Hey,

Welcome to another week of Bootstrapped Growth.

Today, I’m going to share:

• 🎓 3 Marketing Examples

• 🛠 2 Useful Resources

• 🚀 1 Growth Strategy

Let’s jump in!

👀 Things Worth Checking Out

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🎓 3 Marketing Examples

Example #1 - Dupe.com:

Dupe.com spent $0 on ads but still managed to gain 33 million views in just 8 weeks.

Here’s how:

• They build curiosity - example and example

• They show social proof - example and example

• They show how easy it is to use with quick product demos - example

• The videos feel organic - example

• They have a desirable outcome: save money and time - example and example

• They create FOMO - example and example

Example #2 - Barilla Spotify Playlists:

Barilla (yes, the pasta brand) created Spotify playlists that are the same length of time it takes to cook each of their types of pasta.

As a result, they got over 140 media placements, millions of views on TikTok, and 470k+ followers on Spotify.

Example #3 - Chamaripa Shoes:

Chamaripa Shoes used a clever tactic to help rank on Google and sell more shoes.

They created pages for search terms like “how tall is X celebrity” - for example:

Yes, people likely won’t be buying shoes from these searches but, this helped them build domain authority and find a novel way to build awareness for their brand.

It’s great because:

• It’s scalable - every page has the same template and there are thousands of celebs.

• Gives social proof for the shoes, as they show the celeb wearing them.

• Builds brand awareness for free

🛠 2 Useful Resources

(Bookmark These)

• Want to make sure you stand out? Check out this Differentiation Strategy Guide

• Want to scale your business with ads? Here are 20 Psychological Ad Positioning Strategies

• Bonus: the Useful Tools Database I shared last week has been updated into an actual website.

🚀 1 Growth Strategy

Hijack Events

Sponsoring events to increase brand awareness is often left to big players with bigger budgets.

The best hack around this is getting attention by going against the grain.

Examples:

In 1999, the highly publicised (and now iconic) London Eye was having trouble “getting up”. At the time British Airways were the sponsor of the London Eye. Richard Branson immediately saw an opportunity. He hired a blimp with the words “BA CAN’T GET IT UP!!”. It gained worldwide attention and became a masterclass in reactive guerilla marketing.

At last year’s Dreamforce conference held by Salesforce, rival Zendesk saw an opportunity.

They flew hundreds of drones above a Foo Fighters conference happening not too far away from the Salesforce conference. The drones recreated a QR code that gave out free food from nearby food trucks when scanned.

How to Hijack Events:

• Step 1: Create a list of conferences and events that your target audience attends. Rank them from biggest to smallest.

• Step 2: Map the journey of each attendee from arrival to departure.

• Step 3: “Hijack” as many spots in the journey as possible.

• Step 4: Post about it on Twitter, LinkedIn and anywhere else you have an audience. Encourage attendees to share.

• Step 5: Get it in the press and get “influencers” in your industry talking about it.

List of Event “Hijack” Opportunities:

• If it’s a big enough event where people are flying in from across other areas you can do something like this - Max Fosh once tricked tourists into thinking they were landing at the wrong airport by placing a massive sign in a field near the landing strip.

• Buy airport billboards and billboards near the venue. Paddy Power took this to the extreme for the 2012 Olympics.

• Cover the flight upgrade costs for attendees who schedule a call with your sales team (or conduct another meaningful task).

• Likewise, you could cover airport transfer costs. You could even have your sales reps join them for the ride.

• Uber, Lyft, Taxi and Metro/Subway Ads.

• Sponsor the hotel keycards like Brex.

• Sponsor the hotels and get them to provide branded welcome baskets.

• Sponsor the cafes and restaurants around the event (or buy out their coffee and muffins like Jesse Itzler did to sell his first plane).

• Sponsor the cafes and restaurants around the event and offer discount vouchers with your branding.

• Place food trucks and coffee stalls outside the event (make them free).

• Place free vending machines in popular locations around the event.

• Sponsor the coffee cups at the event like Ahrefs.

• Host breakfasts, lunches, dinners, and after-parties.

• Create targeted social media and YouTube campaigns for the geographic area of the event.

• Do a drone show at night like Zendesk.

• Fly a blimp over the event like Virgin Atlantic.

• “Crash” a van like Specsavers - you probably need to make it a bit more relatable to your brand though.

• Hand out flyers to people waiting in line to get into the event.

• Hand out free products, wearables and merch and offer rewards for people seen wearing them. Beats did this at the Olympics.

🗞️ Recommendations

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