Heineken: Ultimate Guerrilla Marketing

The last article that I'm going to post is my favorite Guerrilla Marketing. This stunt is the whole reason I decided to dedicate this blog to Guerrilla Marketing. It's a Guerrilla Marketing stunt done by the beer brand Heineken.

Most people associate beer with men, and what better way to reach a large group of men by the number one male sport in the world, soccer. On the 21^st of October, their was a champions league match between AC Milan and Real Madrid. In Italy, this is one of the biggest matches there is. So Heineken decided to play a joke on them. They had 100 girlfriends, 50 professors and a couple of journalists as their accomplices. These people told there boyfriends/students/employees that they would miss the match because they had to go to a string quartet. On the night of the game, 1136 victims were sitting in a big hall where they were going to watch a concert. They were filmed and aired all over the world. After about 15 minutes, they suddenly noticed the text were changing on the big screen above the quartet. It said that they were set up, and of course they wouldn't miss the match.

There are multiple reasons why this stunt is my all time favorite. I like the fact that they reached millions of people, because it was aired live before the game started. I like the fact that people actually were extremely relieved and happy when they found out that they wouldn't miss the game. And I think that Heineken really set a standard here about Guerrilla Marketing.

 Click here to watch the movie

I'm sad to say that this was my last entry, but I found out that I really like writing these small posts. Maybe I'll start a new one some that, and I'll be sure to post the link here.

The Phone: Someone's calling

I'm almost at the end of my series of posts about Guerrilla Marketing. For this week I'll discuss a Guerrilla Marketing stunt which I watched on TV, far before I knew what Guerrilla Marketing even was. The stunt was designed for the TV-show The Phone. In this show people can win €25.000 by completing the challenges given to them through a mobile phone. These contestants are selected by answering a phone which is taped somewhere in a public area.

To promote this show, the art directors wanted to get the media's attention. They decided to pursue the media in the same way they selected their candidates. In a couple of live television shows they taped mobile phones under the table. When the show was airing live, the producers called the show to tell them when the new season of their show started.

A couple of days later the media bureau which was hired for this stunt, announced that with these simple calls, they reached over 5 million people. This to me means that the stunt was very successful, especially if you take into consideration that Holland only has 16 million people.

I liked this stunt for the element of surprise, and because a lot of people were witnesses of this stunt. Because their stunt took place live on the television, you really could see the first reaction of the persons who answered the phone. So in my opinion, this was a very successful Guerrilla Marketing stunt.

Click here to watch the movie 

Burger King: Gone to BK - Ronald

My next topic will be the Guerrilla Marketing stunt by Burger King. The fast-food chain Burger King does a lot of Guerrilla Marketing stunt. Some were very successful, and some failed desperately. The one I'm going to discuss today is a attack on McDonald's to try to win over the Asian costumers. Employees of Burger King placed a lot of different Burger King items around McDonald's stores. Ronald McDonald, the mascot of McDonald's was dressed up in Burger King T-shirts. They placed huge footsteps from McDonald's up to Burger King and on empty benches before the McDonald's they left a note: “Gone to BK – Ronald”.

Even though I find the stunt amusing, I don't know if I really support the fact that they attacked another fast-food chain. Normally I would find it a bit offensive, but I don't mind this stunt that much. I think it's mostly because they used their mascot to say, Burger King is better, and didn't say McDonald's was bad.

McDonald's and Burger King are huge rivals, and they both make use of Guerrilla Marketing. I like both companies, but I think the Guerrilla Marketing stunts of Burger King are more creative and have a lot more effect. This wasn't even one of the biggest stunts, but I liked to review it because this was the only Guerrilla Marketing stunt were one brand uses another brand to make themselves look better.

The sopranos: Dead mafia in cab

Because I've talked about brands so much the past couple of weeks, I'll be doing something else this week. This week I'll talk about a Guerrilla Marketing stunt done to promote a TV-show. HBO's the Sopranos is a TV-show about a mafia family. So the Art directors thought it would be funny to use the mafia aspect of the show to create a buzz. They made several life-like arms and placed these at the back of several cabs who drive through New York. The arm made it look like there was a body in the trunk, and the arm was sticking out. Next to the arm they placed a bumper sticker of the sopranos, so people would get the gesture.

I do like this stunt, because it really relates to the subject that they're promoting. I do have one thing to say about this stunt though. I don't know if it was a smart move to only place a small bumper sticker on the back. People who see a arm hanging out of a trunk won't pay attention to that small sticker next to it. My first reaction would be to call the police, and I seriously wonder if not one of the witnesses of this stunt has called in this supposed 'crime'. I don't think the NYPD would be very thrilled getting phone calls all day about arms sticking out of trunks. But if this hasn't caused problems, I do think it's a funny Guerrilla Marketing stunt.

Bavaria: Danish or Dutch

One of the best known Dutch Guerrilla Marketing stunts was performed by the beer brand Bavaria. Bavaria wanted to promote their beer and the special dresses they made for the World Championship of soccer. So what better way to promote this than to do it during one of the soccer matches, Netherlands – Denmark . A group of good looking dutch girls dressed up like supporters of Denmark. Underneath these outfits, they all wore the orange Bavaria dutch dress. When the match started, they stripped from their Danish clothes and danced around in their orange dresses. Millions of people witnessed this, because it was all over international television.

This stunt became famous after two of the girls got arrested. Since Heineken was the official sponsor of the World Championship, it wasn't allowed to promote another beer brand in a 2 mile radius around the stadium. The arrest became world wide news, and Bavaria got a lot of publicity. Even though I don't agree with the saying that there is no such thing as bad publicity, I don't really believe this was a bad thing for the Bavaria brand. By most people, the FIFA was the bad guy in the story, and Bavaria wasn't doing anything illegal.

So to conclude this story, I do believe this Guerrilla Marketing was successful since almost everyone knew the brand Bavaria after this stunt. But I do believe that doing something illegal isn't the way to use Guerrilla Marketing as a promotional tool for your brand.

Click here to watch the movie 

UNICEF: fancy a drink?

A company that uses a lot of Guerrilla Marketing to attract donors is UNICEF. There are many examples of Guerrilla Marketing stunts done by UNICEF, but I chose to discuss just one of them. My favorite stunt is the one with dirty bottled water. UNICEF bottled the dirty water that millions of children living in third world countries drink every day. They made a vending machine and placed it in the middle of the streets of New York. People who were passing by got offered a bottle of dirty water. There were different types of water, all named after a disease like hepatitis and cholera. Of course nobody wanted to drink this water, which was exactly the point UNICEF tried to make.

I like this stunt a lot, mainly because it really takes the essence of the action and brings it to the people. What I also think is really great, is that the people could actually donate fresh water to those children by buying one of the dirty bottles. Almost everyone donated, which is what this stunt was all about.

I do believe UNICEF attracted a lot of publicity by this stunt. The stunt was seen by millions of people on the internet, but also on the television, since press showed up when they heard about this stunt. I really believe that they made their cause know by this stunt, so in my opinion, this particular Guerrilla Marketing was very successful.

Click here to watch the movie 

KLM: It's like you're sitting on air

My next Guerrilla Marketing stunt is a very simple one. It was done by the airline company KLM. To promote their Economy class, they placed a man in the middle of an airport. The man seemed to be sitting on nothing but air. Of course that was just an illusion, underneath his clothes was a chair shaped like the man. But a lot of people and especially children stopped to take a look at the man. Some passengers took photo's of the man, others tried to feel under him, as if there could be an invisible chair underneath him.

I'm not really enthusiastic about this stunt. I don't think the stunt was noticeable enough. If you're going on a trip or coming back from one you have a lot of other things on your mind. I don't think a sitting man is outgoing enough to be remembered. And even if they remembered it, they are probably wondering about how that man was sitting, and not about the Economy class of KLM.

I do believe it falls into the category of Guerrilla Marketing. It is a cheap and unexpected way to promote a service. I just don't believe it really created the buzz that a Guerrilla Marketing stunt often gets. And I think a stunt isn't successful until a lot of people talk about it with others. This is the way to check if a Guerrilla Marketing stunt actually had the effect the company had intended.

Click here to watch the movie