Cards Against Humanity

You are busy trying to figure out how much to discount your merchandise on Black Friday and/or Cyber Monday. You attempt to balance competitive practices with the CFO down the hall who will demand that your department is downsized by 20% if you give away too many gross margin dollars.

It's a tough balancing act.

Then you have Cards Against Humanity. I don't play the game they sell, but plenty of people do.

Today, on Black Friday, this was their offer.

1. You give them $5.
2. They give you nothing.

As of this writing, 63,555 customers gave them $5 (assuming that the metric is true ... and that is a big assumption).

Ask your CFO what the gross margin is on a customer giving you $5 and you give the customer absolutely positively nothing in return? I'll bet it is north of 98% ... after factoring in credit card processing fees.

There are two themes that keep coming up, when folks talk to me.

1. We're unique, we're different.
2. We are having a difficult time finding new customers and keeping our existing customers.

This (above) is unique and different.

If you are truly unique and different, there will be a customer base that opens the wallet for you.

P.S. If you want a low-cost customer acquisition program, hint - this is one. Just take a look at the free marketing they're getting today. It's the kind of free marketing that Glenn Glieber would be happy with.