case study: Offline Marketing

CHALLENGE: Secure pervasive offline marketing vehicles for Crisp online magazine.

IMPLEMENTATION: At Strong Bat we know that it's far more effective marketing to be featured in a medium as content rather than forced onto a medium's audience as advertising or a marketing partner. So we developed a marketing strategy that's a unique melange of marketing and public relations, hoping to take full advantage of our enviable positions as established journalists, publishers and guest speakers.

RESULTS: Instead of paying for an advertisement or marketing partnership in Insider, a national magazine distributed to 8.8 million college students, Strong Bat secured a regular editorial column in Insider on life after college which markets Crisp's gist and Web address in the byline. We also secured editorial columns for marketing Crisp in publications ranging from Details to the Boston Globe, and in the 1998, 1999 and 2000 editions of the perennially bestselling book _Writer's Market_ (Writers Digest Books). We also secured marketing for Crisp as content in _Writer's Market_'s resource section, and in such books as _Novel and Short Story Writer's Market_ (Writer's Digest Books), _Poet's Market_ (Writer's Digest Books), and Netscape Press's international bestseller, _Netscape Navigator_. Tyee Productions marketed Crisp on television through infomercials for WebTV. Instead of purchasing a promotional booth at the Eastern College and Employer Network conference or on the college lecture tour, we secured positions as presenters and guest speakers, lecturing frequently on alumni transition as well as Internet-related issues, and marketing Crisp every step of the way. Strong Bat rounded out its Crisp promotions with location marketing at such target venues as NYC's Alternative Fashion Shows and major cyber cafes and colleges across the United States.