151 Guerrilla Marketing Ideas :: Tell A Friend

Today's Low-cost, High-impact Marketing Ideas focus on Tell A Friend aka Word of Mouth.

For the full list of ideas, organized by category, check out this post.

1. Make up some business cards to be your "Tell A Friend" cards. You can use these to create a referral discount program, where each customer is assigned a unique referral # that is printed on their tell a friend cards. If this # is mentioned in future orders, the original customer receives an X% discount on their next purchase from your store.
   
2. If you are selling multiples of the same item and sell one, you can include a few "tell a friend" business cards with the order - that include a photo of the item they purchased. Customers will sometimes share these with people who ask them about your item.
   
3. When a customer refers a friend to my shop and that friend buys something, I offer the first customer 10% of their friend's purchase as a store credit. So if the friend buys a $20 item, the first customer gets a $2 credit on their next purchase. They can save up their credits and use it for their entire purchase (They still pay shipping.) Your customers would be really working hard to get people to buy from you. The new person would need to give the first person's name and convo you to say 'So and so referred me to your shop'
   
4. I would put a 10 referral limit on the referrals and only offer it to a person that actually buys something from you.
   
5. Assign everyone a code that they must pass on to whomever they refer. Referee must put code in notes to get discount. It could be something as simple as the person's name with letters or numbers or something like that. If you keep a little chart, it'd be pretty easy to keep track of.....
   
6. I made a purse for a friend of mine that lives far away from me. Anyway she had sent me a message on MySpace telling me that all her friends LOVE her purse....and one of her friends saw that comment and found me....now she's interested in getting something from me!
   
7. An unknown customer (that is one with no previous knowledge of you) who has a positive experience will tell 5 people. That same customer - if they have a negative experience - will tell twice as many people
   
8. When I first opened my shop, I sent an email to my friends and family. My brother- in -law forwarded it to a friend who was remodeling their house and they bought a painting.
   
9. I remember from the guerilla marketing book was that I should be spending half my marketing efforts on my current/previous customers
   
10. http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/935-Ecommerce-Know-How-Start-a-Buzz-with-Word-of-Mouth-Marketing

As mentioned in this post, the ideas in this post came from my snippets of ideas saved from Etsy forum posts over the last year. If you provided an idea listed here, please comment and I'll credit the idea to you with a link to your shop, ok?

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151 Guerrilla Marketing Ideas :: Contests & Giveaways

Today's Low-cost, High-impact Marketing Ideas focus on Contests & Giveaways.

For the full list of ideas, organized by category, check out this post.

I want to preface today's list with a link to this post in Etsy's Storque regarding contests. By sharing these contest ideas I am not advocating contests, but just relaying info about what other people have said or done.

That said, here is today's list of ideas:

CONTESTS

1. Enter your crafts into contests...such as the county fair. Winning competitions and contests is a good way to get your name out there and win some money or recognition to boot!

GIVEAWAYS - Do they help?

1. I just recently ran my first blog giveaway. I had put an announcement in my shop announcements. I had over 400 views that weeks and over 100 people register for the contest. I would say that was pretty successful, and it was a ton of fun. ;-)
   
2. It is pretty easy, and it does get you traffic
   
3. I know that it generates a lot of views, some hearts, and we've got our fingers crossed about more sales :)
   
4. I participated in a blog giveaway earlier this week on another seller's blog that gets a TON of traffic and someone who read that blog found my site via that blog and purchased $80 worth of prints from me

GIVEAWAYS - Great Ideas

1. EcoEtsy Team did a scavenger hunt through participating Etsy team shops - http://ecoetsy.blogspot.com/2008/02/st-patties-day-team-scavenger-hunt.html
   
2. You could have a contest to post a picture of yourself in one of the ugliest fads you've ever owned. E.g. slouch socks with rolled up stonewashed jeans. And then vote on which one you think is the ugliest and they win something.
   
3. Do a monthly giveaway for those who sign up for your blog/newsletter.
   
4. I have a mailing list that I ask people to join, and I pick monthly from that list. I am also having a blog give away right now, and to have a chance to win, you just have to comment to that post.
   
5. I have people enter my giveaway by sending me photos of things made with beads from my store. I let them know I'll use the photos to create product pages that are inspiring and creative instead of the same drab photos.
   
6. Every blogger that featured us during the month of April, would be entered in the drawing to win.
   
7. I often like product testers for some of my items before I launch them for sale. I was thinking of doing a giveaway for a beta product, so it could be something small or big, with the expectation that the winner(s)would use it, abuse it and answer a few questions in a month's time.
   
8. OneWorld One Heart - an annual worldwide giveaway every January
   
9. I have a giveaway at the beginning of every month.
   
10. How about a "free flair" giveaway where I would send people a free button and then I would ask them to send me a picture of their "flair" in action--- wearing the button on a jacket or purse or whatever--- that I would post on my blog with their link.

As mentioned in this post, the ideas in this post came from my snippets of ideas saved from Etsy forum posts over the last year. If you provided an idea listed here, please comment and I'll credit the idea to you with a link to your shop, ok?

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151 Guerrilla Marketing Ideas :: Memorable Business Cards

Today's Low-cost, High-impact Marketing Ideas focus on making and using Memorable Business Cards.

For the full list of ideas, organized by category, check out this post.

1. I always make and send out bookmarks with my orders. That way, you never know where they'll end up, not just in my city, but all over the world to people I sell to. Mainly I just do it because it's a nice 'extra' for my customers.
   
2. I once found an old theater ticket from England from 1943 in a book I got from a used book store and it was like a treasure. If I were to advertise in library books I think I would make special advertising bookmarks with a nice ribbon and such so that the person feels more like it's a treasure than an invasion.
   
3. When I was 12 I found a very unique and mysterious business card taped to a bus stop window and I still have it because it was so interesting to me.
   
4. i make matchbook style Post It holders with my shop info printed all over the outside cover.
   
5. bookmarks are cool too. i just bought a bunch recently when Overnightprints.com had a special where you get 100 booksmarks free with the payment of shipping.
   
6. I like the idea of making Etsy bookmarks and leaving them in books. I am always looking for a bookmark and usually resort to old bill envelopes or scraps of paper when I'm desperate. Finding a nicely done bookmark in a library book would be like finding buried treasure. (I am a school librarian, by the way.)
   
7. my business cards are actually bookmarks. figure when i send it out with my items it kills 2 birds with 1 stone
   
8. We have MixedSpecies temporary tattoos that we give and apply for free! You'd be amazed at the fun those things create. We also are working on sets of "leave behind" coasters to drop off at bars with a drunken dot to dot game! Just a couple ideas!
   made my banner and my business card into key chains and make sure and show them off every chance I get...I love people at the grocery store asking me about them.
   
9. I make coupons using etsy mini and send then out as postcards and hand them out at craft shows.
   
10. I got pens with my Etsy url and tag line on them. Every time I have to sign something - at the bank, the pharmacy, the doctor's office, etc., I "accidentally" leave the pen behind. I've also left them in public restrooms, at restaurants, pretty much everywhere I go. also, at places that have cups of pens, like my chiropractor or the vet, I put a couple of my pens in there for their clients to use. Sneak marketing.
    
11. I make postcards out of etsy mini with my website on them and send them out and hand them out (with little coupons or discounts on them).
    
12. I got talking with the librarian and told her what I do. I asked her if I was to make up some book marks would she put some up at the front desk.
    
13. Perhaps if you know the item is going to be a gift, offer free gift wrapping and use Kraft brown paper, and then stamp your logo on it nicely?
    
14. Refrigerator and bumper magnets are fairly inexpensive to make yourself now, especially if you are using custom wooden stamps.
    
15. Temporary tattoos of our logo.
    
16. I bought these teeny tiny hardcover composition books (4 in a pack for a dollar) and glued my business card to the front. Once I found a ton of boxes of purple ink Bic pens at the dollar store. Since purple is my colour, I scooped them up! People can always use a little pen & notebook for their purse/backpack.
    
17. gave these out for halloween, along with candy of course! my son takes them to school, too.

As mentioned in this post, the ideas in this post came from my snippets of ideas saved from Etsy forum posts over the last year. If you provided an idea listed here, please comment and I'll credit the idea to you with a link to your shop, ok?

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