Marketing Hack: Promote The Competition

Here's a tip that won't work for every situation, but it did for me. Here's what I did.

I own a small business called Dunk Tank creating demo/explainer videos for startups. Like with any business, it's hard to get in front of people, and the best opportunities are often to piggyback on other popular sites. Such is the case with Steve Blank's Startup Tools resource.

I visited Steve's Startup Tools (http://steveblank.com/tools-and-blogs-for-entrepreneurs/) page recently and noticed that, although the list is extensive, there was no section for creative services like mine. Rather then passing up on a great opportunity or hoping he could fit me into some other category, I simply offered that Steve could create a new category and that I would supply him with a full list of my competition to fill it with.

The end result, Steve had no problem creating a new category as long as it wasn't empty. He created a section called Product Demo Videos, and my company - Dunk Tank - is right at the top.

Sure, the other guys are going to get some traffic and probably business out of the deal, but it's worth it for the traffic that I'll get as well.

Just a reminder that sometimes the best solutions don't come out of any sort of traditional thinking whatsoever.