Hey! Welcome to Marketing Ideas That Stick, where you'll find a bazillion ways to use the most cost-effective, versatile guerilla marketing tool on earth: custom stickers.

Bands to businesses to nonprofits, yoga studios, etc.--even if you've always just had a great idea for a bumpersticker--there's something here for everyone--

including now, my new article on how to use graphics programs to design your own custom stickers. Enjoy!

When it comes to band promo, there are a lot of different ways to market your music. But even in the midst of bold new strategies like band blogging, online radio, and even onstage mascots, one of the oldest ways to promote your music is still one of the most versatile and effective: eye-catching, full-color band stickers.

One of the great things about this music marketing strategy is how affordable it is. Custom band stickers can run as little as a few cents a pop, making them one of the most inexpensive ways out there to promote your music. Another major charm is the longevity of this strategy. Given the right design, your band stickers will be seen a lot longer than your handbills, posters, or shrink-wrapped tour van. They'll also show up in more places: car and truck bumpers, guitar cases, laptops, street signs, you name it. Almost any clean indoor or outdoor surface will do.

Band stickers can also be considered a "step one" strategy for indie band promotion because they're all about the fans. Consider:

• 1) Custom stickers are cheap enough to give away. As a general rule, people like free stuff, especially if it speaks to their aesthetic, sense of humor, etc. Including your URL/MySpace on your stickers is also important, since this is what gives folks a way to get hold of you, buy your CD's, download your music, and find out where your next gig is.

• 2) If you've ever seen a band sticker on one of the many surfaces mentioned above (or a bike, or a water-bottle, or even the stall of the bathroom of your favorite bar), chances are, a fan put it there. This is important, since it shows all the world that this band has fans.

The right design-along with music that people get into, genuinely want to hear, and feel inspired to share with their friends-is key to success with band stickers as a promo strategy. But when you consider where your music marketing budget is going to go, don't discount the power of band sticker as a baseline tactic. No other strategy puts so much power in the hands of the fans, and no other form of marketing shows up in so many places for such an affordable price.

More information on the million and one things you can do with custom stickers is available at www.CustomStickerMakers.com

So let's say you're sold on band stickers as a promotional strategy. You understand that they are an inexpensive, eye-catching way to get your name out there, build some buzz, and put the power to market your music directly in the hands of your fans.

All right, you say, I'm ready! Let's slap the name of my band on sticker, maybe with our logo, or a picture of the band in action, and we're good to go, right?

Yes and no. Before you get your band stickers printed, here are a few essential questions to consider.

What does this sticker say about the person who sports it?

Ideally, it should say more than, "I like free (or cheap) stuff" or even, "I like this band." If, for instance, you're a Celtic group named Finnegan's Wake, and your logo is a Celtic cross, no problem-your fans are Irish music enthusiasts, and your stickers fit that profile.

If, however, you're a funk band with a name like Downtown Brown, you might want to go a little further by building your sticker around an eye-catching statement such as, "I got down and dirty with Downtown Brown" or "I get around (with Downtown Brown.)"

The key here is understanding your fans - their tastes, their culture, their humor.

Will this sticker attract attention?

Visuals are a key factor. If you don't have a visually arresting logo-or one that would look good on a sticker, for one reason or another-consider working with an artist and/or graphic designer to create a special design. Your custom sticker should stand out from the crowd, while retaining the look and feel of your band.

In addition to the basic bumpersticker, consider circles, ovals-or even contour die-cuts, which can be cut to the outline of any design. Contour cuts are new and relatively rare, which makes them a great way to stand out in promoting your music.

Does this sticker fit into our overall master band promo strategy?

While stickers are an inexpensive and versatile way to get your name out there, they work best in conjunction with an overall music marketing strategy. Therefore, make sure to your include your URL/MySpace page, and create a design in tune with the look of your posters, your website, etc.

Custom stickers are also an inexpensive way to "test drive" different potential t-shirt designs, before you go in for the bigger investment. If there's a certain design your fans prefer on a sticker, chances are they'll prefer it on a t-shirt, too.

Build your band stickers with these essential considerations in mind and your fans will prove to you just how effective a promo strategy this can be. You'll run out of your first run before you know it-and be amazed at the way custom stickers spread the word, help you gain new fans, and drive traffic to your website.

More information on the million and one things you can do with custom stickers is available at www.CustomStickerMakers.com

Full color custom band stickers are by far one of the cheapest and most versatile ways to market your music. But basic logo and name designs are just the beginning. Band stickers are inexpensive enough to be used in all kinds of different creative ways, offering some great "out of the box" strategies for marketing your music.

Here are just a few band sticker promotion ideas:

1) Immortalize a tour

Give your tour a clever name and commemorate it for the fans who were there.

2) Collabo with an artist

Got a buddy who's an artist? Collaborate on a series of limited-edition stickers. Fans can scramble to get their hands on one of each run, and collect the whole set.

3) Do band member cameos

This depends on how camera-friendly the members of your band are. (Might want to go in for an outside opinion on this one.) But collectible stickers of your band members can be an attention-getter; think of them as your own personal baseball cards.

4) Include stickers in the jewel cases of your CDs

Nothing says love like a little free (cool) swag.

5) Have your fans vote on the next sticker

Get your fans involved by posting different designs on your webpage, and have your fans vote on their favorite for a chance to win something they might want (i.e., free t-shirts, a backstage pass for your next show, or even a date with your lead singer!)

6) Put them under the windshield wipers of your fans' cars during a gig

This basic play from the guerilla marketing handbook is guaranteed to get you noticed. Whether that's a good or bad thing depends on how cool your sticker design is, and how much people dig your music.

7) Tip your barista and/or bartender

Baristas and bartenders tend to be persons of influence in any community, due to the fact that they have a lot of different conversations over the course of their day. Make a fan of these folks and you're off to a good start in terms of building local buzz. (Kicking them some cash probably won't hurt, either.)

8) Pin a stack to a community bulletin board

If your sticker designs are clever, eye-catching and cool, people will take them, and stick them to whatever fine surface they might adhere.

9) Stick them in captive audience locations (i.e., the gas pump, the bus stop)

Yet another guerilla marketing ploy. But who's not going to remember a sticker they saw in a bathroom stall for a psychedelic jam band called Brain Elevator?

10) Use them as business cards

Business cards are easy to lose. Stickers (with your URL, and more info if you want) stick around

These are just a few ideas from the vast array of possible uses for band stickers, one of the most versatile band promotion strategies out there. Inexpensive, eye-catching and easy-to-use, band stickers can have a huge impact in terms of buzz and exposure-for a relatively small amount of cash.

More information on the million and one things you can do with custom stickers is available at www.CustomStickerMakers.com

If there's one thing nonprofit organizations are almost always in need of, it's reliable sources of income rolling in through memberships, grants, events and donations. But part of the challenge involved with the yearly fundraising cycle lies not just in making your appeal, but in keeping it fresh and making it fun. One of the ideas that offers the most fundraising bang for your nonprofit buck is using custom stickers.

Custom stickers can be made to order with your name, logo and/or artwork, and can include special slogans and catchphrases that help to build awareness of your charity in the community while raising much-needed funds. Here are a few ideas to get you started.

1) Sell them

Custom stickers are an inexpensive investment as far as fundraising products go, offering as much as 300% mark-up. Sell your organization's custom stickers at fundraising events, at booths in fairs and festivals where you might be exhibiting, and anywhere your supporters, current or potential, might be gathered. Stickers are a fun, low-cost way for grassroots supporters to benefit your organization without breaking the bank.

2) Use them as a membership incentive

Have a spring membership drive? Use custom stickers as part of your thank-you for new members. Your supporters will appreciate the thoughtful gesture-and advertise their support of your organization wherever they decide to use that sticker, whether it's on their cars, laptops, water-bottles, etc. Consider a design your supporters will be proud to show off: "I brake for the arts" for a kids' art program, for example, or "Fish Lover" for a conservation organization benefiting a river. Change the concept each year to keep it fresh and encourage annual renewals.

3) Honor your major donors

Have a multi-tiered donation platform with memorable or intriguing names? Honor your donors with a custom sticker designed in conjunction with a local artist as part of your overall thank-you package. Having a number of different "special" designs will also serve to help keep your overall visibility high in the community.

4) Send them to foundation staff

Has your organization received grants for programs or services in the last year? Consider adding the personal touch to your final reports and grant updates by including a few of your organization's custom stickers, with a handwritten thank-you note for those foundation staff who have assisted in ministering your grant. While touches like this can't make your organization competitive for the grant cycle the following year if it isn't already, they can help you to build the kind of relationships with foundation staff that lay the foundation for long-term success.

5) Use them as incentives for filling out surveys

If your organization presents events or workshops, getting audience-members, supporters and/or participants to fill out surveys is one of the best ways to collect the kind of data that makes for strong foundation grants. Offering a free sticker as an incentive is an easy way to encourage this, and doubles as a great way to promote your organization.

With a good working knowledge of nonprofit fundraising basics, custom stickers can be an important, low-cost tool in both raising funds and promoting the visibility of your cause in the community.

Guerilla marketing means maximum impact for minimum expense, often on a Do-It-Yourself basis. And while this sort of thing has always been a priority for small business marketing, in today's tough economy, innovative, low-cost guerrilla marketing strategies have the potential to be more important than ever.

This article focuses on custom stickers-one of the cheapest, most versatile marketing materials in existence, and one often overlooked by traditional marketing campaigns.

Let's start with the basics:

1) Understand Your Customers

First of all, this may seem like commonsense in any marketing strategy, but commonsense is often not so common. If it were, more small business owners would understand that a simple logo sticker-however great that logo may be-is probably not going to go viral, except among folks who are already ravenously loyal to their cause.

However, a sticker that people actually identify with-because of the humor, the artwork, or some other element-does have the potential to go viral, for one very important reason: it says as much about your customers as it does about your business.

A great example of this is a pizza shop in my area called Bob's Pizza. Their logo, appropriately enough, is their name, in a curlicue type font next to a drawing of a slice of pizza. The owner of this shop (Bob) could easily have made a custom sticker of this-instead, he chose to do something different.

As the owner of an affordable downtown pizza joint, Bob understands that his target market in this area is composed primarily of families and students. So he not only provides crayons and paper for young artists and late-night doodlers, he posts these masterworks on the walls of his shop. One of these artworks happened to be by a seven-year old boy; it was a happy, blob-like person with a piece of pizza, accompanied by the words, in a childish scrawl, "I like Bob's Pizza."

This is the image that Bob chose to turn into an eye-catching, die-cut sticker-an image that seemed to strike a chord with both families and students, who appreciated the style and the humor. I've seen this sticker everywhere imaginable. I've also noticed a lot of people in Bob's Pizza.

The moral of the story being: create a sticker that shows you understand your customers, and they will advertise your business far and wide-at virtually no expense to you.

2) Be Useful

Nearly everyone knows the old trick about putting a tip-calculator chart on the back of your business card, to encourage people to keep your cards in their wallets.

Depending on your business, however, there may be a better way to "stick around" in your customers' lives-and in a way that helps to establish authority in your area of expertise. By printing a custom sticker with useful information related to your business, designed for semi-permanent mounting in important, everyday places, you can keep your name and number in front of your former and potential clients for an almost indefinite period of time.

Fix computers for a living? Design a sticker with quick-reference trouble-shooting for common computer problems, designed for mounting on a computer monitor or laptop. Yoga studio? Create a daily ‘mindfulness meditation' designed to mount on the dashboard of a car. Heating and cooling business? Print a sticker designed for thermostats, featuring energy-saving tips.

The trick here is to be innovative, useful, and to stick around long enough so that when people need your services, you'll be the one they call.

3) Be Outrageous

If you truly want to create some buzz in your area, you can put the "gorilla" in guerilla marketing with some over-the-top, in-your-face marketing-that-does-not-resemble-marketing.

Case in point-a website called SprayGraphic. This online artists' community wanted to create some buzz in different places across the US. First, they recruited creative artists to feature their graphic design work on their website. Next, they sent out eye-catching posters and custom stickers to these artists, in order to help them promote their work.

The result? Intriguing posters began to appear in coffeeshops and on community boards all over the country, accompanied by their characteristic, funny moustache, nose and eye-glasses logo, explaining who they were, what they did, and why people should join. Then a series of die-cut stickers featuring their logo started showing up everywhere, accompanied by their URL. You can rest assured this simple, affordable guerilla marketing tactic created a huge amount of traffic for this site, almost overnight.

The trick with using custom stickers this way is not to give too much away-and to use them to create a kind of mystery, which your customers will then be compelled to solve.

Interested in more ways you can use inexpensive, custom stickers in marketing your business, band or nonprofit? Check out http://www.customstickermakers.com/

School fundraisers are a regular part of the academic season almost everywhere, whether it’s for sports teams, musical programs or extracurricular clubs. Often, promotional products such as candy or coupon books, Mother’s Day flowers or Christmas trees form the backbone of annual school fundraisers. But custom stickers are a cheap, versatile promotional item often overlooked in school fundraising campaigns.

Anyone with basic design skills can put together a custom sticker, which can then be ordered online. Whether you choose to go with a basic design, such as your team or club’s logo, or a phrase with a specific purpose, such as “I support the arts at Freemont High”, a full-color sticker utilizing a die-cut or contour shape is a good way to make sure your design stand out and grabs attention.

Stickers are a great recession-proof fundraising tool because they have the highest mark-up value of any promotional product around—offering margins of as much as 300%, depending on the size and quantity ordered. Custom stickers can be sold directly, used to reward donations at events, and/or in conjunction with low-overhead fundraisers.

Selling custom stickers is a low-stress way for schools and clubs to generate funds through direct sales, due to the fact that a sticker is an item almost anyone can afford (typically retailing at $3 to $5 a piece.) That means students can sell them not just to relatives and friends of the family, but friends their own age as well. While the asking price is low, funds generated through stickers sales can add up quickly, while doing double-duty by helping to spread the word about your team, club or cause. A good way to drive sticker sales is to build in a prize or reward for those students or classes with the most sales during the fundraising season. Another way to generate added buzz for this type of fundraising campaign is to sponsor a contest through the art department for the best student sticker design. 

Custom stickers are also a great way to encourage donations at games or other events. By setting up a table with information about the cause you’re raising money for, along with custom stickers in return for a donation in any amount, you’ll attract more attention and raise more funds than if you were simply trolling for cash. Often, you’ll raise more funds this way than from simple sticker sales at events, as well—since donations can range from spare change to $10 or even $20 for folks who are truly passionate about your cause.

Custom stickers tend to work well with low-overhead fundraisers, as well. Say you host a student spelling bee, in which students gain sponsorship from friends and relatives for every word spelled correctly—custom stickers are a great way to thank everyone involved. Or maybe you want to do some version of the ever-popular “goat insurance” fundraiser, in which everyone in the school is asked to make a donation in a certain amount to insure that they are not given a goat—or any other “gift” people in general do not want. Custom stickers are great way to take an intangible fundraiser and make it feel more real, while thanking those who participate and giving them a way to show the world that they support your cause.

How ever you choose to use custom stickers, the low costs involved with this versatile promotional product makes it a clear winner for raising money, and one of the best school fundraising ideas out there.

Want more information on how to use custom stickers in fundraising? Check out Nonprofit Fundraising Ideas That Stick, an article available for free download at  http://www.customstickermakers.com

With the economic downturn spelling an end to ‘business as usual,’ small business owners are increasingly looking for ways to reach more customers and increase cash flow. But the ‘Catch 22’ of recession marketing is that often, by the time a business realizes it needs to invest in marketing, funds are already running short.

Big stickers, big decals and big labels offer a cost-effective alternative to traditional signage and advertising for a number of reasons. One, they are versatile marketing tools that can be used in conjunction with almost any large outdoor surface. Two, they are significantly cheaper than traditional signage and advertising. Three, they offer an innovative ‘out of the box’ approach to raising the profile of a business and attracting the attention of customers who might otherwise overlook a given product or service.

Just about any image or message that can be affixed to a large outdoor surface is a good candidate for a big sticker. A construction company, for instance, might use a big sticker on a compressor or generator to advertise their business or logo. Or, an ecological landscaping company might use big decals on rainwater catchment barrels to take advantage of the attention these tanks tend to attract.

Whatever image or message you choose to display, if it can be mounted to a smooth outdoor surface, high-quality big stickers and big decals that will be visible at a distance are a cost-effective way to stand out and make your business known.

For retail businesses, large stickers can also offer a cost-effective alternative to traditional signage. Offering a comparable level of weatherproof durability and high-resolution, photographic quality, large decals tend to be significantly cheaper than signs and banners.

While traditional signage tends to run $9.00 to $12.00 per square foot, large decals can be made as inexpensively as $7.20 per square foot—can be affixed to virtually any smooth surface—and are often indistinguishable from traditional signage.

For all types of small businesses, large stickers tend to be more versatile than traditional print, radio and television advertising, and can be used in conjunction with trade-shows, home-shows, and other ‘in-person’ networking and presentation venues that drive sales in a more direct way.

One eye-catching option available for big stickers in any context is the die cut. Die cuts closely approximate the outline of your words, image or logo, helping it to stand out at a distance and add ‘pop’ to your message.

How ever you choose to use big stickers, it’s important to choose a large decal printing company that uses only high-quality outdoor vinyl and inks. This helps to ensure that your stickers will stand the test of time—as well as the elements, if you’re planning on using them outside— and remain as eye-catching in the years to come as the day they first arrive.

Interested in more Marketing Ideas that Stick? More information on innovative uses for custom stickers is available online at www.CustomStickerMakers.com

Custom sticker printing offers a flexible, low-cost way to gain visibility for just about any cause imaginable. Now that it’s increasingly easy to make custom stickers online, more and more people are discovering creative applications for custom stickers in promotion, personal expression, and more.

Curious about what you can accomplish with custom stickers? The following are the top eight applications for custom sticker printing online.

1) Promoting a business

As marketing budgets shrink, more and more small businesses are looking for creative ways to get their name out there.  Custom stickers offer an easy, accessible “guerilla marketing” tactic that turns every bumper into a potential billboard, provided the design is catchy and speaks to the businesses’ customers.

2) Promoting a nonprofit

Like for-profit businesses, nonprofit organizations can always benefit from increased visibility among their potential supporters. But nonprofits can also use custom stickers as a low-cost fundraising tool by selling them or using them to reward donations for a specific cause or campaign. Custom stickers also give nonprofit members a way to publicly demonstrate their support.

3) Promoting a band

Having a band sticker if you’re in a band is nearly as essential as having a business card if you’re in business. Custom stickers offer bands a medium to express their unique style and get their name in the public eye, while giving fans a way to show their support.

4) Promoting a website

The key to making any website successful is in driving traffic to it. Eye-catching custom stickers featuring a URL are a great way for anyone with a website to generate local interest.

5) Promoting your artwork

For artists looking for eye-catching ways to promote their art-work, photographic quality custom stickers can offer a cost-effective solution. More affordable than greeting cards, stickers featuring an artist’s work and website can be a great way to publicize a unique visual style. 

6) Service compliance

Certain industries such as construction and commercial shipping require stickers noting the nature of materials or on helmets and other gear. Custom sticker printing online offers a cost-effective way for manufacturers and other businesses to comply with applicable regulations within their industries.

7) Personal expression

Almost everyone has had some great idea for a bumpersticker, whether funny, pithy or political. More and more people are now realizing how easy it is to make custom stickers, and actually make those great ideas happen.

8) Mindfulness/Meditation

A recent trend in custom sticker printing comes out of the field of alternative health and spirituality. “Mindfulness reminders” designed for use in potentially stressful everyday environments like the inside of a car or on a computer monitor at work offer the clients of yoga studios and alternative health practitioners a daily reminder to center themselves and breathe, while maintaining top-of-mind-awareness for the business which provides these stickers.

If you’re looking for a way to promote a business, a band or even just a great idea, custom stickers can be a low-cost, versatile solution. But printing custom stickers means submitting a digital sticker design online, and if your experience in this area is limited, the process can be daunting.

What follows is a basic guide to designing your very own custom sticker.

Your Sticker Printer Online

Before you begin designing your sticker, check the requirements of your sticker printer online. This should give you the accepted file formats for graphic work (.psd, .pdf, .jpeg) as well as the required resolution. In most cases, sticker printers will require a resolution of 300 dpi (dots per square inch) or better, in order to ensure professional print quality. A color format such as ‘RGB’ may also be specified.

Your sticker printer may also offer custom sticker design online for a fee. This may be as simple as adding a line of text or a URL to a digital image you already have or as complex as creating an image or logo from scratch. Fees for custom sticker design online and services offered vary from one sticker printer to another.

Graphics Programs

In order to design your sticker yourself, you will need to have access to a graphics program. You may have a friend or relative who has a copy of Photoshop or Illustrator on their computer you can use—or your computer may have a simple program like Microsoft’s Picture It! already installed. Alternately, Photoshop is now available in a free, ad-supported format online at www.Photoshop.com and tutorials are freely available in many places on the Web.

A few sticker printers also give you access to a free online sticker design tool specifically created for that purpose.

Alternately, if you’d like to work from an image that you or someone else has drawn, or a printed image you have, you’ll need to use a scanner, making sure that the scanner is set to the requirements of your sticker printer (ie., 300 dpi) before you scan. If you don’t have a scanner at home, businesses such as Kinko’s or other copy centers can provide access to a scanner for a fee.

Technical Elements

The most important element to consider in designing your custom sticker is image quality. A good rule of thumb to bear in mind is that if you have pulled an image off the internet, it probably will not be an appropriate resolution to produce a good-looking custom sticker. That’s because images on websites tend to be saved at a lower print resolution (72 dpi) in order to achieve quicker upload times and save space on servers. This is true even if the image looks fine on your computer monitor at the size you have specified. If you’re in doubt about the quality of an image, the best way to check its quality is to print it out on your home printer at the size you want your sticker to be.

Make sure your image quality on  your graphics program is set to 300 dpi or greater, and that your color profile matches the one specified by your sticker printer. Create a new file on whatever graphics program you’re using, making sure it’s the size of the dimensions you want your finished sticker to be. Open any pictures you may want to use, and cut and paste or drag them into your open file. Add text, effects and any other graphics that may be part of your design, and make sure you save it in one of the formats specified by your sticker printer.

Now you’re ready to upload your finished sticker design online, and await your great-looking custom stickers!

Gillian James blogs for http://www.CustomStickerMakers.com, the Web's best source for low-cost, high-quality custom stickers, bumperstickers, labels and decals. Offering full-color stickers for band promo, non-profit fundraising, school benefits, business marketing, service compliance and more, Custom Sticker Makers also offers a popular online sticker-making tool. Interested in more marketing ideas that stick? Visit http://www.CustomStickerMakers.com