Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

I have been tinkering with a business idea that I came across some time ago and wanted to bounce it off of you all to see if I can get some criticism, comments and suggestions on the idea.

The business would be a marketing business that made money by helping their clients use "message wraps" as a part of their marketing campaigns.

What is a message wrap? Very simply, a message wrap is an object that is wrapped in your marketing message.

You can see an example at http://www.akotamedia.com/messagewraps/messagewraps.html

Here`s the magic of this idea: There is something about receiving an unsolicited package that makes it especially valuable to the recipient. By that I mean, a box of breakfast cereal on the shelf is only worth the price of the box. Wrap it in a label with a clever idea and the stock on that box goes through the roof.

So I have a fundamental question about the viability of a marketing business like this. Do you see any potential downsides? I think the uniqueness can be very powerful.

The other question that I have is what would be the best way to position this company? As a standalone marketing company, responsible for going out and educating the market and bringing on new clients? Or act as a subcontractor, enabling other marketing firms to provide this service for their clients.

Any and all thoughts are appreciated.

Mark Bebout

I checked it out and I like it. I was in the magazine business for a short time and we sold "bands" to certain players for a very high ticket. I think a unique marketing comany is the route to take. People come to you with their new product and you would create a wrap for it. Unique is key in a field full of dogs barking for attention. I could see you creating wraps and going to some Big players with this new, innovative tool! Good Luck and All the Best!

 

Diana Low

www.theappreciationstation.com

 

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Interesting idea. I can see two perspectives, based on how people in general feel about advertising in general.

The one side of the discussion would be, "Oh jeez...yet ANOTHER advertisement on top of an advertisement. When will it end? Can`t I get away from all this commercialization?"

The other side would be, "Hey look at that! I never would`ve thought about this dog training company if they hadn`t sent me some freebie biscuits. What a clever idea!"

So it seems to me that you`d want to be a standalone company, where your product would be not only the wraps and getting them made, but also the "link."

In other words, seeing examples makes it easy to get the concept. But coming up with the "link" between the 1-word and the viable product to wrap, that`s the trick.

You could easily outsource the printing, and also the direct-mail of the client`s product. So you could be the central sourcing point. All the client would need to do would be to send you however many units of their product. You`d take care of wrapping it and getting it back to them for distribution, using whatever normal channels they use.

If it were to be a special mailing, you could also manage the liaison between the product warehouse and the mass-mailing company.

But it`s that link that`s the trick. :-) That`ll involved graphic design, cleverl copywriting, and marketing savy. Are those your skills?

Thats a pretty unique idea you have going there.

Run with it...I definitely would encourage you to have a LOT more examples instead of just the few you have, I probably would strive for at least 25 at minimum. I think the more people who view/read the samples, the better.

I was disappointed I couldn`t read more.

Cartess