I don't know if this will work for other areas of interest, but cigar forum readers do this kind of thing all the time. I'm just tweaking and using it to promote my site.
I've put together a flyer that says "You've Been Jacked" and sending it out with a few cigars to different people on cigar websites. The rules on the flyer ask that they replace two of the four cigars and either hand it off or mail it to another cigar smoker. It encourages them to log on to my site to find out where the package has been.
Cigar smokers that hang out on web forums already do Pay It Forwards or Cigar Swaps all the time and in the habit of sending packages to each other. So I think I should be able to float this around for awhile and might be able to generate some buzz about it.
I'll update this thread in a couple weeks and see how this progresses.
Interesting
Do let us know, would be a good post for the homepage once your results are in!
Photos
Lots of groups are creating photo contests and asking people to put them in Flickr with a certain tag or upload them to a website. Spread Firefox did a photo celebration of 100 Million downloads which was quite successful. Similarly SaveRoe.com has a photo contest to protest the decision by Target (US retailer) to stop selling birth control.
The basic plan is simple:
1. Come up with something to celebrate/protest/photograph in a variety of places
2. Do a contest for a few weeks asking users to submit photos - this bring word of mouth, traffic, and linkbait
3. Choose some winners and give them some sort of reward (could just be the fame of winning)
Damn
I was going to do that and thought it was an original idea ... grr
Flickr Link Bait
I was looking for an idea for a contest. I like the flickr photo tagged idea. I may have to do that.
Another fun one
Another fun one I've seen is asking other bloggers in your area to do a monthly coordinated post.
I forget where, but somewhere in the wine world there was a guy who did this. The plan is simple:
1. Contact lots of your peers and tell them about your plan to do a "reviews of XYZ topic" post on March 1
2. Everybody publishes on the last day of February and sends you the link for their review and includes in the review a link to your aggregation.
3. You read them all, link out to them with a comment, and maybe provide your own report
I think it mostly works for product blogs (e.g. everyone reviews a merlot, or a chilean wine), but it could also work in other areas.
It's basically like the whole "webring" system, but is a little classier/bloggier style.
Thanks ... valuable inspiration!
I'll mix both and make it a competition series.
actually...
I've been considering sponsoring a wet t-shirt contest. think that could work?
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