101 Gueri l la Marketing Ideas: Grow Sales with Zero Budget

Not everyone can afford to hire a marketing consultant, so we offer you a spectrum of kick-ass guerrilla weapons to arm your marketing war chest with. A lot of small businesses are facing budgeting setbacks and low cash-flow which can lead to a downward spiral of less advertising, less promotional activity and less sales. With this creative cost-saving tactic, marketing campaigns can be low on cost, but big on innovative ideas, imagination and creativity. Definition of Guerilla Marketing – Jay Conrad Levinson’s Guerrilla Marketing book, first published in 1983, simply puts it as “The achievement of conventional goals (e.g. Profit) using unconventional methods such as investing energy and ideas instead of money.” Guerrilla marketing delivers publicity via local unconventional marketing activity that makes people sit up and notice -- think “Shock & Awe”. How do you know when you’ve nailed guerrilla marketing? “It’s when the public can’t tell what’s advertising and what’s not.” 1. Public Relations and Publicity --The oldest guerrilla trick is old fashion PR so

keep at it. Pick up the phone and give local journalists what they need most; great news content – It’s all about spinning your activity to make it a human interest story. BONUS – Farmers Markets are a HOT TOPIC … food is a trending issue, especially local food.

2. The Calendar –There’s no end of ideas in the calendar for things you can do to find customers and make an impact. Why not recruit some aspiring actors from the local college to put on a little flash mob skit promoting your product or business on National Talk like a Pirate Day

3. Sticky Notes – Another way to use your stamper or even your printer. Sticky notes are noticeable anywhere because people know what they’re for; notes. Put these on local business doors, offices, cars, or above mail boxes in apartment complexes and people will take notice.

4. So many stamps – Looking for a way to get noticed in the huge pile of advertising mail potential clients get? Send your promo material in a big manila envelope and put 1 cent stamps on it to cover necessary postage. Out of 100 envelopes, who’s do you think will catch the eye first?

5. Do Not Disturb – Heading to a blog expo anytime soon? Get some door hangers printed up with your business information on it and possibly a link to something free on your site. Get the attention of everyone in your market this way, and it’s super cheap as well. No one else I know has been doing this so you’ll stand out for sure.

6. Pay it forward – when you’re heading into the movie theater, pay the person's way behind you and tell the cashier to give them your business card. You’re not guaranteed that the person will become a client but I bet the word of mouth on that one would be pretty big.

7. Fake publicity stunt – you could have people picket your storefront with signs that read “This business is too nice” or “Company X is too good at their job”.

There’s a million fake publicity stunts, use your imagination and I bet it’ll work no matter how weird or out of the box it seems.

8. Guest blogging – This is for the bloggers out there, or even the freelance writers. Guest blog on other blogs largely related, or semi-related to your websites niche. Opening other peoples eyes to your name and your website is always good promotion, especially if you’re an awesome writer. Not to mention networking with other bloggers is great for business as well.

9. Business Cards – STOP! Don’t skip this one. So many people see this and think you’re going to tell them to print cards and hand them out. I’m not! What you do with these cards is head to every library or book store in your city and find the section that relates to your business. Open each and every book and place a business card somewhere in the book. This is great targeted marketing and only costs you a few bucks for the cards and an afternoon of placing the cards. If you need some great business cards, check out UPrinting.com

10. Bumper Stickers – These are great because they can go anywhere, not just on your car. Bathroom stalls, street poles, etc. Get creative with where you place them, they can grab peoples attention when placed in the right spots.

11. Temporary Tattoos -- These tattoos will last for X amount of days and would be perfect for blog expos or other events where tons of people will be. Placing it in a weird place (forehead, neck, full back, foot, etc) is also a great way to get it noticed.

12. Help Home Based Businesses – most HBB owners try to keep their records hidden from local housing authorities so they’re hard to reach. head over to your local chamber of commerce and suggest a HBB committee. They might appoint you head of it (you can even ask to be) and you have a bunch of HBB owners who will come to chat and you can promote to with business cards, flyers, booklets, ect.

13. Anything Else? – These are two words to say right before you exchange money with a client/customer. This will make them think and could open doors to a larger pay day.

14. Top 10 reasons to choose YOU – instead of leaving business cards or other promo material at a business or in someone’s email box, create a list of the top 10 reasons why the prospect should choose your company. Make them 100% true, humorous and memorable.

15. Demonstrations – got a service business? this is perfect for you. Find a local store that pertains to your services and put on a free demo of your services. Your service involve outdoors? Contact news stations and let them know you’ll be offering a BBQ and free service demonstration. The BBQ could get a little costly, but the amount of press and promotion could really pay off.

16. Print Calendars – These could be given to each of your clients or left in a store for people to take for free. Print your website address and a little slogan or client testimonial on each months picture for exposure every day. The people using your calendars will even help you out when they have company over who will see the calendar, especially if the images you use are high end and visually appealing.

17. Window decals – get a custom printed window decal on your car with your logo/website and possibly a slogan, looks professional, and is great for red lights.

18. Fish Bowl Business Cards – You know the fish bowls at stores offering to choose a random card for a free lunch? Well, there’s two ways to benefit from this. – 1. put your card in the fish bowl (hey, a free lunch is a free lunch, and who knows, the owner of the store might need your services) – 2. ask the store to let

you have the losing cards each week/month which will generate a ton of free leads for you.

19. Sponsor an event – doing this is at most times, very inexpensive and also GREAT for publicity, especially if it’s a big event. You normally get your logo and business mentioned in all of the events promo material which is tons of publicity you normally wouldn’t get. Be at the event to add extra stickiness to your business name and interact with the guests.

20. Holiday Greetings – send emails or snail-mail to your past clients wishing them happy holidays (Christmas, Thanksgiving, New Years). This helps them keep your name/business in their head as well as standing out from the other people they’ve done business with before.

21. Charity Donations – Donate some of the profits you generate every month to charity. Great for promotion in the media and clients to feel like they’re helping out the charity by purchasing from you.

22. Hold a Contest – This could have 1-10 winners which helps the word-of-mouth promotion everyone needs and wants. You can gain free press for starting the contest, plus publishing the winners is great for more press coverage.

23. T-Shirts – This is great for turning yourself or others into walking billboard. You can give the t-shirts away as prizes which is also another great way of gaining word of mouth promotion. Your t-shirts for the prizes don’t need your website address on it. Just give away a great, fashionable shirt and that’ll have people eager to tell friends and family where they got it from.

24. Partnerships – Any partnership which benefits both companies is a great idea and a great way at grabbing the attention of new potential clients. Also a great way of giving your business targeted marketing.

25. Blood Drive/Support Local nonprofits – Or, any kind of support for a local non-profit; Invite nonprofits to your market. Everyone loves to help their country, city, state, etc.

26. Vendor Appreciation BBQ – Invite your past clients to a BBQ and let them invite 1-2 friends to come with them. This will help your customers LOVE you even more than they already do, as well as bring some new faces into contact with you as potential vendors.

27. Art Demonstrations -- Give an artist some free space – have a potter creating ceramics; create a painting at the market; if you have a building/area/fence – have artists paint a mural about the market.

28. Business Sponsor Displays -- Create exhibitions in vacant display space or work with local businesses to have Farmers Market displays. A live display of real human beings (or kids, pets, etc.) in windows/porches at local supporting businesses.

29. Lawn Signs/Streets signs -- Put up a controversial Political slogan to get noticed. Check on city/county ordinances for approval.

30. Urban Art, Reverse-Graffiti & Street Propaganda -- Great for evoking curiosity and planting brand awareness in specific geographical points in your city. Clever if it’s used on a route like a bridge with high footfall, allowing you to target specific locations or neighborhoods. Caveat: Be careful when engaging in street tactics as you are encroaching on public space – people usually forgive you for imposing your image or promotion on a public space only if it is entertaining, temporary, and an improvement to the environment or aesthetic.

31. Use stenciling on vacant urban spaces e.g. the Movie Troll-hunter was marketed using a stencil on Bridges in the city saying “Troll Below” sparking off curiosity.

32. Chalk it up: write your website in chalk outside a major event related to what you do say in the parking lot or registration driveway

33. Use Reverse Graffiti: Street artists use soap instead of a spray can and a stencil to scrub out an image in public space.

34. Urban Hacktivism -- Play with outdoor installations: turn an outdoor sign or piece of public works into something new and entertaining.

35. Yarn bombing is a good example of people decorating the urban environment & using a product in an unexpected but decoratively visible way – an arts and craft supplier for example could supply free yarn to a knitting Circle and encourage Guerrilla Yarn bombing in the locality. Catch some enjoyable examples in Time Magazine’s photo gallery on “The Fine Art of Yarn Bombing”

36. Create Projections onto a blank wall at night and it becomes a natural billboard/cinema screen.

37. Community Events -- Tap into the people in your neighborhood who use your market by providing them with meaningful events

38. Sponsor/support social events at other venues that make a positive association e.g. a book club in a book store after hours, storytelling evenings in a cafe, coffee mornings, etc.

39. Offer free/discounted exhibition space to new edgy performance artists, a nearby visual merchandising school looking for practice or design students. You will be getting some amazing visual merchandising for free that may spread via word of mouth.

40. Trade marketing events -- Get sponsors/businesses to offer a workshop or educational lecture to customers for free thus getting their collaboration. DIY store could hold free DIY or upcycling classes

41. Demonstrations – Partner with vendors, local businesses, etc. 42. Old Fashioned Door-to-Door Selling/image building -- Need I say more?

Improve your image in the neighborhood … 43. Flash mobbing and Crowd sourcing as advertising -- Use staff/volunteers as

Cast or your own customers as a captive audience. 44. Organize a Community Potluck or Picnic – as part of the market or as a

special event with neighboring businesses; Manzanita FM for the final market offers FREE beer and ice cream, yes, free beer and ice cream.

45. Games & Competitions -- Playful and Entertaining promotions engage people, tap into their competitive streak and can target sales; think Scavenger Hunts – Find the Market logo at 6 booths around the market – be entered to win something – encourages shoppers to peruse the whole market

46. Reward Cards/Frequent Shopper cards -- The most basic application is a loyalty points system on your reward card. Or award a badge for targeted buying activity and let customers qualify for the next level of rewards.

47. A classic – “be the 100th customer today and win a free prize” and so on… encourage customers to buy a special basket or combination of goods and reward with a prize,

48. Find a Champion -- An important influencer (or several) or celebrity personality that buys or uses their product/shops at your market and use their fame, endorsement and connections to get noticed. It usually helps if you tie this in with charitable activity.

49. Free Business Networking events – Presentations at service clubs, groups, organizations

50. Shared Services & Collective bargaining- learn from Cooperatives: collaborate with your business network to pool marketing resources, procurement and engage in collective bargaining.

51. Barter Products and Services within your business network or set up a system of your own between local stakeholders; A skills and labor system set up to service a local business community.

52. Special/Secret Tours get together with vendors and local businesses town organize a special tour around a theme: for example, a secret food trail showcasing the best culinary experiences for tourists and locals.

53. Random Acts of Kindness -- Do something to raise a smile and bring goodwill. For example-- Give Free hugs in a busy street area near your market.

54. Pay it forward: be a parking fairy pay for someone’s parking (or coffee, or lunch) outside a key establishment.

55. Give it away – FREE is always a good idea, and if you can do a special giveaway, such as reusable shopping bags. Put sponsor logos on bags to pay for printing and giveaway bags.

56. Product placement -- Offer vendor products/market as props to local visual merchandisers, Theatre or film producers,

57. Support local community events like auctions, family days or fairs by offering products for raffles – farmers market gift certificates; baskets of goodies, etc.

58. Need Inspiration? Take a look at what marketing, events & design creatives are using around the world today. Scan through some of these sites: The Inspiration Room – www.inspirationroom.com -- view creative content from all forms of media around the world; Lecool – www.lecoolbook.com has published a compilation of 111 City projects around Europe ranging from popup events, urban farming to sustainable design via their book: “Smart Guide to Utopia”; Cool Hunting – www.coolhunting.com/culture/guerilla-advertising-2.php Design Trends and Ideas blog The Pop-Up City – www.popupcity.net -- have great examples of urban hacktivism and outdoor guerrilla campaigns; Trendhunter.com -- community features micro trends, and cutting edge ideas; For spontaneous raw trend information you can also checkout Trendline online magazine – www.trendline.com

59. Start with the basics -- Social media presents a huge opportunity for Guerilla Marketing and increasing your revenue and customer loyalty. Online tactics can broadcast and amplify the local Guerrilla Marketing activities you’ve executed offline, but they can also help you build an online following, raise your brand’s awareness, connect to prospects and customers you would never have previously been able to reach, and transform all of your efforts into a comprehensive, strategic, global dominating marketing plan. Below are a number of steps you can take that will allow you to maximize the possibility of traffic and connecting with new customers.

60. Set-up a Facebook business page -- Add lots of content in the about section and be personable so that people can connect with you; post often, but not too often …Currently Facebook is free (there are rumors that it may be moving towards some kind of charges for business pages – FYI), and your customers (and a lot of new prospects) are more than likely already using it, so it can be a great source of direct traffic. Find other pages where your customers and prospects hang out already and post there as your page. Other people viewing those pages will see your posts and if what you’ve said is interesting (or if your logo is interesting) they will click over to your page to check you out. Add value to the conversations and avoid (at all costs) putting out promotional updates for your products/services on other people’s fan pages.

61. Make it as easy as possible to get more likes for your Facebook page

62. Setup a Google+ business page. Google+ is probably the best single thing you can do at the moment to boost the organic placement of your website in Google’s search results.

63. Setup a Twitter Account. Twitter can be an incredibly powerful tool for finding new customers for your business and it’s important to have an account so that you can secure your brand name on Twitter if possible. When setting up the profile make sure to be personable in your profile box and customize the background. Put your brand name in the background if possible and the URL to your website in both the background and more importantly in the profile section.

64. Connect all of your social media accounts so that you only need to post to one place for all accounts to be updated. This free tool – www.socialba.com --will allow you to distribute your Facebook posts to Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn. Now you will be able to focus on being really active on just one social network; whichever you feel has the largest number of your target demographic of customer.

65. Content Marketing for Success -- Content marketing involves creating valuable or entertaining content and publishing it online so that people can find it, become interested in it, take value from it and get to know you and your business before they’ve bought from you. It helps establish your authority in your industry.

66. Write blog posts -- If you don’t already have a blog, perhaps its time to start one? You can start a free blog on WordPress.com or Tumblr.com, if your current website doesn’t have blog functionality built in and you don’t have the budget to get one added.

67. Write guest posts on other blogs where your target market read. This is a great way of getting yourself in front of potential future customers and making them aware of your existence and your knowledge of your industry. There is a hidden bonus with these posts. Not only will you potentially get direct traffic when prospects read your post and click through to your website, but you will also get an SEO boost from the link to your website at the bottom of your post.

68. Write how-to articles for article directories and how-to blogs. 69. Sign up for a Dlvr.it account. Dlvr It is a free service, which will facilitate you

publishing an RSS feed to your social media accounts. RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication and it is a quite straightforward to setup. If you have a blog, it will have an RSS feed that you can easily copy and paste in to Dlvr.it which will automate posting about your blog update on social media.

70. Create videos and post them to YouTube. YouTube is a completely free resource and the 2nd largest search engine in the world. You can also publish the videos to your Facebook stream and your Google+ account. All you need is a good smart phone or a digicam and you are all set to make a video.

71. Post your videos on your blog and add a bit of descriptive text around them to activate interest and conversation in the comments section of your blog. Ask questions at the end of the piece.

72. PHOTOS – Instagram & More -- completed designs or photographs and post them to Pinterest, your Facebook timeline and Google+ stream.

73. Amplify your offline advertising – such as a graffiti art campaign by videoing the whole thing. Film meeting up with your graffiti artist, traveling to the venue, the preparation of the work and everything that happens until the end. Think of a few questions to ask the artist and yourself. Turn the result into a cool viral video for YouTube and Facebook.

74. Amplify your everyday activities. Do you or your staff do something during the normal course of your working day that people would find interesting? Why not film it and create a viral video of the daily activities in your premises?

75. For ideas, PR/Social Marketing firm Simply Zesty – www.simplyzesty.com. 76. Run online/offline promotions -- Does your business service the public in

some way? Maybe you could give away a freebie in exchange for having prospects & customers tweet about your business.

77. Put a QR code in advertising/posters and connect it to a mobile page on your website with the details of your business and a list of the benefits of using your firm versus your competition.

78. Run a QR street campaign – “Simon on the Streets” used QR codes very creatively to raise funds for homeless people last Christmas. theinspirationroom.com/daily/2011/simon-on-the-streets-qr-codes

79. Find a cool sounding voiceover guy to speak over a video you create from images or PowerPoint slides to showcase your business

80. Get a bunch of people who live near interesting places to hold up signs with part of a message you want to transmit on them. Compile the videos into a promotional clip

81. Use Graphic Art Students for flyers, images, websites often for free or minimal charges – benefits to both – they get build their portfolios, you get cheap/free graphics.

82. Tap Local Talent – for a jingle, special music or other special ways to promote your market.

83. A cautionary tip: On various websites, you will find a lot of people that will be will be happy to increase the number of fans, followers and connections in the various social networks. You will also find offers promising to tweet a massive following with your marketing message. These services are a waste of your money because the fans/followers you will receive will not be targeted and as such will be low quality.

84. Guerilla Marketing Traffic Getters: Traffic is the online equivalent of people walking into your shop or office. Your website should be designed to turn the casual visitor into a customer who is dying to spend their cold hard cash in your business. However, before your website has that conversion opportunity, you will need to get the traffic to your website in the first place.

85. Post a link to your latest blog posts on Digg, Reddit and Delicious. Well you’ve written the content, why leave it to gather dust?

86. Start a discussion about your latest blog post topic. Use big forums like boards, or whatever your regional hub of activity to start a discussion around the topic you’ve blogged about. You can usually paste a link to your post in on most forums as long as you are genuinely trying to have a conversation about the topic, and as long as it’s not your first post on the forum.

87. Give your exact target market something fun to do online. 88. Join some community forum’s where your target market would typically hang

out. Put a link to your website in your forum profile signature and then join the conversations happening on the website. Say valuable things and make a contribution that is helpful.

89. Search on Google+ for people who would enjoy or find value in your product/service. Particularly those who are very active in your niche. Add them to a special circle and message them asking for their feedback on what you are doing.

90. Have you got something to say? Why not host your own Radio Show?? Don’t just drone on about your products and services, talk about issues relating to your niche and give tons of value away for free.

91. Interview someone your target audience would find interesting. Blog about it, or have them on your Blog Talk Radio show. Or have them on your Podcast. Or even better do all three, and then bundle the MP3 and a transcription as a downloadable reward for joining the email list on your website.

92. Setup an email newsletter. Even if you are just emailing special offers out once a month it’s better to have on your website than nothing. You can use Mailchimp who are free and will keep you compliant! This will be huge for bringing traffic back to your site.

93. Create an on-line community specific to the primary related area of interest of your target market.

94. Record a weekly podcast, and publish it to a page on your blog and to iTunes. This free software and some time is all you need!

95. Team up with another business owner in a related but non-competing business and do a Joint Marketing Venture online. Your JMV should involve the creation of content (any form) designed to attract the perfect target market for both of your businesses.

96. Setup a LinkedIn group for your target market. 97. Setup or join a meetup group where you can make industry or customer

connections. 98. Host a weekly webcast. At the moment this awesome new tool is free.

CynoCast will allow you to offer a new level of interactive webcast experience to an almost unlimited number of attendees.

99. Run a multi-platform competition to generate interest in your brand and products. If you give something you sell as the prize you’ll ensure you attract your exact target market.

100. Showcase your expertise by answering questions in LinkedIn’s Answers section.

101. Finally, wherever possible, show people the passion you have for what you do.

Guerrilla Marketing is about using your Marketing Mix in an unexpected way in unexpected places with unexpected tools: shock, raise eyebrows, titillate and pull at your public’s emotional strings at street level. Or do something altruistic and service your community thus buying you a positive human interest story spin and goodwill in the press. Key takeaway: Keep it Local: It’s got to be high concept, appealing and relevant to your local community and target audience. What Next? Go Global: These real world tactics are extremely effective in themselves for getting your brand and business noticed out there. But combine these marketing tactics with the power of the Internet, social media and the various online tools available today, and hey Presto! You’ve just generated food for viral online content. Guerrilla Marketing is a growing trend: executed correctly, it can be targeted at the people you want to turn on the most. Be diligent and consistent. Be creative and have fun with it!

--COMPILED by Laura Swanson, for OFMA/Oregon Small Farm Conference 2015