Business Card Idea

I am a big believer in having other people sell my show for me. So I create systems where my customers become my unpaid sales force. I covered this in some pretty good detail in my Viral Marketing system. Here is another idea that I recently encountered that fits that same sort of strategy.

I have always felt that photos are better at stimulating conversations than logos are. Few people will ever ask "What company does this logo represent?" in reference to (for example) a magnet on your refridgerator. But when people see photos, particularly interesting photos, they often ask "Who is this?" or "What's happening in this picture?" People like to know about other people much more than they want to know about corporate logos.

So I'm at my parents house last week and I see a business card magnetically attatched to their fridge. It was a very typical photo business card layout, with a full-color head shot on the left side, and contact info on the right side. But what really caught my eye was the fact that it was a picture of a VERY young child, no more than 7 or 8 years old.

The busines was one that was clearly NOT owned by a 7 or 8 year old. So anyone looking at the card HAD to ask the obvious question...

"What is this kid's picture doing on this guy's business card?"

Now, the guy who designed the card really dropped the ball because he didn't have (or didn't provide to my parents) a compelling (read viral) story to tell. He could have created a story that was funny enough or interesting enough to be worthy of telling and re-telling. It isn't that hard. Here are a few examples of stories that would have really inspired me to spread this guy's business story:

1) That's a picture of the guy who started this business taken when he was 8 years old. That's the year he first started doing this line of work.

2) That's a picture of the CEO of the company. Really. They set up the corporation and made their kid the CEO. He's a natural genius and supposedly they are doing really well under his guideance.

3) That's the 37 year old man who runs this business. When he says that his product makes you feel years younger, he's not kidding!

The point is that with a little bit of thought you can create simple systems that virtually FORCE people to talk about you. If you plan a little bit, think a little bit, then you will provide them with something compelling to say when they do talk about you. This is how you CONTROL word of mouth. This is the difference between typical word of mouth (in which you HOPE and PRAY that people will talk about you and that they will say nice things about you) and Viral Marketing where you FORCE them to talk about you and you tell them EXACTLY what to say when they talk about you.

The results are amazing. You literally create armies of unpaid sales people who gladly and regularly tell others about you and continue to sell your shows for years and years.

--Julian Franklin