphia team doesn't even have laundry. Mostly just hot air, I suppose.

But hey, I'm on the side of the SoB's. Maybe a Philly-based MLS team would actually win some championships, unlike our other local squads...

But I digress.

The marketing lesson in this story? Create a groundswell by rounding up your biggest fans and let them spread the word for you. But it definitely helps if you have something to sell first.

Goodwill Does Good

If you live or work in or around Philadelphia (or Texas, California, Michigan or North Carolina), you now have a wonderful option for recycling those old computers, monitors, and other electronics sitting in your closet (or, in our case, basement). Dell and Goodwill have teamed-up to recycle used electronics instead of sending them to a landfill. You just need to drop it off at your local participating facility. And you may even qualify for a tax deduction.

Everybody wins!