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Online Promotion: Using Bumper Stickers To Promote Your Online Business But There Are 3 Rules

2006-12-31T14:41-05:00

When I first promoted the idea to my clients of using bumper stickers to promote their online business assets, they all thought I was nuts. In fact some of the comments were like "Promoting your online business on bumper stickers, you have got to be kidding, no one is going to access your website." Except along came the 3G Network and true internet enabled phones. Guess who's laughing now!

The world and the internet is undergoing a major revolution. The revolution is that the world is truly getting wired with more and more gadgets becoming wired to the internet and in particular mobile phones and vehicles. Two years ago, the most common way people would access the internet was through using a computer at either work or home. With the release of internet enabled phones, more and more people are now using these devices to engage services and buy products.

We started a campaign some time ago in which we decided we were going to actually use our website in our car cleaning business as the primary contact point rather than using a phone number. We placed bumper stickers and window decal stickers on cars we clean regularly to tell the owners when their car was next due for a car cleaning service (similar to mechanics) but instead of having our logo only on the outside of the sticker, we incorporated our logo and domain together. The outcome, 35% of our business now comes from people seeing the bumper stickers on the cars whilst they are in carparks or being driven around the city.

So what do you think this type of advertising is worth if you had to pay for it. Well in our city to place a moveable ad it costs between $1,500 to $2,500 for a 6 week stint on a bus. I am quite sure in places like LA or New York you could expect to pay $20,000 to $100,000 for that same service. We get the service for Free and we currently almost 1,000 cars with bumper stickers on them and consequently this is one of the largest sources of business for our car cleaning business.

We have also used the same principle for other businesses as well like builders, computer training and so forth. Why does it work?

One of the reasons we chose to use our domain on our bumper stickers was that a domain name or text is much easier to remember than a phone number. If you do not believe me, just look at the number of advertisers who get 1800 or 1300 numbers and then convert the next 4 or 6 numbers to text. For example there is a dentist in Townsville whose phone number is 1800 SMILE. I have no idea what the number is but I certainly remember his 1800 SMILE.

Look to get this technique to work there are three key rules you must follow in using bumper stickers on cars or vehicles -

1. Your Domain Name Must Be Easy To Remember

When we used this technique for our computer training business we found the domain name we used was way too difficult for people to remember because it had a combination of ones and dashes in it. To overcome this issue we simply bought an easy to remember domain name and then linked it back to our existing domain. For example we actually used the domain Townsville Computer Training dot com on the bumper sticker because it was easier to remember than one dash on dash one dot biz.

Keep the domain names you use really simple and easy to remember and this will work really easily. For example if you ran a pizza shop and you wanted people to order online and you were in say LA in the United States, I would be securing a bumper sticker with domain name LAONLINEPIZZA.com This is a much simpler domain name to remember than your business name. However, your online optimization should still revert around your business name.

2. Make Sure Your Text Is Able To Be Read 2 Car Lengths Away

The biggest mistake I see many people who use stickers on their cars is to make the text to small to see. I always try to develop our stickers so that the domain names actually can be seen two car lengths away. If the text is too small then no-one will see your website domain.

3. Encourage People to Put Your Sticker Where it is visible

The biggest challenge most people have is to get people to put the sticker on their vehicles after they have received it. The best way to do that is to give them something free if they do that. For example if you ran a website and you wanted your clients to put a sticker on their car, you might say to them, send me a photo of the sticker on your car and I will give you a 10% discount off your next purchase or you might give them a Free Travel Mug. Put it this way, giving them something that is cost effective for you as a reward will mean they are more likely to do that.

I have seen many different companies use a range of techniques to achieve this. One of the radio stations in North Queensland Australia, wanted to promote people to listen to their station, so they ran a competition where they got everyone to put a sticker with the radio stations logo onto their cars and they ran prize patrols over a number of weeks. If your car was seen with a sticker on it, you were then pulled over and given a prize.

Another food outlet company, actually global fast food chain gave a sticker out with their logo on it and a special offer, out in the local newspaper. They basically said that if you put the sticker on the driver side of your car each time you go through their drive thru you would get a free drink upgrade. The interesting thing about this sticker is that it expires after 6 months, but it is quite amazing the number of people who still have the stickers on their cars, promoting the fast food chain two or three years after the sticker had expired.

Literally the bumper sticker has become a long term advertisement for your business. Bumper stickers with your logo and domain name is a great offline promotional tool and will get results for your business for a lot longer than any other medium plus the cost of a bumper sticker is negligible compared to other mediums.

One other note, you can measure the success of this medium by ensuring the domain name used is different and easier to read than your standard business domain name and as such the number of people who use the bumper stick domain should be able to be measured just as you would on the internet. This will then prove to you whether your marketing investment was in fact worth while.

About the Author

For other great online and offline marketing ideas visit our website Online Marketing Business Opportunity. If you would like the opportunity to read the book Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill simply visit our website where you can download the book and audio reading.

Making A Statement With Custom Bumper Stickers

2006-12-31T14:38-05:00

by Morgan Hamilton

I was working at an awful office job a few years ago, when I suddenly came up with an idea for custom bumper stickers. I worked at one of those notoriously inefficient and micro-managerial environments that are common in the US. I have to put up with a little cubicle, and a boss that was constantly peeking over my shoulder. My boss was always spouting new slogans, printing up new customized promotional material, and adding more forms that we would fill out. He was doing this to increase the productivity of the company.

He came in with a batch of new custom bumper stickers, and told us to give them out to at least 10 people. Those awful stickers were printed in orange and green, which were supposed to catch the eye of the viewers. They were so eye catching that it was impossible to look away from them. Just looking at them would give you a headache, even though they were just small stickers. Being near them makes you feel that you were standing in a room painted with the neon paints.

My boss often printed up custom bumper stickers, custom coffee mugs, and the like, but he didn't have that high of a budget for advertising. I was also certain that he squandered what he had. It must be pretty reasonable if he could print up custom bumper stickers practically every week. I was able to ask some friends about the stickers that they printed out, since I was involved in the antiwar movement at the time. I found out that a person can get them made cheaply, so I decided to print out some of my own.

The custom bumper stickers that I printed out were mainly antiwar slogans, but I also made ones that were funny or cute. I also began taking requests from friends after a few weeks. One of my friends was disgruntled with her work place, so I printed out dozens of stickers making fun of that company. My friend would anonymously put them on the cars of everyone who worked there, sneak away, and give everyone a laugh without ever being caught.

I guess it was kind of a childish impulse, but I just couldn't stop myself once I realized that I could make my own custom bumper stickers. Maybe it's the same urge that drives people to paint building after building with graffiti. To tell you the truth, I'm still doing it these days. I have probably put guerrilla custom bumper stickers on more than a thousand vehicles.

About the Author

Morgan Hamilton offers expert advice and great tips regarding all aspects concerning Custom Bumper Stickers. Visit our site for more helpful information about Magnet Bumper Sticker Custom and other similar topics.

Are Bumper Stickers A First Amendment Right?

2006-08-10T01:07-04:00

by Gregg Hall

If you get out and drive around town at all you have surely seen all kinds of different bumper stickers ranging from just a timid "Virginia is for Lovers" to "I hate Bush" and many variations between. We see parents displaying stickers stating they are proud of their child like the "my child is an honor student" ones, and conversely the negative parody, "my kid beat up your honor student". What you may not know is that many states have statutes prohibiting certain kinds of statements or illustrations. Is this a violation of our rights under the First Amendment? Let's take a look at what is being said.

The U.S. Supreme Court has stated that "the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable and the fact that protected speech may be offensive to some does not justify its suppression."

Regardless, there have still been many situations where individuals have been cited for the language or illustrations displayed on their vehicles. One woman in Florida who had the famous four letter word for intercourse stated three times on a sticker was cited but the charges were dropped because the word was not being used in a sexual context.

A man in Georgia displaying the infamous "_ _it happens" statement was fined $100 by a local jurisdiction, he took the case to the Georgia Supreme Court citing that the law was unconstitutional and they sided with him saying, "the peace of society is not endangered by the profane or lewd word which is not directed at a particular audience." This seems to state that as long as you aren't directing your remark to a specific group of people that it is okay, at least in Georgia.

Despite the victories by these mentioned above and many others there are a lot of states that have laws similar to the one below:

According to the law in Tennessee, "the display of obscene and patently offensive movies, bumper stickers, window signs, or other markings on or in a motor vehicle which is visible to other drivers is prohibited and display of such materials shall subject the owner of the vehicle on which they are displayed, upon conviction, to a fine of not less than $2.00, nor more than $50.00." The state defines obscene like this:

"(A) The average person applying contemporary community standards would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest;
(B) The average person applying contemporary community standards would find that the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct; and
(C) The work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value
(11) "Patently offensive" means that which goes substantially beyond customary limits of candor in describing or representing such matters.

I have to agree with what the Georgia court concluded their ruling in the case mentioned above, a statement from Benjamin Franklin, "Everything one has a right to do is not best to be done." So, in plain English, just because we have a right to do it doesn't mean we should. Use some common sense in what you display on your car.

Gregg Hall is an author living in Navarre Florida. Find more about bumper stickers and Funny Bumper Stickers at http://www.bumperstickersplus.com

What Is With America's Fascination With Bumper Stickers?

2006-08-10T01:05-04:00

by Gregg Hall

Although bumper stickers are a worldwide phenomenon, it seems that Americans are more fascinated with the use of them than others. When driving down the highways and streets of the United States there is no telling what you might find emblazoned on one of these. So, when did all this begin? Well first of all you had to have cars with bumpers which didn't happen until 1927 with the introduction of the Model A by Henry Ford. The first so-called bumper stickers were not stickers at all and were attached to the bumpers by wires. These first started showing up right before the onset of WWII and were rather large. The first person to actually make stickers that could be attached to a bumper is thought to be Forest Gill, a silk screen printer from Kansas who began making the bumper sticker in the 1930s.

Bumper stickers are used for a wide variety of reasons, most of which are simply to let others know what the driver's view is on a certain issue, make a statement, or just to be funny. The most widespread use of the advertising medium is for political campaigns and this dates back to the 1940's with politicians handing them out to their constituents to have them advertise their support for all to see. During elections times you will see a huge increase in these kinds of political stickers, though some staunch supporters never remove them, even when their candidate loses.

Another use of bumper stickers in a support role is that of displaying stickers embossed with the logo of their favorite sports team or the name of the team that their child plays for. Along these same lines are the those that express pride in a child's accomplishments as an honor student or like the ones that parents of military children that state something like, "My son is a U.S. Marine".

Sometimes it's fun just reading some of the stickers I see on cars I happen to be behind, they are very telling of someone's personality. If you are behind someone with surf shop stickers on the back of their car, they are most likely involved in surfing. If you see someone with religious statements on theirs, they are usually people who are very serious and outspoken about their faith. And there is no denying that anyone that has one of the political stickers that simply states "W" is a die hard Republican.

Gregg Hall is an author living in Navarre Florida. Find more about bumper stickers and get Bumper Stickers online at http://www.bumperstickersplus.com