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March 3, 2025
By Taylor Benedict
Article topics: Guerrilla Marketing, Marketing Strategy, Unconventional Tactics
The market is saturated with new projects, products, and services. Being able to stand out from the crowd is essential. A brand must be able to reach its consumers in creative ways: enter guerrilla marketing.
The term derives from “guerrilla warfare,” unconventional war tactics that smaller forces use against larger, more established opponents. Similarly, smaller businesses can leverage guerrilla marketing to gain a competitive advantage against larger corporations. Guerilla marketing is a marketing campaign strategy that utilizes surprise and creativity to catch consumers' attention.
There are a variety of forms of guerrilla marketing, including but not limited to:
Buzz: creating anticipation and excitement for a product or campaign
Stealth: ads are hidden in plain sight, making it hard to realize you're being marketed to
Ambient: ads placed in unexpected locations to surprise and engage consumers
Street: using public spaces for creative marketing, often with stunts or interactive experiences
Viral: content designed to spread quickly throughout social media, often relying on humor or emotion
McDonald's use of the Street guerrilla marketing type
Image courtesy of SignSpin
Image courtesy of Medium
Image courtesy of Clios
An early example of this strategy would be the missing person posters for the iconic horror film The Blair Witch Project. These posters would be an example of Buzz and Stealth guerrilla marketing types. Buzz creates excitement and anticipation for a product or campaign, and Stealth ads are hidden in plain sight, making it hard to realize you're being marketed to.
A more recent example, following in the footsteps of its horror predecessor, would be Smile 2’s marketing campaign. Actors with frightening smiles began showing up at sports games and public areas, brandishing bright neon shirts, startling and intriguing those at the events and people who stumbled upon the viral retweets and posts online. This would be an example of Ambient and Viral guerrilla marketing types.
Brands can employ guerrilla marketing to appeal to their target audience. A guerrilla marketing campaign allows marketers to flex their creative muscles and experiment with innovative ads.
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