Hacking the 2024 Election Yard Sign Craze: Guerrilla Marketing Edition (Copy)
Most people HATE politics — that makes it perfect for Guerrilla Marketing
Nearly every founder is familiar with Airbnb’s journey. After early success, they struggled to get more users on the platform, ran out of money, and turned to some creative marketing to bankroll $30,000 to help extend their runway.
Their solution? Selling politically themed cereal, Obama O’s and Cap’n McCains which would help them gain notoriety, stay afloat, and ultimately secure funding from YC en route to becoming one of the most successful startups in history.
Airbnb’s Obama O’s and Cap’n McCain’s cereal
Fast forward four election cycles and insert BoxedUp, a B2B e-commerce platform I re-launched a year ago that helps rental equipment companies grow and scale. Because we’re a white-labeled product, a stunt like the one Airbnb pulled off won’t do us any good.
But as I walked down my Atlanta street last week, I noticed something. No matter how many times I’d previously seen the various Trump and Harris signs scattered throughout the yards of my neighbors, I couldn’t help but stare at every single one that I passed. Whether big or small. Blue or red. Flags or banners. My eyes locked in no matter how many times I’d seen it previously. That’s when it hit me, I needed some signs of my own.
Why Election-Themed Yard Signs Are Perfect
Most people hate politics. The picture of me holding the two political signs probably stirred up something in you, some of which you can’t even explain. But that’s why it works.
Guerrilla marketing is an advertising approach that borrows the concept of “guerrilla” warfare, or the element of surprise, to communicate with target audiences.
And since one of our newest rental Suppliers, Waste Eliminator, was launching their residential dumpster service (they’ve long served commercial customers) locally here in Atlanta, tapping into the political yard sign craze could garner some attention.
Once my inspiration struck, I popped open Photoshop and tried to come up with a simple, dual party design that flew as close to the sun as possible.
Nailing the Design + Execution
This Bizzabo article does an awesome job breaking down 35 real world examples and why they’re effective. The unifying thread from each example: Be bold. Be divisive.
With concepts in mind, the execution was simple. Try to get as close to the design of each candidate’s most popular yard sign brand as possible.
For Trump, the five star, red, white and blue sign is an absolutely magnet. For Harris, the dark navy, two-lined sign would be my template. Keep it simple, and give passersby a quick way to scan each sign. “Be bold. Be divisive.” Check and check.
The Results — Maybe These Are Too Convincing 😅
After uploading my design to nextdayflyers.com, I was able to turn prints around in about five days from order to delivery. After quick assembly, I threw on a reflective vest, hard hat, and hit the streets.
It only took five minutes for the early results to come in.
As I went to post a sign in the ground at the first street corner, the universe had other plans. Full of dirt and rocks, the soil was absolutely destroying the aluminum sign posts, prohibiting the rods from penetrating the ground. I gave up, tucked the signs under my arms and hopped back in the car.
HONK! HONK!
“Why are you taking those signs out of the ground?!” a driver from across the street screamed. Confused, I turned around and asked her to repeat herself. “WHY are you taking those signs out of the ground?!” I was shocked. She clearly thinks these are election signs. And given the tactics some people have resorted to in order to inhibit the spread of messages from candidates they don’t support, this idea seemed perfect.
My immediate thought — they are perfect!
As much as I love people confusing Waste Eliminator signs for Trump and Harris signs, fake campaign signs aren’t worth the arguments, so hit the streets before sunrise, armed with a safety vest and head lamp. And in just three days, the first dumpster order rolled in. What seemed like an absolutely ludicrous Hail Mary just 3 weeks ago was actually working. In tandem with Facebook ads, organic web traffic and word of mouth, we were off to the races.
Will the traction from our signs be enough to transform Waste Eliminator’s business? Only time will tell. But given the investment, mission complete!
Then the next break. After winning a $20k pitch competition, Google’s “Black Founders Fund” selected us to join their second cohort. $100k in the bank! The “no’s” were still happening but they no longer felt make or break. Biagio would join in November and I had enough savings to fund my runway until February. For the first time, I felt like I had real momentum! I rode those wins to another $10k pitch competition, another YC interview to their next batch. Before long, with Biagio in the fold, I was also getting follow-up meetings with large funds that I could only dream of meeting just a year ago.
A few weeks later and Biagio and I were in Seattle, pitching another Amazonian who liked our idea. Shortly after drinks at Sam’s, he agreed to become our CTO. It was happening! The hard work was paying off! Then our largest break yet, “If you move forward with the Seed… we’d like to invest $500k.” After that commitment, our second commitment would come just days later. This time, a $1 million dollar commitment and from that point we were rolling.
Written by Donald Boone, CEO, BoxedUp