Every marketing department should try to think and act like a minor league baseball team's marketing department

The Super Bowl is just hours away, and already a winner is emerging in Super Bowl related marketing contest. It is not Budweiser, Pepsi or any of the advertisers that reportedly paid $4 million per spot. My winner is the independent minor league baseball team the Bridgeport Bluefish.

Peyton Manning has been yelling "Omaha" at the line of scrimmage while calling out plays for the Denver Broncos. In their game a few weeks ago against New England, he called out the Nebraska city's name over 40 times. To which the Omaha Chamber of Commerce responded with their own marketing campaign capitalizing on that publicity. The Omaha Chamber is planning donations of $1500 to Manning's "Peyton Payback" charity during the Super Bowl. http://espn.go.com/nfl/playoffs/2013/story/_/id/10366971/super-bowl-xlviii-omaha-chamber-commerce-pledges-1500-peyton-manning-utters-omaha

But the real winner of gorilla marketing is the Bluefish organization.

First some background. While I am a big baseball fan, before today I've never heard of the Bluefish franchise. Frankly, I'm not really sure where Bridgeport is except that is somewhere in Connecticut. To my knowledge, I know no one associated with the organization yet I'm championing their cause as I sit in my Central Indiana home.

Watching TV this morning, the local Fox station did an entire segment on the team. The Bluefish have come out on Super Bowl Sunday suggesting that Manning change his "Omaha" call to "Bridgeport" instead. It is a ridiculous idea you say, right? Probably so, even though GM Ken Shepard is offering a $5,000 donation to the Peyton Payback charity if he does.

Clearly no one expects Manning to do this, but I love the fact that Shepard and his creative marketing team created this ploy to gain publicity for the team. All marketing teams should take note of this, and try to figure out how it can be replicated in your market.

The typical minor league baseball marketing budget is nothing; or very close to nothing. But the Bluefish figured out that they could get publicity through a creative ploy such as this. Sure, they've put up $5,000 on the highly unlikely chance Manning said "Bridgeport" during the Super Bowl. That's like placing a bet you know will never be collected. Beyond that, they are out $0 and yet they have received local, regional and now national attention. All of this coming in early February, right when minor league baseball teams start pushing for program ads, ballpark signage agreements and season tickets.

It is great when you have a huge budget and can buy your way to a great marketing campaign. It is even better when you can get creative and figure out a way to do even more with less. Full details on the Bluefish's offer can be found at:  http://www.bridgeportbluefish.com/blog/post/281/bluefish-ask-manning-to-call-audible-play.

Kudos to the Bluefish! I hope the team on the field can be as successful as the marketing team has been with this promotion. You can check out the Bluefish at www.bridgeportbluefish.com.