Tryvertising - the way forward?

Wine producers have for many decades understood the most effective way to market their products. Invite a select, highly targeted group of wine drinkers into a relaxed, appropriate venue and get them to sample and rate your product. It works...brilliantly.

While tasting, smelling, looking at and evaluating the wine, they tell the tasters about the product... the grapes, the weather, pictures of the farm… it's like a total brand emersion.

But why should this highly-effective form of marketing be restricted to harvesters of the grape? The growing global trend which taps into the elusive idea of introducing brands to people in an honest and engaging way is called tryvertising.

Tryvertising involves consumers being introduced to new products and brands by actually trying them out for themselves, instead of being told what to think by more traditional forms of marketing communication. It's like a no-strings-attached, reality product placement where people are encouraged to interact with products as a way of promoting them.

Old-school forms of tryvertising would be the perfume samples you get in fashion magazines, or the lady who flips burgers in the supermarket and then gives you a tiny piece of it on a toothpick to snack on. Going forward the trend lends itself to luxury car brands offering the free use of their vehicles to guests of selected 5-star hotels and running shoe makers offering the free use of a pair of their trainers for an early mountain session.

The Internet and its ability to encourage easy social interaction has sparked an idea to take South African tryvertising into an online space.

Cherrypicka.co.za is a brand new way to tryvertise in an innovative online environment, which has been created by Cherryflava Media.

For lazy gift givers, wannabe critics or people in search of new things to try out, the new product said to be an ideal marketing tool for brands that want to effectively use tryvertising to interact with an affluent, web-connected audience. The business concept is an efficient, word-of-mouth/experiential marketing tool, which invites users to buy, try...and then review showcased brands on Cherrypicka.

The site invites customers to register as 'cash test dummies' and purchase new products and services at steep discounts in exchange for submitting reviews. Not only do consumers get rock-bottom deals and first dibs on new merchandise, but merchants get direct market promotion of their brands, online word-of-mouth advertising and guaranteed feedback from some of the first users of their wares.

Participating merchants supply a limited number of their product to be showcased on the site. Consumers can browse through an array of items, including categories for 'bedroom accessories', girls, guys, arts & culture, food and drink, services and music.

It's safe to say that as a marketing trend, tryvertising is still just finding its feet. But in a world where the marketing landscape is changing at such astonishing speed, future innovative tryvertising ideas could well be the ones to watch.

For further information, go to http://www.cherrypicka.com