I go to a lot of conferences, more than I want to admit. Part of my job is to cruise the vendor rows and talk to folks to learn about what new offerings that they have. It’s rare that I ever see a booth that grabs my attention, forces me to take a picture and then share it with many others.
Last week at Online Market World in SF, I stumbled upon Doba appears to be an inventory middle-man that connects ebay sellers with companies with merchandise allowing for a marketplace where the sellers don’t have to have physical inventory, I guess in a way this is a digital wholesaler.
Have you been to O’Reilly’s Web 2.0 expos? There are hundreds and hundreds of vendors crowded in Moscone West, it’s an absolute jungle and I hide my badge so folks don’t see I’m from an analyst firm and get stopped every few feet. When the marketplace gets this crowded and everyone who walks by is a prospect, companies will need to stand out in order to get noticed.
Click on the image to read comments, the Chris Knudson of Doba ended up responding to me, a clever group.
Help me caption the above photo, leave a comment below, have fun with it.
Update: see this gallery of other creative outdoor advertisements.
John’s job leaves him feeling a little boxed in
Doba’s earthquake preparedness seminar in SF = ultimate fail.
Completely genius! Sometimes it’s hard to muster the courage to stand out, almost like we unconsciously just want to play it safe for fear we’ll be noticed for all the wrong reasons or something.
A great alternative to the traditional ‘booth babe’!
Caption: “The one day Tim didn’t have his hearing aid and mistakenly heard his CEO say “Think under the box”
Caption: Doba goes a little overboard with their recycling program
Their trade show crates lost in transit, Doba quickly improvises and hires a guy named Chad off of craigslist to lay motionless under a pile of boxes for 8 hours.
Jeremiah:
Thanks for the post!
In retrospect, I wonder if the banner should have said “Inventory Kills”
Caption: Doba thinks inside the box.
“Yeah, last show, they flattened a sort of gnarly-looking gal with ruby slippers. Saved us a bundle on airfare to get home.”
Caption: What do stocks and boxes have in common?
“No fair! He doesn’t have to suffer through the financial crisis with the rest of us!”
“Nah, we work for Doba. We do things different, we’ll be fine”
Looks like we’re gonna need a bigger box.
“When I accepted this job I thought I was being crated off to Dubai!”
“anyone got a box cutter?”
“When they told Todd he’d get the corner office, he didn’t realize they’d just be cardboard corners”
“Tired of being tossed around, the boxes strike back: Attack of the Killer Boxes.”
“Is inventory weighing your Company down?”
“As you can see from this statistical analysis – our safety program is the best in it’s field”
That’s funny. Actually, we were an Exhibitor a couple of months ago at SES San Jose, and our booth didn’t even get delivered. So my colleague and I put on our “innovation” hats, and went out and bought some signs:
“DHL didn’t deliver, but IZEA will!”
It got much attention and praise. In fact, one blog named us the #1 booth at the conference. Oddly, the majority of folks thought that was our normal “schtick.”
I'm not finished read this yet, but it's so fabulous 'n I'll back again when I was finished my job 😀
I'm not finished read this yet, but it's so fabulous 'n I'll back again when I was finished my job 😀