Guerrilla Hacks hijacking unveiled Guerrilla Marketing Hacks
6 different types of trend hijacking explained
Every few years (5, to be precise), something massive happens in the cricket world - the ICC Cricket World Cup.
Big budgets, crazy marketing campaigns, and a healthy dash of glamour make it something of a global spectacle. It’s cricket’s big moment.
But, what’s in it for marketers? What can you do to leverage the World Cup for your own brand - even if it has no connection to sport? Or if you don’t have deep pockets.
Jumping on a trend is one of the most effective forms of marketing. It’s also often hit or miss, so it’s important to do everything you can to make it work.
Luckily for you, we did some digging and found the 6 main types of trend hijacking that you can apply to your own marketing campaigns and use to hop aboard the #CWC19 bandwagon.
2 #1 The Bouncer
Viral marketing
Just like a bouncer, viral marketing can have a massive impact.
Simply put, this marketing approach relies on an audience to spread the word. As a result, the key principle is to create a relatable and shareable message - be it textual, image-based or video.
Humor, innovation and emotionally driven campaigns tend to deliver the goods.
Who Hit a 6?
IKEA, with this campaign, conceptualized by Publicis Spain, where they recreated famous living rooms from The Simpsons, Friends and Stranger Things.
3 What did they use for it? You guessed it - IKEA furnishings.
This campaign was originally created for IKEA in the UAE, but became so viral that it spread all over social media and became a global phenomenon.
Here’s a look at the viral tweet and how quickly it spread across the globe.
IKEA played a strong game here - mostly because the campaign leveraged old time classics - nostalgia is a powerful motivation factor and IKEA leveraged it well.
Since the launch of the campaign (May 28), overall engagement has increased by 10% compared to the previous period and mentions have increased by 11.6%.
So, anytime you want to go viral, appeal to people’s sense of nostalgia - looks like it works very well!
And for more tips, we always have Matthew.
4 #2 The Googly
Ambush marketing
Like the name suggests, ambush marketing literally means an ambush or attack.
Most marketing campaigns of this type capitalize on a big event, creating campaigns around it in a bid to be seen as a partner of the event - even if they are not official sponsors.
It’s a clever tactic, but marketers must be careful to not get into trouble while using the official event logo or any of the material available to sponsors.
If done correctly, it can bring in large scale awareness, business and even exposure to new audiences. If not, at least you tried!
Who Hit a 6?
Swiggy managed to cleverly ride the IPL wave in both 2018 and 2019 with their “What a delivery” campaign.
5 The theme was centered around the fact that Swiggy can take care of your food cravings while you watch your favorite teams battle it out on TV.
Apart from their hugely creative TVCs, Swiggy came up with Swiggy Sixes - users could get 60% off every order placed on Swiggy within 6 minutes of a six being scored in the IPL.
You’re probably wondering why Swiggy decided to invest so much in the IPL this year. Mostly because they had a successful innings in 2018.
The brand saw their orders go up by 25% during the IPL season last year.
Additionally, there was a 10x increase in searches for Gulab Jamun on Swiggy’s platform last year - following their ad about Gulab Jamun. Not bad for a brand that didn’t shell out the big bucks for sponsoring.
Mentions about Swiggy this year peaked during the IPL and stayed consistently high till the end of May as per the screenshot.
It’s no coincidence that Swiggy also chose to launch 3 TVCs and their Swiggy Six offers at the same time.
6 #3 The Yorker
Grassroots marketing
Grassroots marketing is very much based on relationships with the community.
It’s an approach based on connections, relationships and your rapport with your target audience.
Activities that take place both online and offline are a part of this initiative - for instance local fairs and sporting events.
Who Hit a 6?
Lush, the UK-based cosmetics company, announced in April this year that they were “tired of fighting algorithms” and would shut down all of their social media accounts.
7 They even indicated that they were not keen on paying to reach their target audience’s news feed.
The funny part is, their mentions seem to be soaring just after they closed down their social media accounts (early April). And this is the real genius behind the campaign.
Lush went off social media, and the deep connection they have with their audience ensured that they were spoken about anyway.
Take a look on the right.
Lush North America though has not followed the same approach and still has active social media accounts.
Sentiment for Lush Cosmetics in the month of April was 30% positive and 15% negative’ this rose to 55% positive in May and only 5% negative! They definitely know a thing or two about grassroots marketing.
If you want to try something similar, you probably don’t have to go as far as disappearing from social media, but the key is to develop and nurture a strong connection with your community and thereafter you can experiment with different tactics on how to capitalize on this connection.
8 #4 Slow Ball
Stealth marketing
There’s nothing sneaky about stealth marketing, in case you’re wondering. Mostly, it’s about conveying a message in your marketing campaigns that is not about pitching your product.
People don’t like aggressive marketing and the stealth approach provides a softer touch - a message without a pushy agenda which helps keep people happy.
It’s more about appealing to the subconscious part of their mind. It’s a bit tricky, but again, if done correctly, it can boost your marketing efforts considerably. Who Hit a 6?
Carlsberg. Last month, Carlsberg beer - whose motto has historically been “probably the best beer in the world” - abandoned their classic slogan to “probably NOT the best beer in the world”.
9 In a bold move, they used this to promote the recipe for the launch of their new beer in the UK, since the brand had been underperforming in the market.
They sponsored lots of negative posts about Carlsberg, including “Carlsberg tastes like stale breadsticks” and “my pint of Carlsberg tastes like naan bread”.
And then, quite brilliantly, released a video where staff members read out the mean Tweets in satirical fashion.
Don’t know about the new recipe, but sentiment has been consistently positive about the brand since the launch of this new campaign in the first week of April.
Mentions for Carlsberg have increased by 26% in the last 3 months compared to the previous 3 months. So, the campaign definitely managed to create a positive buzz.
This one is for the risk-taking marketers out there, a campaign like this one can be a hit or a miss - so, it’s probably better to proceed with caution.
10 #5 Medium Pace
Ambient marketing
Ambient marketing is about being present in as many places as possible. You want to be everywhere that your consumers are and grab their attention.
For instance, influencer marketing is an example of an ambient marketing tactic - if your audience follows certain influencer personas then the best way to tap into the audience is having those influencers post something about you.
The slightly more “vintage” version of this is the billboard - a classic tactic used as far back as the 18th century. Who Hit a 6?
Coca-Cola has mastered the art of using both these mediums. But their recent campaign with billboards in Europe has been especially impressive.
11 Publicis Italy helped Coca-Cola design billboards pointing to the nearest recycling bin.
Coca-Cola’s campaign was genius, but they also made sure to place their billboards in locations where pre- existing or new bins would attract the most attention.
The campaign has had impressive results so far - 85% of the cans that have been used for Coke have been collected for recycling - which is awesome!
12 #6 The No Ball
Astroturf marketing (it’s not cricket)
While guerrilla marketing can be massively successful, some methods risk controversy - Astroturf marketing is one such example.
Astroturf marketing simply means “faking it”. So, fake reviews, fake endorsements and fake buzz are what astroturfing is all about.
There is always a thin line between influencer marketing and astroturfing - but if one is careful, it’s easy to balance.
Who was out for a duck?
Want a helping hand? What you shouldn’t do is something akin to The North Face’s recent campaign.
13 They replaced a lot of Wikipedia photos to include pictures featuring their products, managing to get their brand in front of millions of people.
The North Face picked topics relevant to their brand - such as trekking, hiking and other outdoor activities. This was done on the sly, until Wikipedia’s moderators were able to trace these changes.
Before these changes were brought to light, The North Face had unabashedly boasted about their project.
More recently, however, the company apologized and declared that it had terminated the project. It’s probably a black hat marketing tactic that’s best left unexplored. A recent Tweet from Wikipedia received a lot of engagement and support from around the globe.
The dip in sentiment in the last 30 days, around “The North Face” has been hard to miss. I wouldn’t want to be a part of their PR team right now.
And, with that, we complete our super over of guerrilla marketing tactics.
Jumping onto a trend is always slightly tricky since you never know whether it’ll be a hit or a miss - but it’s definitely worth a shot (pun intended) becauseyou’re as likely to score a six as be out for a duck.
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