Marie Wiere's Blue Sky Management Blog

There is an Irish folklore from the 5^th century, which tells the story of how St. Bridget negotiated with St. Patrick to allow women to propose to men on February 29^th. Her argument was that since February 29^th had no legal status, traditions should have no status on this day either. Today leap day is not just about folklore and can represent a great opportunity for businesses to create innovative marketing strategies to attract their customer’s attention.

While not suitable for all types of businesses, many restaurants, hotels, theme parks, car sales companies, radio and TV stations and others are taking advantage of this one in a 1461-day opportunity. Organizations of all sizes can take advantage of leap day by offering sales promotions such as 29% off, flash sales, discounts, coupons, contests, birthday offers for leaplings and other promotions.

Below are some examples of my favorite 2012 innovative leap day campaigns:

Honda’s “2012 CR-V Leap Year Contest”

Honda has created a leap year themed advertising campaign to promote the 2012 CR-V.

Honda’s website for this campaign enables people to create lists of goals they hope to achieve before they take the next major leap in their life. To inspire you to get your list started, Honda is hosting a contest where all lists submitted will be judged on their activity, variety and feasibility. The grand prizewinner will win a 2012 Honda CR-V and free gas for a year.

Disney Theme Parks: “One More Disney Day”

My favorite of all the leap day campaigns is one more Disney day. On February 29^th for the first time ever both the Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom in Orlando, FL and the Disneyland Park in Anaheim, CA will be open for 24 hours.

The campaign’s big question: What would you do if you had one more Disney day?

If I had one more Disney day I would head to the Walt Disney World Resort and relive some of my memories from my days on Disney’s Cultural Representative Program. I would head to the Disney Studios and ride Rock n’ Rollercoaster and Tower of Terror, before heading to Epcot’s World Showcase to walk around my old workplace and buy some overpriced but delicious British chocolate. I would then head to Animal Kingdom to ride Expedition Everest and watch the Lion King show. Once the other three parks were due to close I would head over to the Magic Kingdom where I would stay until the early hours of the morning hitting all the mountain rides and watching the incredible 3D Mickey’s Philharmagic.

Also on leap day Disney will be offering free “one more Disney day” mouse ears to the first 2000 visitors at both Magic Kingdom and Disneyland. In addition, there’s a sweepstake to win a trip to either resort but as you can probably tell I would really like to win so I’m not going to share the details, though they are really easy to find!

Anabella Hotel’s “29 $29 rooms” 

Located in Anaheim, CA the Anabella hotel were quick to react to Disney’s “one more Disney day” announcement by creating a complementary offer. Through their Twitter and Facebook accounts the hotel offered 29 $29 rooms for the night of 02/29, which went on sale at 10 a.m. on February 7^th. The Anabella hotel’s leveraging of their social media platforms, helped make their promotion a big success. All 29 rooms sold out in less than 15 minutes.

WIRK Radio: “Take Leapers to Lunch”

Southern Florida’s country radio station 107.9 WIRK has offered to take anyone whose birthday is on February 29^th to lunch at Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse on leap day (a cap may be imposed at some point). Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse in North Palm Beach will open specially for this lunch. No doubt the radio station will include this event in their broadcast and this promotion seems ideal for radio or TV stations.

So what do you think? Could your business take advantage of leap day by creating an innovative marketing campaign? Share your thoughts below.