If you think your online marketing strategies aren’t reaching anybody, consider this story about a Calgary clothing shop that relied only on non-traditional advertising to get the word out.

The staff at Lululemon, a Canadian clothing retailer, disocvered to their surprise that thousands of people were lined up outside the store waiting for it to open on the morning of a huge sale. That might not sound unusual, but the only advertising the company used was on Facebook, a social networking site.

From one little advertising technique, the word spread to thousands of users, many of whom were in the store’s targeted audience. The result was more than the retailer could ever have imagined. And what makes this story even more dramatic is the fact that the people were standing in line for hours in below-freezing temperatures!

According to University of Calgary business professor Debi Andrus, more companies are turning to social networking sites like Facebook and Myspace to create a buzz about their products. She said it gives consumers the feeling that they are involved with the word of mouth and the advertising in general.

The next time somebody tries to downplay the effect of online ads or network marketing, remember this story. There are dozens more like it, too. Online marketing is the future of advertising, and these stories are likely to increase as more and more companies realize that fact.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 5th, 2008 at 5:05 am and is filed under Marketing Strategies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.