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The Promotional Idea Showcase - Winter 2001 - Updated
Quarterly
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Real Problems,
Real Solutions
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Promo
Helps Radio Station Pump Up The Volume
 Radio
spots are always a tough sell, but perhaps not quite as hard as
building listener loyalty. Radio audiences frequently identify
themselves by their listening choices, so it’s not always easy
to make them switch stations.
Los Angeles-based 93 FM faced this obstacle when it wanted to
expand its listener base. To do so, it incorporated a
cross-promotion using a daily desk calendar as a link to the
station and its Web site.
The calendar’s cover bore an image showing a gift card reading,
“Compliments of Arrow 93 FM. All Rock & Roll Classics.”
Pretty standard stuff. But the catch was inside – every one of
the calendar’s pages posed a classic rock question such as
“Who drew the connect-the-dots picture on the cover of The
Who’s By Numbers album?” or “Who played guitar on the
Beatles’ ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’?” The hook: The
answers weren’t given on the calendar, only on the air or at
Arrow’s Web site.
The calendars were distributed by Arrow at various on-site
promotions and by its salespeople as leave-behinds for radio-spot
buyers – an especially fickle bunch when it comes to grabbing
their attention.
“[The calendars] brought awareness to Arrow 93 FM,” says Kim
Kelly, manager of marketing and promotions. “They sit on
everybody’s desk, and whatever is in front of you is often the
thing that holds the most interest and [creates] top-of-mind
awareness.”
That awareness has garnered some definite results. “In terms of
ratings, the [overall] ratings remained somewhat flat, but the
cumulative went up,” says Kelly. “And the cumulative measures
the overall size of the audience.”
Looks like a promo that tuned in its target.
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A
Real Perk ...
 “Forget
the daily grind. Something big is brewing for companies just like
yours.” So read a direct-mail flyer from Interland, a
Web-solutions provider. Tying into the concept of the daily grind
and staying on the front page of news, the firm offers imprinted
incentives for those signing up for its service – a Braun coffee
grinder, a pound of Starbucks coffee and a personalized mug,
imprinted with the image of a newspaper’s front-page headline,
e.g. “Joe Smith Chooses Interland. Business Soars.” Coffee is
almost always a good way to catch people’s interest
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Clorox
“Bug” Promo Nets 15% Response Rate
Perhaps more so than the rest of
the country, residents of Florida have to do battle with bugs,
including the always-popular palmetto bugs and flying cockroaches.
Most Floridians deal with them by enlisting the help of
professional exterminators or with over-the-counter remedies.
To maximize retail sales of its Combat roach baits, parent company
Clorox developed a promotion that offered consumers a chance to
kill bugs and at the same time win them – as in one of five new
Volkswagen Beetles.
To give the promotion a kick, Clorox used the power of the
airwaves. It worked with a local radio station and select
retailers to announce an “Enter, Listen and Win” promotion. A
Peel-A-Deal card was used as well. On the front was the Combat
logo, a “good bug” (the VW), a “bad bug” (a cockroach),
the promotion’s title and the logo of the participating retail
location. On the reverse side, the card had a peel-off
money-saving coupon and a PIN number that entered the cardholder
in the contest. The cards were available at sponsoring retail
outlets. Remote broadcasts and special in-store appearances helped
promote the contest.
To enter, consumers dialed a toll-free number, listened to a
one-minute commercial about Combat, then entered their PIN number
when prompted. Five winners were chosen randomly from all the
activated numbers.
“Clorox considered the promotion very successful,” says
counselor Mike Sims, explaining that, thanks to the Peel-A-Deal
cards, Clorox was able to track the number of consumers taking
advantage of the sweepstakes and purchasing its products. Over 50%
of the retail stores in the target area participated and 1,000
incremental displays were shipped to them.
All told, a respectable 15% redemption rate was achieved for the
activation of the PIN number, and approximately 3% of the coupons
were redeemed – not bad results for this type of program.
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UTi
Pairs New Name With Merchandise Offers
Sometimes internal
changes are simply an outgrowth of an evolving marketplace.
Corporate structure and identity evolve with the times. This was
the case recently when freight-forwarder Union Transport
officially changed its name to UTi.
The company knew it was time to revamp its image and logo, and
contacted counselor Barbara Dail for help. “It felt the original
name was indicative of an organization that just transported goods
from one point to another,” she explains. “It wanted a logo
that would express the true capabilities of the company. The new
name denotes integration, the Internet, implementation and
information.”
Obviously, UTi had a lot to communicate with its new name. A fall
unveiling was set to showcase the firm as a global supply chain
solution, providing air/ocean freight forwarding, customs
brokering and postponement warehousing services. The kick-off came
on the heels of several key changes in senior corporate and
regional management, including a new CEO.
UTi had 450 offices in 135 countries to “reach and rally”
under its new banner. So it organized a party at each office,
inviting vendors and clients to help celebrate the change. With
Dail’s help, imprinted balloons were used to decorate the
events, and attendees received candy-filled mugs and lapel pins
sporting the firm’s new logo.
Perhaps most important to the objective, though, was UTi’s
launch of an online company store, which offered a range of desk
accessories and logoed apparel for purchase – either by
employees themselves or for management to use as incentives or as
customer gifts. Months later, the site is still selling items at a
brisk pace, and the name change has taken hold.
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Logoed
Products Give Sampling Program An Extra Kick
 When
giving away samples, a brand can only assume trial use by the
recipient. But by combining a captive audience and interactive
campaign, brands can get consumers involved – and like they say,
the more senses you tap, the better the chance of success.
That’s exactly what Procter & Gamble did when it introduced
Physique, its newest line of hair-care products. To achieve its
objective of building trial and awareness of Physique products and
create a groundswell of buying activity among consumers, P&G
traveled to four major U.S. cities – Los Angeles, San Francisco,
Chicago and Miami – and threw “Hurricane Parties” to
introduce the line.
Representatives of Physique trekked around in silver SUVs,
bringing samples and prizes to the cities’ hottest nightspots.
The target audience was both men and women, mostly between the
ages of 18 and 24, who style their hair four or more times a week,
according to Tracey Long, P&G spokesperson. “This was an
opportunity, in a more social setting, to provide interaction with
Physique, to get a sample of the product, to learn more about the
line and participate in contests for fun prizes,” she says,
noting that participation was the key; to get people actively
involved so they’re more likely to remember the experience and
the brand.
Everyone received samples of Physique products. Winners of
contests such as “Tell your worst hair day story” received
T-shirts, towels, beach balls, cosmetic bags and silver tins
containing more product samples. All items carried the Physique
logo.
“We believe that people don’t participate in events just to
get a free sample,” Long says, adding that almost every company
introducing a product offers samples. “We wanted to go that
extra step and make it interesting. And that’s what contests and
prizes do. They give you something privileged, something not
everyone across the country has.”
The parties were an unqualified success. Overall, upwards of 5,000
prizes were awarded and nearly 10,000 samples were distributed.
More parties are planned for the future.
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Fuzzy
Wuzzy ...
 To
grab the attention of prospective clients, Aquent – a talent
agency for creative professionals – mailed out thousands of
fuzzy postcards. With their soft, furry texture and bright colors,
the postcards promoted the company’s creative abilities and made
a lasting impression. A message on the back of the cards explained
why the prospect would want/need Aquent’s services. The cards
received the highest response rate of any of Aquent’s
self-promos.
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Ah-Choo!
...
As the seasons change, allergy sufferers may want to go into
hibernation. However, new medications offer effective ways to
treat them. To advertise one such medication, Allegra, Aventis
Pharmaceuticals Inc. joined forces with the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Brochures containing information about Allegra and imprinted
packets of tissues were delivered with the Sunday edition of the
paper to all subscribers. The products were attached to the
plastic sleeves of each newspaper, demonstrating to subscribers
that allergy relief was within their reach.
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