Promotions is often the Art of being relevant, topical and in-the-moment. Mancow blocking the Bay Bridge? It would have just been a mean-spirited prank if it hadn’t occurred the day after Bill Clinton fouled up air traffic west of the Mississippi when he got his hair cut while sitting on Air Force One at LAX.
Between Chases Calendar of Events and social media, it’s pretty easy to gauge what’s trending and what kind of stupid holiday like “Talk Like A Pirate Day” might be fodder for doing something with it.
And sometimes you don’t even need matrices and algorithms to know that there’s an opportunity, like, when, everyone in town is losing their minds about your team making it to the playoffs. That’s a given. You would think.
First, you need to acknowledge the Hard Truth that no one can tell you what you did for contesting last week. But come to the Twin Cities, find someone born after about 1972 and just say “Let’s play word association, okay? Tom Bernard and the 1987 World Series…” and a large percentage of them will without pause say “The light happy music!”