There’s a plumber in my hometown that created some yard signs during the last election and convinced some customers to put them in their yard at the height of the electioneering cycle. These signs promoted – Bob Hamilton for Plumber. They were cute and likely generated some positive buzz.

I’ve long considered the idea to perhaps be more powerful than the casual one time use might imply. What if you were to find a few well placed homeowners – that would mean on high traffic residential through streets – and offered to buy some advertising in their yard. The stipulation would be that they would agree to place a sign promoting your business or service in their yard and to leave it there.

I know some of the homes association types might be rolling their eyes but, like anything you do, if you take care to select homes that have side yards and maybe only use a 30 day term, who knows. This is an ideal approach for home services folks – window cleaning, landscape, plumbing, HVAC and the like.

Now, let’s expand our thinking a bit. What about delivery vehicles, statement stuffers for complimentary businesses, trash bags, recycling bins, pizza delivery boxes. There’s really no limitation to this idea of creating your own advertising vehicles.