If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Truly successful marketers target people and other businesses that are on the fringe. What is the fringe? The fringe is everywhere the masses aren’t.

When you look at a standard bell curve, you see how it looks like an upside-down U. In marketing you want to market to the people on the edges of the graph. This is where your marketing efforts are rewarded the most and will typically result in higher profit margins. Avoid like the plague that middle 68% of the people. In that area you are competing for the attention of the same consumers as Coca-Cola and Nike. For example, if you are in the market of credit cards, you want to target the people who American Express targets, not the everyday person who is fighting for the typical Visa or MasterCard. Only certain people qualify for an American Express card, but almost anyone can get a Visa or MasterCard.

There are a couple major benefits to targeting the fringe market. First would be the availability for more people to talk about your product or service to others. If everyone knows about you or your product, it will rarely be brought up in conversation because when everyone knows about your product, it is no longer REMARKABLE.

Secondly, targeting the fringe often means you can get into markets that not a lot of people are in. If you don’t have to spend a ton of money advertising, then you can take that money you save from advertising and make your business or service even more remarkable now that it is unconventional. Go the extra mile to make every person feel excited about your product, make them feel treasured by offering a free coupon for their friends or any other thing imaginable to get people talking about you. In most cases, making yourself remarkable will save you more in advertising and result in higher sales than any traditional marketing. So find your fringe market and meet their needs in a way that has never been done before. When you do, the customers will do the advertising for you.

*Don’t forget about the contest for the best business card design for Unconventional Marketing worth $50.

Popularity: 8% [?]

The best business model meshes the best of online with offline. By finding a unique and interesting way to combine the best of both worlds, you will succeed in both.

The ultimate way to mesh online business and offline business it to have a product or idea that can flow between the two. A family friend of ours owns the Mt. Shasta View souvenir shop in Weed, CA. The funny thing about this shop is the merchandise the store sells. Located at the foot of Mt. Shasta in Northern California, Weed was named after a timber baron, Abner Weed. Nowadays the use of the word “weed” is more often than not associated with marijuana. Needless to say, the town of Weed has a lot of jokes surrounding it. Back to my friends shop.

This store has been in business selling souvenirs for about 60 years. I am also willing to bet that some of the best selling t-shirts were created not long after. As of lately, they have started moving their tangible business from the store in Weed more online. Sales have been trickling in from all over the country. My guess is that most of the sales have resulted in some potheads finding the site after searching for different t-shirts on Google. Now this is an instance of a “real world” business making its way online and growing even more.

The million dollar question is how do you take your online business and incorporate both businesses and people offline? As I was flying to Washington State yesterday it occurred to me that probably the easiest solution is through the use of business cards. What if you had not only a business card, but a business card with value attached to it? What if your card had $500 off first-time Internet business consulting? This would convey that not only do you do consulting, but that you also must be doing a good job to deliver $500 off. Make sure to express that this only works by having the business card. Now that card becomes something of value and worth. Who loses something worth $500 bucks, right?

Now if you know how to hold someones attention by getting them to see that you have a skill that they like, and they have a need you can fill, you are on the right track. They have your card in hand and wont easily lose it, knowing that it is worth $500. Perhaps, to make it even more dramatic don’t have the discount printed on the card, but rather, lay out a line that you enjoyed their time and their company and write the discount out on the card before handing it to them.

Popularity: 13% [?]

I watched the last Top Affiliate Challenge and had a blast watching each episode. I did learn some interesting affiliate marketing ideas, but more importantly there is now a reality show for geeks who don’t pay for cable television. If I am going to watch TV it is either going to be at the gym or online.

The neatest part about this next challenge about to take place is that one of my blogging buddies is in the top 10 to be selected for the next challenge. Ty Herd of Ty’s Blog is currently number 4 in the running to be chosen. He is a character and will bring some interesting knowledge and style to the show. I would encourage all of you to check out the videos at the Top Allifaite Challenge website and to also vote for Ty. I gave him a 10 and probably will each day the contest is running. I think it is really cool to be able to have someone you know get onto a fun show like that. Maybe I will try next time ;).

Popularity: 14% [?]

This week I interviewed Michael Marcil, the founder and CEO of The Marcil Group, based in Fargo, ND. The Marcil Group is primarily centered around the management of commercial and rental property in and around North Dakota. Other areas of involvement include construction, technology, capital investment, venture capital, restaurants and philanthropy.

I actually had about 20 some questions drawn up that I really thought would lead the interview. How wrong I was. I only asked a couple from memory, and the rest of the conversation took on a natural course of its own. Michael Marcil was recently named a winner of The Forum’s 20 under 40 award (local newspaper). A diverse panel gave the award out to recipients chosen as those who are making a difference in the Fargo community.

A majority of my conversation with Michael was focused on the unbelievably bright economic future North Dakota has and how that will transform the state’s citizens. In a time of uncertainty for the U.S. economy with the sub-prime housing mess and skyrocketing commodities such as oil and wheat, the only downside for North Dakota is its chilly winters. Just about everything else in the state will benefit greatly due to the rise in oil and food prices. Michael shared his love for all the different types of energy our state has the potential to produce and pictures North Dakota becoming the “Dubai of North America.” In case you didn’t know, North Dakota is very rich in agriculture, coal, oil and wind. Michael Marcil spent roughly 10 years in the dot com industry with his hand in a few projects like food.com and many, many more. Through consulting, he built up his management and development company extremely fast. So fast, that The Marcil Group has grown over 800% in three years. Not only that, but the company has been in positive cash flow every quarter since inception. It takes a man with a grand vision to grow and expand a company that fast. I have no reason to believe there is any slowing down in his future. The sky is the limit.

I have never before met someone who has openly endorsed the idea of promoting their competitors. I know this seems very counterproductive, but there is a genius behind it that most will fail to realize. Imagine that you own and operate a business in a town that is bursting at the seems. If you can garner some business even for your competitors, eventually you are able to leverage that flow of traffic to further your reach in that market. Essentially, you are making your competitors reliant upon your business more and more. Now that’s some unconventional marketing.

I enjoyed my time with Michael, and I can’t wait to see what he does in the future.

Popularity: 22% [?]

Just the other day I went to the grocery store to pick up a couple necessities toiletries. On my way into the store were a couple of Boy Scouts and their parents. I love helping little kids with their endeavors. I feel a great sense of reward making a kid smile and have a feeling of accomplishment in the activities they do. I was always one of those kids who outsold the others in school fundraisers and in collecting donations for charities. Anyways, I decided to head over and see what it was that they were promoting.

The Boy Scouts were handing out blue plastic bags for people to fill with food to donate to the local food bank. I had no intention of going to the store to buy anything more than toilet paper and a toothbrush, but I wanted to help the kids succeed and donate to a good cause.

Now, I don’t know if they purposely planned to have blue plastic bags or not, but these were the only colored grocery bags in the whole store. Every isle you went up and down, someone else had one of those blue plastic bags. Even more importantly, those people were filling them up with lots of food. What an extremely effective marketing strategy, just like someone getting a present in one of those famous blue Tiffany’s bags (expensive jewelry I have yet to buy anyone). I am positive that people overfilled those bags to avoid being the only one who didn’t fill his or her bag. I know I was having a secret competition with the people around me to get the most food in my bag.

Moral of the story and marketing lesson goes like this:

• Find a need that needs to be met (food shelter needing food).
• Passionately seek to fill that need (bunches of eager kids with free weekends).
• Find a unique way for others to help (standing in front of a store with a bunch of kids).
• Encourage competition, good feeling and other people’s money (blue plastic bag).
• Reap what you sow (collecting all the food and giving it away).
• Add value (so far everyone has benefited and not much was lo$t in doing so).

This was such an easy way to get the maximum effort and cooperation out of people in one afternoon. Unknown people showed up to the store in order to buy whatever and go on with their day, but they made a quick, easy choice to help others. In doing so, these people entered into a feeling of generosity and silent competition with other shoppers. Each person filled that bag in order to be seen as someone who is charitable for a good cause. In the end, hungry people were fed, Boy Scouts were rewarded, average Joes left with a sense of accomplishment, and I ended up with a blog post. See the power of one blue plastic bag?

Popularity: 29% [?]