I always encourage my clients to look to other industries for great marketing ideas. In this age of rising gas prices, public transportation already has a leg up on being foremost in people’s minds. However, since we as a society love to drive our own cars, public transportation is a tougher sell in more suburban areas. I live outside of Washington, DC and the DC Metro has added a Commuter Calculator on their web site where you can compute the cost of driving to work vs. using the Metro (buses and trains, included). Brilliant!
In fact according to the radio DJ who alerted me to this service, a survey of 1800 commuters showed an average savings of $171 per month by using Metro. As gas prices go up, I am sure that cost savings will increase.
How can you apply this to your business? Do you need to convince your prospects to make a change in their normal behavior? What is the compelling factor for them to make that change, in this case cost savings? Can you display that on your web site in an interactive way? Can you make the information more personal through a calculator type tool? This makes the change more compelling since this is so personal to your prospect.