It pays to be different in business.
Take Burger King, for example.
The company is no stranger to thinking outside the box.
That includes trolling its biggest competitor ...
One of my favourite stories is when they asked McDonald's for a "burger wars ceasefire", and proposed that the two fast food giants combine forces to create a "McWhopper" on the International Day of Peace.
McDonald's didn't bite (no pun intended), but BK won a bunch of advertising awards and got free publicity from it.
Then they were at it again with a "Whopper Detour" promotion ...
Anyone within 600 feet of a McDonald's could use the Burger King app to get a Whopper for just a penny.
Then the app shot the directions to the closest Burger King to the user's phone, and they could go pick up their almost-free burger.
It worked like a charm - it led to a huge number of downloads for their app, and drove people away from their main competitor at the same time.
Another example:
I once read that a restaurant put a sandwich board sign in front of their business, with "Do NOT Read The Other Side Of This Sign!" written on it.
Curiosity got the best of a number of passersby, and the other side of the sign had a special deal that drew a lot of them in to eat.
Coaches can learn something from these restaurant examples.
No, I'm not suggesting that they offer their coaching for a penny (although a creative coach could massage that into a cool promotion?), but it does pay to think outside the box.
If you're looking for ways to think outside the box with your content creation, grab the January issue of my Secret Coach Club hard copy newsletter.
It's my "content creation playbook", and the deadline to get it is this Sunday at midnight (EST) ... here's the link:
Marc Mawhinney