CNN T-Shirts: Smart Cross-Media Marketing

Alec McNayr — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 17:30:45 +0000

CNN suffers, like most respectable news entities, to keep news at the forefront of their business. It’s so easy to walk down the entertainment/celebrity/buzz path to draw attention and readership (or viewership). I think they do a fair job, even though the Tina Fey/Sarah Palin SNL sketch has been all over their site of late).

Where this doesn’t apply so much is the opening up of a marketing campaign to draw in viewers. As news continues to become commoditized, how do you stand out?

CNN crossed two mediums that don’t seem to work together. Headline T-shirts.

Brilliant. What does CNN have an endless supply of? Headlines. What would be the least-relevant news delivery-vehicle? Clothing. Put them together and you have a humorous, self-referential motif that really works.

In this case, the number of shirts they sell don’t matter as much as the concept itself. They are printed on demand, and carry the benefit of a buzz-worthy idea.

Alec McNayr » cnn

CNN T-Shirts: Smart Cross-Media Marketing