Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Introducing...

Marco, the marketing gorilla! I kinda felt like DevCo could use a mascot (not that I don't love the fish!). What do you guys think?

Also, on a total aside, I'm trying to find a way to a) put our profile pictures with our names at the bottom of each post and b) rotate the scribes list, so my name isn't always at the top. If anyone has any ideas on how to do either of these things, please let me know.

And now for the actual reason for the post, which wasn't really going to be about Marco, but was going to be about marketing. I want to know what you think of this idea for marketing on less than a shoestring:

My thought is this: I want to do a book tour, but without the author, the signings or the book stores. Not a blog tour (although I do plan on having one in the mid-to-late summer), but an actual physical tour. What I want to do is send a single copy of my book to someone who has agreed to read it, review it (this may be optional, not 100% decided) and pass it on to someone else who has agreed to read it (possibly review it) and pass it on to someone else, etc., etc.) Each person who receives it will write their name (full, first or last), approximate location (as long as they give province/state and country, they don't have to give a city if they don't want to) on the inside cover, along with, if they want, the date they received it. They'll also be encouraged to include small stickers/business cards/lightweight, flat tokens of their location (ie small canadian flag stickers, or whatever) next to their names or on the inside back cover of the book. For my specific purpose, I plan to include a little paper doll of Moloch which will fold flat and make the journey with the book, so that participants can post pictures on the Facebook fan page/blog that I'm going to create for the purpose of Moloch in their town/ wherever he ends up. I kind of want to make it an interactive sort of deal, where the page (wherever it is) would track the book's progress (and Moloch's adventure) as it travels around to various places.

So, that's my plan. Thoughts?

3 comments:

E said...

That is a rather brilliant idea. Like the teddy bear who took a trip around the world?

And our new mascot is the shiznickets.

Athena said...

I remember reading about that Teddy. I wonder if, subconsciously, that's where I got the idea from.

I'm glad you like Marco ;)

Rhiannon said...

That is an effing WONDERFUL idea!

Try Swap-Bot. It's a website for organizing stuff like this. And check around LiveJournal communities - things like this are going on all the time >:)

Also, I ♥ Marco the Marketing Gorilla >:)

We should put him on bookmarks etc, for the con >:D