Have you ever seen these? I dont believe so. Unless you have taken a walk on a sunny day in Japan, where you are bound to bump into a student handing out pocket tissues.  Tissue pack marketing is one of the mainstream ways to advertise in Japan, building up to a billion-yen industry. From my experience, I accept the free tissue pack but never really pay attention to the advertisement.

However Reimi Nakagawa talks about this form of advertising being extremely popular and successful in her blog post, hence the billion yen reputation. I do agree with her that it is a very cost efficient form of advertising, and an efficient way for the firm to be considered in the consumer’s evoked set. Nonetheless, we can see growing demand for tissue pack marketing outside of Japan for its multi-usage for both genders and, of course, because it is free! There are companies now that tailor uniquely to companies that want to advertise via tissue marketing.

After reading Reimi’s post as well as other articles, I was reinforced with the idea of offline marketing. I had been under the impression that marketers nowadays pay too much attention to technology and entertaining online viewers through advertisements.

“Very few methods of advertising can guarantee exposure like that for the same price. Although online marketing can be wonderful, offline marketing still offers businesses a fantastic way to drive a direct call to action.”

Perhaps markers should reconsider their medium of advertising and start considering cheaper, more effective ways of spreading their name, especially now in times of economic downturns.