EP287 Back To The Chair | Ken Courtright’s Today’s Growth | Growing Business Today

Where does a group of people hang out and sit for extended periods of time? Where people sit, congregate, and stare into space, they are your potential customers. Two forms of advertising that may be the most creative advertising mechanisms are on subways and on cabs. Picture watching a movie being shown on the walls of the tunnel and the movie is going with the train, each short movie clip advertising a gaming app. Or imagine being stuck in traffic in a cab, looking at the back window of the cab in front of you with a hologram advertising auto-repair clinics and car parts. They’re turning those dark walls and panels into advertising billboards. Get back into your thinking chair and try to come up with some creative ad or mechanism that gets your killer message in front of people while they’re killing time.

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Back To The Thinking Chair

This is my third podcast where I’m going to reference China. I got back from a ten-day trip to see my daughter out there. It’s amazing the things that you come up with when you have to. I did a previous podcast on Episode 286 where you’ve got to think a bit defensive sometimes. This one is titled Back to the Thinking Chair. I saw two forms of advertising that may be the most creative advertising mechanisms I have ever seen. There are 21 million people per city in both Beijing and Shanghai at a time.

These cities are the size of Chicago. It is so densely packed with people and it is suffocating. I got jostled and bumped into in that ten-day period of time more than I have in my whole lifetime. That dense amount of thinking in one city caused people to create some cool things. The first thing is we were on the subway, it goes under the city and I saw something so creative. Picture this, you’re on the subway and it’s dark. It goes through the tunnels and you look out the window and to your shock, you are watching a movie being shown on the walls of the tunnel and it’s only six to eight inches from the windows.

The movie is going with the train and each short movie clip was advertising a gaming app like, “You could download this racing game. You could download this gorilla monkey game.” I’m thinking to myself, “That creative son of a gun.” Somebody thought to themselves, “Where do a group of my potential clients hang out, sit, and kill time?” They said, “What about the subway? What about the metro? There are millions of people riding these things, in these tubes, in these caves for days on end, and what are they doing? They’re staring at their phone, reading texts, and playing games.”

Somebody must’ve made the leap, “How can I reach these people on the train?” They probably said, “I can put banners and signs inside the train,” and somebody must have said, “They’re staring out these blank windows. What are they looking at? They’re just looking at dark walls. What if we can find a way to turn those dark walls into an advertising billboard?” It was the most creative thing from an advertising standpoint I have ever witnessed. You have to picture outside of the train. They must have had these cameras that are shooting film only six inches away, so the cameras have to be everywhere.

The next day, we’re driving in a cab and it’s bumper to bumper at all times. You can’t go anywhere. You never go more than fifteen miles, twenty miles an hour and you’re always at a red light. I’m in the front seat of a cab and I look up and in the back of all the cabs are more of these movies that I saw on the subway. Picture the back window of the cab, in front of me is a hologram where they must have a camera somewhere inside the cab shining inside of the back window. They’re advertising auto-repair clinics and car parts. I’m thinking to myself, “How creative. What better marketing could there be than shining automobile repair ads to people driving in their car that’s about to break down or is currently broken down.” It was so creative and I’m thinking, “Why have we never seen these in America?” You know what the reason is? We just never thought of it.

Here’s a question for you. Where does a group of your potential customers hang out and sit for extended periods of time? What do you sell? Do you sell insurance? Do you drill teeth as a dentist? Do you repair clothing as a tailor? Do you install the carpet? I don’t care what you do, I want you to think where do people sit, congregate and stare into space. They are your potential customers and what creative mechanism that doesn’t exist could you create to get your message in front of them. I’m thinking about this 24/7 for our own product lines. For Episode 287, why not get back into a thinking chair and try to come up with some creative ad mechanism that gets your killer message in front of people while they’re killing time. Hope this helps. Take care.

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• Episode 286 – previous episode

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