On my way to Vegas for CES (#CES), Affiliate Summit West (#asw09) and WordCamp Las Vegas (#wordcamplv)  I had the pleasure of a sweet 2 hour layover at the Cleveland airport.

While wandering around I came across some smart, useful, and relevant examples of “Marketing with Meaning” a concept that is the basis of a book coming out next year by Bob Gilbreath, CMO of Bridge Worldwide (you can learn more about Marketing with Meaning at his blog or in the post where I covered his session at the Cincinnati Digital Hub event).

First off, airports can be a great place for marketing…. A captive audience, waiting, bored, with nothing to do except eat terrible overpriced food.

The first (and best) thing that I came across was this play castle area sponsored by littletikes.

First, it is really useful. I don’t have kids, but if I had young kids and had to wait around the airport I would be thrilled to find something like this. It is a clearly marked play area, so they can run around and make noise without annoying other people. Also, the kids can burn some energy before their parents have to try to get them to sit still during the flight.

Second, there is a clear call to action for the parents – “shop online at littletikes.com”. When I first walked by there were a handful of kids playing and a few parents had their laptops out.

The next source of amusement was a little interactive billboard from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (which is in Cleveland).

There are curtains and a mic stand and you can get your photo taken on the “stage” with fans cheering and grabbing at you…. Like a rockstar. By making the display interactive I bet that people take notice, take their picture in it and share the picture with friends and family. Awesome.

Key Learnings for Branding:

1) Look for creative opportunities where you can promote your brand (in the book Personality Not Included Rohit calls these “personality opportunities” or something like that).

2) Add real value for your audience.

3) Include a call to action to increase ROI.

4) Be USEFUL.  This is almost the same as #2, but find an opportunity to be useful.