Ecko hits homerun with Bonds' ball balloting

by King Hill September 18, 2007

Over the last week or so, fashion magnate Marc Ecko orchestrated a brilliant promotional ploy from which all of us can learn a thing or two.

On September 17, Ecko, who's namesake $1 billion Marc Ecko Limited designs and markets contemporary apparel under various brands worldwide, announced that he had purchased at auction Barry Bond's 756 homerun ball for $752,467.20. He is now asking the public to tell him what to do with it.

The brilliance is that Ecko knows that his target audience (young men/women 16-35) can't get enough of notoreity, controversy and popular culture -- and this Bonds ball hits a homerun delivering it all in one spherical package. He also knows how to leverage all that with the most effective blend of relevant touchpoints for this tech-savvy group: public and media relations (start the conversation), social network marketing and user generated content (feed the conversation) a simple website (channel the exposure for profit).

Over just one night, Google reports more than 225,000 search results for ecko + bonds ball; Technorati lists more than 5,000 blog posts; and Yahoo! news lists more than 330 news stories.

Bam. With one swing of the pen (and checkbook) Ecko has bought himself millions and millions of dollars of exposure. and, more importantly, he did it in a way that is perfectly aligned with his brand and the emotional  appetite of his target audience.

Technorati Tags: Auction, Baseball, Bonds, Circle44, DigiKnow, Ecko, King Hill