Viewing entries tagged
WOM

Charmin and SitorSquat: nontraditional marketing at its finest

Charmin and SitorSquat: nontraditional marketing at its finest

Ever find yourself on a road trip in the middle of nowheresville and needing a bathroom so bad that your teeth hurt? And let's face it (especially the ladies), we don't want just any bathroom, we want a clean bathroom. Well, no need to look futher than your phone, because the marketing geniuses at Charmin have signed on to sponsor a new app called SitorSquat that locates and records restrooms across the globe.

This is social networking at its finest...hunting for your hiney. SitorSquat greets you on the homepage with Charmin's brand image of a cute animated red Charmin bear wagging his behind that will make you laugh out loud. The app is a free download for iPhone and the BlackBerry, and allows users to locate bathrooms and also depends on users to post bathrooms and rate them.

So far, SitorSquat has logged more than 50,000 toilets in 10 countries, more than half a million unique visitors and 1,600 downloads of its mobile app. Charmin is capitalizing on the social media craze, and believes the continued growth of SitorSquat will bring growth to the brand.

According to the Charmin press release, this is the first time a toilet-paper brand has partnered with a downloadable mobile application. My prediction? Looks like Charmin is not only selling TP, they're TP'ing all over the market.

Humble is the new Buzz

Humble is the new Buzz

Buzz, word-of-mouth, viral marketing. I’ve been thinking about the value of WOM after discovering the Skittles site, and seeing how many people were blogging and twittering about it.

Everyone knows that WOM is always the best way to advertise. As talk about your product begins to snowball, then it becomes a buzz topic. And buzz can turn your product into the next must have item.

But it’s important to make sure you point out the right buzz producers. Be sure to do your research, because the type of individual that will produce the best ROI may surprise you.

I just read on knowledge@Wharton.com, about a pharmaceutical company who discovered that word of mouth was affecting physician’s prescription behavior, but what really surprised them was to discover their best promoter was a doctor that they did not know anything about.

Typically, pharmaceutical companies expect their best promoters to be the physicians that are high profile or self-reported opinion leaders. But this study showed their best advertiser came from a well respected doctor who kept his name out of the medical spotlight.

It’s good to be humble. Those people who truly possess great skill or knowledge about something don’t need to flaunt it. Others will see their knowledge, along with their humility, and respect will follow. Respected individuals produce valuable opinions, and people naturally listen to them.

So keep your marketing eyes on the humble, because he or she could be the one to bring you buzz.