Guerrilla advertising is the term given to a particularly powerful and attention-grabbing form of marketing. Many of the world’s best-known advertising campaigns are examples of guerilla advertising, making use of unconventional methods to achieve some truly phenomenal results.
Guerilla advertising is always highly engaging and designed to be immediately shareable by all those who stumble across it. Take a look at our examples to see how guerilla advertising works and learn how you could use it to engage your audience.
What Is Guerrilla Advertising?
Taking its name from guerilla warfare, this style of advertising is known for its unique ability to take consumers by surprise, piquing their interest in a whole host of creative and original ways.
There are many different ways in which brands can use guerilla advertising to their advantage, from creating a buzz with the help of big-name celebrities to viral marketing campaigns that get people talking.
Guerrilla Advertising Tactics
There’s no one size fits all method behind the biggest guerilla advertising campaigns. Instead, brands take their pick from a range of inspiring and original guerrilla advertising tactics to come up with a campaign that resonates with their intended target audience. Here are some of the top guerilla tactics to try.
Astroturfing
It’s no secret that strong relationships with influencers can be enormously beneficial to a brand, but did you know that influencers can also help to create some of the best guerilla marketing campaigns? Known as astroturfing, this popular tactic involves creating a huge buzz around a particular product, by getting its name out there with the help of a handpicked group of social celebrities.
Example: Watch brand Daniel Wellington has partnered with a series of top influencers to promote its products on social media, through the use of carefully curated content which always appears authentic to the influencers’ personal style.
Viral campaigns
All brands dream of going viral, and this is just one example of guerilla marketing done well. Many of the most famous viral campaigns we’ve seen in recent years have been typical guerilla advertising ideas, which proved so interesting and shareable that they captured the attention of audiences all over the world. By making great use of the power of word of mouth, these campaigns have achieved results most brands could only ever dream of – and they’re usually started with a minimal amount of investment too.
Example: Spotify’s wrapped campaign encouraged users to share their listening habits from the year, and it proved enormously successful. The annual campaign never fails to create a buzz on social channels as users engage with the brand and talk about the sounds of the year.
Wild posting
If you’ve ever been wandering around the city streets and found yourself noticing similar posters and flyers everywhere you go, you’ll probably have been experiencing something we call wild posting. This guerilla advertising tactic is inexpensive to employ, and it can have great results in terms of awareness and reach.
Example: Artist Andy Leek began creating motivational flyers and leaving them for strangers to find. The series, which quickly became well known all over the capital, was known as ‘Notes to Strangers’. Over 40,000 Instagram users have since snapped and shared Leek’s work, helping to spread his message of optimism.
Stealth marketing
Stealth marketing happens when consumers least expect it. That’s part of its appeal. If you’ve ever noticed branded products in a film or TV series, for example, you’ll have seen stealth marketing at work.
Example: The Tom Hanks movie Cast Away is a prime example of stealth marketing in play. In the movie, viewers are repeatedly shown branded FedEx parcels, which helps the brand to raise awareness and boost its reputation without the use of in your face advertising.
Guerilla projections
Projecting a branded image onto a high profile building can do wonders for a company’s image. This guerilla marketing tactic makes use of the incredible potential of digital billboards, to get a company’s message out there in a way that never fails to get attention. Sometimes brands will even swerve official permission for stunts like this, adding to the shock value when a branded image lights up the night sky.
Example: Lego projected its iconic Ninjago ninja warriors onto the side of the white cliffs of Dover to publicise the long-awaited return of its TV series on cartoon network.
Conclusion
Guerilla advertising offers enormous opportunities for brands in all industries. Take a look at some of our most popular guerilla tactics and start thinking about how you could use guerilla advertising to engage your audience.
About the author:
Sean Begg Flint is the founder at Position Digital, a digital marketing agency for ambitious startups and growing brands across different industries. He is passionate about helping businesses establish and increase their online presence through purpose-driven content marketing and using outreach for good.
