Outdoor advertising includes no shortage of awe-inspiring campaigns that bring consumers closer to a brand’s vision and imagination. Executions such as transit advertising, wheatpaste posters, mobile billboards, wallscapes, and more provide audiences with clear messages depicting a user benefit or creative quality. Though these executions play a huge role in shaping the success of outdoor advertising, there is another marketing tactic that is sure to get consumers talking, sharing, and buying into. It’s called guerrilla marketing, and it has to do with unconventional, real life approaches and installations that create more memorable experiences with a brand.
Guerrilla marketing refers to the invested time, energy, and wide imagination put into a greater campaign. Guerrilla methods focus on atypical communication, usually popping up in the least likely of places, in order to surprise audiences with another, less streamlined, view of a brand or product. Guerrilla marketing is used to increase consumer engagement with a brand and respond positively to its unexpected presence. This blog post will highlight the different types, benefits, and examples of guerrilla marketing that help to elevate the performance of outdoor advertising.
Types of Guerrilla Marketing
In actuality, there really aren’t limits to how far guerrilla marketing can go. From a larger-than-life size Yellow Pages dart touching base at a restaurant to a fork standing in as a tree truck symbolizing the important of eating your greens, guerrilla marketing is extremely versatile and boundary breaking. Let’s outline the main types of guerrilla marketing you may see in outdoor spaces near you:
1. Street Marketing has to do with all the guerrilla marketing components you would find outdoors, on street level so that the campaign appears to be interacting with everyday street signage/objects. This is the type of guerrilla marketing that appears to blend into the natural environment, because it’s playing off of street elements, but also reimagines that elements we’d take for granted when passing by them.
2. Ambient Marketing is a branch of street marketing, which has to do with placing an advertising campaign in the natural flow of an outdoor environment- without interrupting the natural order of things, but adding to the regularity of it all by creating a new feeling or refreshment.
3. Event Ambush Marketing happens when marketers use an event already taking place to promote a product/service or create a campaign experience interference.
4. Guerrilla Projections broadcast hidden projection installations onto buildings to generate buzz and awe from pedestrians. Large-scale and digital.
5. Experiential Marketing, also referred to as participation marketing, is the creation of pop-up experiences that use immersive techniques to invite people to take part in a brand through any of the five senses. This provides sensory and emotional connections between participant and brand.
Benefits of Guerrilla Marketing
Since guerrilla marketing is all about invading spaces with meaningful symbolism and content that attracts consumers, there are plenty of benefits it has on the outdoor advertising community. Guerrilla advertising strategies tend to incorporate cleverness, compelling and memorable messaging, and interactive components that stick with people as time carries on. A few benefits of guerrilla marketing include:
1. Low Cost – guerrilla campaigns often rely on what’s already existing in outdoor spaces, therefore the cost of installing new, technological outdoor elements is fairly low. It’s a cost-effective way to build brand awareness with people out and about.
2. Opportunity of Global Outreach – guerrilla marketing efforts are easily shareable and likely to be spread out among social media platforms due to their creative zest and nuance. Since many consumers opt to share their personal experiences with brands online, outdoor guerrilla marketing can go from street to social instantly.
3. Unforgettable – due to the conventional nature of guerrilla marketing, long lasting impressions will be created among individuals. People enjoy freshness and delightful surprises, especially when it comes to brands they’re already familiar with. It excites them and makes them remember what they love. Even with new brands, a successful guerrilla marketing strategy will encourage consumers to remember that name.
Examples of Guerrilla Marketing
Now that we’ve examined the types and benefits of this space invading outdoor advertising medium, let’s get into a few examples of guerrilla marketing that’s sure to get people talking, snapping, and spreading the word. These examples of guerrilla marketing help consumers experience a brand better.
1. Outdoor Installations – falls under the street marketing and ambient marketing category; uses novelty items in strategic placements to help sell a brand, lifestyle, or product. An example of this is red balloons attached to sewer grates helping to promote the movie, IT.
2. Improving Existing Spaces – uses decorative items to extend on the existence of a natural outdoor setting. An example of this is IKEA using their products to refurbish outdoor settings such as windows on trains with curtains or bus stops with pillows to increase their brand awareness while also showcasing their range of products. This is a subtle way to get your brand talked about and enjoyed in public.
3. Coming Up with Counter-Campaigns – usually done politically, these guerrilla marketing examples have to do with changing a conversation in a public setting, that can spill into social media, through the use of opposition propaganda as a means of activism and rebuttal or spreading further awareness on topics that address the laws and rights of people. A great example of this is marketing public health issues.
After looking at the types, benefits, and some examples of guerrilla marketing it’s easy to see why this form of outdoor advertising is successful in creating further conversation among consumers and lasting memories with brands. Creative guerrilla marketing can also take the form of augmented reality, which is a trend that’s only on the rise. Guerrilla marketing is a mighty display of advertising that wonderfully infiltrates the most common of spaces. Watch out for an installation near you.
