The bobblehead community looks on skeptically
Talk about brilliant.
In what must be the most cost effective promotion ever, the Tri City ValleyCats — an extremely minor league baseball team in Troy, NY — scored a marketing hit with their Bobblehead contest.
They selected a group of local celebrities — consisting of TV anchors, radio personalities, and newspaper writers — and had them face off in a March Madness style tournament. The objective? The winner will be immortalized as a boblehead given away at a game in August. Each contetstant chose a charity support, which gets some cash from the ValleyCats if they win.
The contest generated huge buzz as the contestants and others (including me) touted their favorite picks online, in print, on the radio — one TV station actually ran a promo encouraging people to vote for their anchor.
Now the cost effective part.
The ValleyCats only pitched in $600 for the charity of the winner and $100 to that of three runners up. Work $900 against what the ValleyCats are getting, and you have an amazing return on investment.
Some have pointed out that $600 is peanuts — making this marketing scheme less than crackerjack. Blogger J. Eric Smith says that the media companies involved, who are getting tons of free publicity, should pony up some more cash — and that the non-profits are getting jobbed. He writes:
Your organizations have true value, and you have something to offer the corporations in the Capital Region. So I hope you don’t feel like you have to sit there with your begging bowls, hoping that your “champion” makes it through three rounds of bobblehead competition so you can get $100 or $600 out of the deal. That’s a poor trade for organizational dignity.
When you put it that way, you’ve gotta ask, “Who’s the bobblehead?”
You gotta admit, it was a GREAT promotion. Vic Christopher was a genius.
Yes, good stuff. It really took on a life of its own.