Guerrilla Marketing - whats it all about

Dear Giles,

Thank you very much for your info on Guerilla Marketing.

I'm Helen V. Jarandillo, writing from New York City. I've just started an educational service agency/corporation that specializes in academic tourism (i.e. Ivy League Tours coupled with a language component like a TOEFL ibt Skills Attack course) and cross-cultural connections through global academia. My agency is called EnglishXperience, Inc. I've been in the field of ESL/CO for many years and this business venture is new and exciting for me---as a teacher, a leap into the business world is a tough and mind-boggling one for me. Needless to say, marketing is the hardest part and actually, due to budget constraints, I've initiated a bowling party for a small group of international students last week to announce my maiden project for this summer. It's called TOEFL Bootcamp and Ivy League Tour 2008, Aug. 3-10, out of beautiful DeSales University, PA (www.desales@edu) and College Valley, PA. I'm really starting from scratch, using my own resources and consider myself an uninitated guerilla in this business, so I need all the help I can get from you guys out there who've done the deed and are generous of what you've learned. I've just ordered Sarah's book 1001 Ways and look forward to diving in and getting all wet in this language and academic tourism business.

Thanks again, Giles,for all your generosity. Even though I'm new in the business of educating, I have years of wisdom on teaching, training and curriculum design and materials development in ESL, TOEFL, etc..., so in turn, you're welcome to pick my brain on these areas.

More power and best regards,

Helen

Thinking a little outside-of-the-box is essential when marketing on a budget. Our school is in a university town and many of our students are of university age. We used our contacts to host and sponsor a regular night at a local night club. We advertisie this in our school and the local university campus and it has raised our profile and student numbers. We charge a small admission fee on the night which covers our expenses so its pretty much free advertising. Word of Mouth also works in our favor.

Described by .marketingterms.com as “unconventional marketing intended to get maximum results from minimal resources”, guerrilla marketing is a great way of getting your marketing message across without going overboard on your marketing spend.

The term was first coined by Jay Conrad Levinson in his 1984 book Guerrilla Marketing, and is described as “an unconventional system of promotions on a very low budget, by relying on time, energy and imagination instead of big marketing budgets”.

Levinson identifies a series of key principles as the foundation of guerrilla marketing:

• Guerrilla marketing is specifically geared for the small business and entrepreneur.
• It should be based on human psychology instead of experience, judgment, and guesswork.
• Instead of money, the primary investments of marketing should be time, energy, and imagination.
• The primary statistic to measure your business is the amount of profits, not sales.
• The marketer should also concentrate on how many new relationships are made each month.
• Create a standard of excellence with an acute focus instead of trying to diversify by offering too many diverse products and services.
• Instead of concentrating on getting new customers, aim for more referrals, more transactions with existing customers, and larger transactions.
• Forget about the competition and concentrate more on cooperating with other businesses.
• Guerrilla Marketers should always use a combination of marketing methods for a campaign.
• Use current technology as a tool to empower your marketing

Guerrilla marketing demands investment of time and energy rather than money to achieve the desired result. Although guerrilla campaigns can be costly, the key is high efficiency through clever, creative, highly targeted messages. The real investment in guerrilla marketing is the time spent understanding the needs of your customers and producing creative, imaginative ways of communicating your value proposition to them.

Somer examples of guerrilla marketing:
blog.guerrillacomm.com/
uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Dn2hG2SecB4&feature=related
uk.youtube.com/watch?v=n0qrnNc6FbI&feature=related
uk.youtube.com/watch?v=QlBMF1MvAGY

More about guerrilla marketing
guerrillaguru.co.uk/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guerrilla_marketing