Welcome back my friends to the show that never ends. We’re so glad you could attend. Come inside, come inside…
Before we move on to our tentful of amazing marketing acts for your entertainment and edification, let us pay homage to the lessons we can learn from those quintessential marketers of the past — the carnival sideshow promoters:
- The sideshows had what Seth Godin would call a remarkable product (though definitely not politically correct today!) — unusual people (siamese twins, the dogfaced boy, the alligator man), amazing acts (sword swallowers, fire eaters) or strange artifacts (mummies, elephant skeletons). These were things that people did not see every day and that were so intriguing that they were willing to pay to get a look. What is unusual and different about your product?
- To entice people to buy a ticket, large colorful canvas banners were hung on the front of the tent depicting the wonders to be found inside. They also hung bills, or advertising posters, around the town. Make your product attractive and your advertising hard to miss.
- Many shows featured an outside talker (often erroneously called a barker), who stood on a small stage in front of the tent doing a sales pitch — the spiel. You have to grab their attention!
- Sometimes the pitch would include a “bally,” or a free show outside to attract a crowd of potential patrons. They also used a teaser curtain that let people on the midway see only the reactions of the crowd to pique their curiosity so they would pay the admission to see what everyone is looking at. Give your potential customers a way to try out your product before they buy — but leave them wanting more.
- They often planted shills in the crowd, who would pretend to buy a ticket in order to entice others to follow them. Make your potential customers feel like everyone’s using your product.
Sorry, we don’t have any cotton candy, ferris wheels or bearded ladies, but we do have seven of the best marketing posts from throughout the blogosphere. Move along through the midway and take a look.
Marc Sirkin at npMarketing Blog writes about Fourth Place Marketing — extending the idea of “third place” communal meeting areas outside of home and work like Starbucks to cyberspace. How can we work with the virtual self-sustaining communities like MySpace, YouTube, etc?
Eric Mattson at Marketing Monger offers a podcast of his interview with Joe Waters of Boston Medical Center, who writes about cause marketing in his Selfish Giving blog. Listen to the interview to learn more about how cause marketing can be used as a win-win strategy for both the business and the nonprofit partners.
I loved the report at Selfish Giving about the fleet of cement trucks that bear the logos of various local nonprofit organizations — everything from the Boys and Girls Clubs of America and the American Heart Association to smaller organizations, like the Buddy Dog Humane Society. This is a great way to build goodwill with the community for a very small investment.
Josh Cohen at Multiple Mentality discusses how Starbucks is trying to make itself the generic name for coffee (a la Kleenex), by making coffee into an experience rather than just a drink.
James D. Brausch says that Split Testing Sucks, and offers us a way of analyzing a sample of other people’s ads to see what kind of marketing approaches work best.
Kavit Haria at Awareness and Consciousness talks about his experience with building his musicians’ coaching business through developing relationships.
And from Houtlust, one of my favorite blogs highlighting social marketing campaigns from around the world, take a look at a powerful Australian outdoor advertising campaign raising awareness of the plight of homeless children.
Thank you for coming. Don’t forget to get your hand stamped on your way out if you’d like to return later. And check out the Carnival of Marketing next week when it will be hosted by Marketing Monger. Send your submissions over to eric at marketingmonger.com.
I would also like to pose a challenge to the brilliant marketing minds who read this post. How can we do a better job of spreading the word about the Carnival of Marketing across the blogosphere so that we get a wide range of participation and readership? Please leave comments with your suggestions.
And finally, happy Mother’s Day to all of my fellow mothers out there. Hope you had a good one!
Nedra helps nonprofits and public agencies create positive change on health and social issues through social marketing and transmedia storytelling strategies at Weinreich Communications since founding the company in 1995. She helps organizations make a difference for the populations they serve by strategically designing programs that draw on state-of-the-art behavior change techniques, digital media approaches and the power of stories. 
Interesting—will this go from marketing blog to marketing blog, Nedra? If so, that seems to be a good way to get word out.
As to the concept itself, my instinct tells me that there is one hitch to the analogy. Once in, the audience doesn’t get to experience for itself getting shot out of cannonballs or clowning about—the carnival almost seems non-participatory. Is there another analogy we may use in an age where consumers expect to be a part of the fun?
Jack,
The Carnival of Marketing is just one of many “carnivals” on different topics that travel from blog to blog (see blogcarnival.com for a comprehensive list of what’s out there). The idea is that both the host and the bloggers who submit posts reach a wider audience, and that the readers can quickly see the best of what’s been written on a particular topic for a given week. While there are no clowns or ferris wheels, the people who read the carnival can then submit their own bloggy goodness for future weeks, so therein lies the participatoriness (okay, not a word). Guidelines for the Carnival of Marketing and the updated list of hosts can be found at http://okdork.com/grand-opening-carnival-of-marketing/.
I hope you’ll participate!