Marketing in the physical world
Enough about Windows Vs. Linux, how about advertising. Jon Lewis has apparently got a knack for advertising in the digital world; but what about out there on planet earth?
I currently am working on a website for my school to simply list books to sell [jpauls.net]. I have been posting advertisements around school for a couple weeks, and am now up to 30 books on my website and 7 users. I know this sounds pathetically low, but considering it is the middle of the semester perhaps this is to be expected. I am hoping once the end of the semester rolls around, I can gather the masses to post their books online. What are some suggestions for advertising at a Community College in the real world to direct them towards my website. Should I take any previous action to my website to ensure it is ready and appealing to students? If so, what? I am hoping this will give all my readers some ideas for real world advertising we maybe haven’t thought of yet.
My thoughts were: Hand out flyers as students walk by. This is a little close for comfort for me, since I am a introverted online nerd. I was hoping to put up something that people say ‘wow!’ I can’t believe they did that!
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
Comments
I know Jeff, and I know Jeff isn’t a party throwing kind of guy. I was talking with my wife, Jeff’s sister, Kristi, she says Jeff should have a ton of cool stickers made. Set up a little table down in the lounge area or something and hand out stickers, flyers, and CANDY. People like free stuff. People could put the stickers on their cars and notebooks and things like that.
My first thought was, you could advertise at your school that you are going to have some sort of drawing where they could win $50 or anything like that if they register and put a book up. People, especially poor college students, will jump on $50. Then they’ll help spread the word because they’ll want their books to sell. It’s called snowballation… but you just have to get it rolling.
Really, this is a good question to ask at Digital Point.
Why not advertise beyond the school walls? Think downtown - restaurants, coffee shops, anywhere students hang out and you could stick up a flyer/poster. Flyers on car windshields?? Well, maybe not - that could get people ticked off at you. Is that even legal? I don’t know.
Better yet… print up a magnet and stick it on the side of your car. It’s a mobile ad unit. Then you can park anywhere and turn it into a Jpauls expo, handing out stickers, flyers, and pop or something. That’s what Redbull does on campuses. They zoom around giving out their juice. That’s the first time I ever experienced a Redbull.
Do you think people would have issues with putting their personal info up for the world to see - like phone #, email, etc. I’d be a little leary. That would be a really good way to get stalkers. Like on Ebay you’re info is secure. In case somebody thought you ripped them off, they couldn’t come back to haunt you. I’ll keep thinking. It’s a great idea for a site; you just have to get the word out.
Well…. in my opinion you are lucky to get 7 users…
i remember when i was on college (not so log ago) and i din’t buy any book…. only when extremetly needed.
by end of semester people are so worry about finals that nobody shave. Literaly i saw (and this still happends this days) people without taking care of their personal aspect or smell because their strees for finals. I don’t know how things are over there.. but at least here, on the electric engineering school i catch some guys stinky.
What i’ll do will be something like viral marketing…. make a party and use the flyers to promote the party and your website… if somebody ask why is the party… you may say it’s the oppening for your new online bookstore or somethign like that.
at the end it will make you popular with the girls…. just make sure you buy tons of beer!
