1. Getting the public to listen and accept your message takes lots of work and creativity, or lots of money, Try getting creative and adapting some conventional marketing ideas to serve your cause. Here are three likely sources of ideas:

 

 

Get them online at Amazon.com (used copies are probably available, cheap), or through local booksellers.

 

2. Do a reality check. Will the idea go over reasonably well? Or will it cause a backlash against the cause or group? One group tried to raise awareness of date rape (I think) by posting fliers that listed a randomly selected group of male students under the heading "Potential Rapists". If you want to accomplish anything useful, do not do this!  Here are some suggestions for judging an idea:

 

a. Does the message appeal to readers' or viewers' self-interest?

b. Does the message appeal to a value most people would claim to share (e.g., equal opportunity, liberty)?

c. Is there strong scientific evidence or statistical data to back up your ideas or claims? (If not, you should find something before proceeding.)

d. Is there an explicit connection between your idea and your goal? Are people likely to understand the connection? (Be sure to explain it carefully!)

 

Some Fundraising Activites to Consider:

 

1. Run a race (car, boat, bicycle, foot, snails, whatever)

2. Wash stuff (cars, boats, dogs)

3. Write a grant proposal

4. Take care of lawns

5. Recycle stuff that'll sell!

6. Run online auctions with donated stuff

7. Sell group members' skills and talents

8. Strip an old building of useful parts and sell them. I recommend getting permission first :)))

9. Restore and sell stuff

10. Haul away old vehicles and restore them, or sell parts. Once again, I recommend getting the owner's permission first :)

11. Enter contests, lots and lots of contests - see www.ezsweeps.com

12. Hold a raffle (with donated prizes)

 

Some fundraising objectives:

 

1. a trip

2. continuing education

3. conserving energy through buying the needed supplies

4. Conserving resources

5. Getting money for a big fundraising project

6. Start an advertising campaign to support your cause

7. Buy something important

8. Restore something important

9. Buy equipment for future activities or fundraising

 

One of the best ways to get new ideas is to adapt existng ideas to your needs. So, I've assembled a list of techniques that businesses use to grow, survive, or increase revenues. Think about one or two of them and see if you adapt them to selling your idea (and that is what activists are doing!) or raising money:

 

coupons

rebates

refunds

early bird specials

advertising hype (Example: "History's greatest cooking innovation!")

humor

sex appeal

customer surveys

test marketing

clearance sales

2-for-1 specials

free smaples

red tag sales

meaningless terms (premium, super-duty, heavy-duty, economy size, etc.) 

strategic alliances

window displays

consumer reseach

exaggerate the differences between you and the competition

 

And, finally, a few thoughts on selling "far-out" policies and ideas:

 

1. Work up to the idea/policy/suggestion - explain the problem or issue you intend to address with the idea and answer likely objections to your idea *before* presenting it.

 

2. Be practical - an idea that people can imagine being implemented by given available resources and the political climate is more likely to "sell".  

 

3. Show concrete benefits for people implementing your idea or affected by it. Do not rely on appeals to abstract moral principles.

 

4. Show consistency with widely held values, attitudes, and beliefs. If your idea would be considered "far-out" by John Q. Public then it is not at all clear how the idea can coexist peacefully wtih existing values and beliefs. The burden is on you to show why your idea deserves to be enacted, not on the rest of us to show why it shouldn't be enacted. Lots of radicals with wild ideas seem to forget this point, or willfully igore it, because "reason" and "logic" are used by elites to prop up a corrupt and oppressive system.

 

5. Show how it can be made to work - Your idea to replace industrial civilization with communistic, agrarian communities using iron-age technology is intriguing. But if you do not know how to get there from here you ideas are just an idle fantasy. If you want revolutionary change you have to have an idea how to get from here to there, through means that the public is likely to accept. .