What The Duck?

Late every spring, area residents and businesses are asked to sponsor rubber ducks in a race across Rancho Bernardo’s Webb Park Lake.

A fundraiser for the Rancho Bernardo Business Association, the race is a regular Spirit of the Fourth activity. Sponsorships are requested in May and June.

You’ll know it’s duck season (not wabbit season) when realtor Patti Hall dons her waterfowl costume and waddles around town.

And therein lies the mystery: Why doesn’t the RBBA sell event sponsorships year-round?

Corporate budgets all start at different times, and fitting a non-profit organization’s fundraising request into that budget sometimes takes finesse.

Plus with so many non-profit groups vying for attention, something must be done to stand out of the crowd a bit more.

Since wearing a duck suit year-round isn’t practical, an alternative promotional tool may be in order.

Fans of the TV show How I Met Your Mother remember Barney, the unrestrained character who was forced to wear a rubber duck-imprinted necktie.

I wore this same tie (Amazon, $17) to the RB Foundation Thanksgiving Luncheon and found it attracted tremendous awareness.

Then County Supervisor Dave Roberts gave my tie a shout-out from the podium.

No fooling!

Now let’s connect the dots:

• RBBA has a rubber duck fundraiser it re-sells each spring
• RBBA needs to stand out of the crowd
• Rubber duck ties are an inexpensive promotional tool

Conclusion: Having RBBA sales reps regularly wearing rubber duck ties year-round will brand them to the race and increase sales opportunities.

This lesson also applies to your business. Competition for every kind of customer attention is horrific…and getting worse.

And if you’re like most businesses you go hunting for business only when you want more customers, but then slack off when you’re too busy.

It’s a mistake! Regardless of your message, finding gentle ways to develop ongoing visibility provides reasons for people to seek you out and do business with you.

Furthermore, if you’re marketing yourself while your competition isn’t, guess who’s going to get the business.

Of course, if he’s marketing and you aren’t…guess who’s getting the business.

Bottom line: it’s easier, cheaper, and more effective to remind people you’re there, rather than having to completely re-educate them every time you wake up to the need for increasing your sales.