It was only a matter of time. Naked Pizza, a uniquely healthy pizza joint in New Orleans, has replaced its “call for delivery” billboard in favor of something a bit more unorthodox: its Twitter handle. The restaurant now features a large Twitter bird above its storefront, inviting passersby to follow ‘NAKEDpizza‘ for special deals.
Aside from being among the first brick and mortar businesses to so prominently feature its Twitter handle, Naked Pizza is notable for a few other reasons. Its menu was created to offer the “world’s healthiest pizza”, with each slice only weighing in at a fraction of the calories and fat of standard pizza, while still tasting delicious, according to Yelp reviewers . Oh, and Mark Cuban just partnered with the company to turn it into a national franchise.
To be honest I was skeptical of the sign at first (it’s fairly easy to Photoshop the Twitter logo onto a billboard), but I’ve confirmed with the New Orleans sign company that installed it that it’s real. And while it’s still a pretty strange sight to behold, it makes perfect sense. With the growing ubiquity of smart phones, free 411 services, and Google Local on the computer, looking up a restaurant’s phone number is trivial. And phone numbers only form a very fleeting bond with the business, anyway.
But if a business can get a customer to add their Twitter handle, it gets a free channel to constantly remind them that they exist. By tweeting out promotions a few times a week, Naked Pizza will maintain a presence in the customer’s consciousness, and the customer gets a chance to score some cheap pizza.
This isn’t the first time Twitter has been featured on a billboard. Just last week, Ashton Kutcher’s Twitter handle was displayed on thousands of digital billboards across the country in support of his quest for 1 million Twitter followers.
2 Yelp reviews and they think they’re going to reach people in their market via Twitter?
Good point! Did this business just started?
Advantage of vanity url’s over facebook page no 23783476289. Not just web links, they can be put in real life billboards
we have been on twitter for about a month now. we actually surprised at how well it works for us. our overall mission allows us to connect in a way via twitter that other pizza companies cannot.
Congrats on the Twitter idea. But how about working on your website? Looks like it was built in 1996.
no money, dude. how about give a small company a break.
Direct us to your website – I am sure it is fantastic
No money you say? “Mark Cuban just partnered with the company to turn it into a national franchise.”
Uh huh, sure.
Come on ! It aint so bad..
im sorry but the name NudePizza is not gonna work.
SpamLocator.com – locate bullshite spammers from Ning.
Huh???? What does the number of online “reviews” have to do with anything?
This is marketing 101. Find new ways to get the word of you company to the masses. If anything you should be noting that with only 2 reviews, they should have done this sooner. (maybe they will advertise that they were on twitter before Oprah)
2 Yelp reviews just means that the crowd eating at this place might not be very 2.0ish… Or that Yelp sucks in New Orleans… The idea is good. A video store is doing it on a smaller scale in San Francisco. I still think you should buy yourself a few Yelp reviews if you are a restaurant looking for some online buzz.
Or…instead of buying reviews, just run a promotion for a week called “Review our business on Yelp.com and get a free slice of Pizza”
Interesting. A friend of mine who’s a marketing exec for a major corp told me the other day that Twitter has huge potential for marketers.
Wow!
Nice marketing strategy.
even thou i hate the constant amount of twitter post here daily. i must admit this is clever marketing.
They have quite a few followers, but not sure how many are even targeted. Great media stunt, but this would work best if they had thousands of locations across the US.
would be nice to know. someone needs to develop the app.. but, we seem to have a nice following. only at it for a month – will grow. we’ll see.
Three weeks ago we released http://localtweeps.com, the LOCAL Twitter directory that makes it easy for people and businesses to find and get found by Twitter users near them. It’s a great place to find Tweeps in and near your City and ZIP. Once you’re listed, any tweet that includes #LT will show up with your listing, making it easy to share information about specials and events and attract geographically targeted followers. Check it out!
GOD DAMN IT! WTF IS THIS POST!
You have stooped so low to give coverage to an obscure pizza joint (2 YELP REVIEWS AND YOU CITE THAT AS EVIDENCE OF GOOD PIZZA?) because they made a STUPID marketing move by advertising Twitter in their prime billboard space.
Aside from being A SUCK OFF TO MARK CUBAN, why is this on your site? Seriously, WTF ARE YOU GUYS DOING? TC is a joke.
I’ll also have anon’s slice. plz thx.
Oh please…. we all know it’s you.
Bridging the gap between traditional brick&mortar and the web has been a fantasy for a long time. The hyper-local web has only existed in the realm of classifieds for the most part. Twitter represents such a low barrier to entry, it is believed it may represent the path to the one_per_week_email_check users.
anon – you must me genius – step up to the plate and do something – anything
I’d buy pizza if I saw that. Plus it’s healthy, double bonus.
That’s because you are a sheep. Healthy … why, because they say so? Double sheep.
What??? A sheep on TC???? No… really???????
Dur… this is sheep central
yeah, doi, we’re only on TC so we can be told what to think about the latest tech trends…and follow the crowd…
bahhh…
Anon, not for nothin’, but you are a moron. Perhaps you should get a job, a date, get arrested – anything to get you away from the keyboard. Just sayin’.
Now to the topic…
I live in New Orleans, and it’s good to see a local joint making forward progress. Best of luck to y’all!
I guess pizza places get twitter – only a matter of time – and everyone will get it.
This is a good idea – but where they are going wrong is what looks to be following lots of people in hopes that they follow them back and doing this: http://twitpic.com/3×2p7
we are building an interesting following in new orleans. time will tell.
T-minus 2 months until Twitter becomes unbearable to look at from all the re-tweets.
Hope not, but not exactly optimistic.
Daniel
https://Spideroak.com – Online Backup and Sync Free!!
unsubscribe or remove device updates
stupid. hype.
http://www.worstpizza.com just said “If we ever get to New Orleans we will see if the pizza is even worthy of having a twitter user name
let us know when you are coming to NO – love to meet you
LMAO!!! I can’t stop laughing at this comment! HAHAHAHAHA!!!
Pizza Naked: Pizza Base, No Cheese, No Tomato, No Olives, No Capers, No Anchovies, No Mushrooms, No artichokes Just Naked…. Follow Chef_pete on twitter!
The rest of the article aside, having a title saying that naked pizza erected something is disturbing…
Thanks, now I realize why it sounded so unappetizing.
Funny.. the guys in the Castro are strangely interested.
brillant comment
If a person is willing to follow Naked Pizza on Twitter, then there’s no telling who or what they’ll follow.
And with that, the likelihood of their tweets actually getting read – or even seen – among the celebri-tweets, “mygoldfishdied” and “how I lost 20 lbs in 2 weeks” tweets is close to none.
But I suppose it’s good for 5 minutes of air time on the local news, which is why Tech Crunch is posting about it.
Good grief.
It is good if you’re in the vicinity and you’re passionate for their product.
Such a great idea! Another person shouting out useless information that very few people actually listen to. A very good marketing idea though.
you might want to read the website – before you comment
yeah but isn’t that what marketing is?
A great marketing idea but it could get kinda boring after a while… after about two tweets people would probably lose interest and go do something usefull
I bet this is a Mark Cuban marketing idea seeing as he is a new investor. And, of course, Techcrunch covers any story with the word Twitter in it.
Why are you care???
Why do you care???
Hey Naked Pizza,
I noticed your having a conversation w/ TechCrunch readers in the TC comment section of all places; wouldn’t you want to expand this type of dialogue to your actual consumers?
How do you think Twitter is going to achieve this? Be honest, this was a ploy to have an article written by a TC writer about your company….
-Chuck
??
oops. your link to a page about mark cuban partnering with the company points to the nakabout calories page.
oops. i meant the nakedpizza calories page.
Thanks, fixed it
As long as Naked Pizza don’t overdo their tweets, it’s a brilliant idea!
Sorry, I like my pizza loaded and my women naked.
tom – you wish
Good grief! Why all the negativity about a local company using a “hot topic” to gain attention with their target market, which in this case happens to be – the LOCAL community? It’s done all the time in marketing.
Would there be all this bitching and moaning if they had included the url to their website on their sign? I doubt it, and since their Twitter profile links to their website, they’re essentially killing two birds (no pun intended) with one stone.
thank you. just a small company doing its best.
You said it best Sharon – the pioneers get the arrows -
this is just a marketing move, they wont get anything from twitter anyway.
i think they should have saved it until they have more branches around california at least.
this could be a great jumpstart for sales if they had branches around. now all the people who have seen this coverage will not be able to drive to their only store to taste this naked pizza.
Did you go to the website?
we have been on twitter for about 30 days. summary to date: very useful tool and driving traffic through the door. we r now focusing the followers and cleaning our “who we follow.” we honestly see this as an additional tool for our business.
I’m quite sure they didn’t change their sign with the mindset, “oh boy, now we’ll get mentioned on TechCrunch, our sign will be seen by thousands of people online and we’ll get millions of followers on Twitter.”
That would sorta be equivalent to a spammer sending out millions of emails for Viagra, in the hope that they might get a “rise” out of one or two people.
Why is it so difficult for some to understand that the sign was created to reach the local community, of which I’m sure there are thousands of New Orleans Twitterers?
In my opinion, the fact that they got a write-up here, which could possibly lead to a 5 minute story on the local news stations, is just a feather in their very smart advertising cap.
And when they do go national and arrive in your town, you can brag to your family and friends that, “I saw it on TC!”
The guy is just targeting his market. New Orleans is a place where a lot of marketing is already very soical. Even without twitter or facebook or anything. He’s operating in a younger (where more people are likely to be tech/social media saavy) part of the city (at least two college campuses nearby). In this city if you can get someone to really like you AND your restaurant then you have free advertisement for a long time. Twitter is great because you can react to your customers and keep them happy so they keep talking about you. People like to do that here. He’s taking a risk, but at the same time he has a memorable name and it is so easy to find a phone number nowadays.
I hate to say this for all the twitter fans but twitter sucks is there is nothing but twitter on techcrunch will you guys move on from twitter techcrunch because this could be my last visit to this site if all i see is twitter. If I wanted to hear about twitter id just go to the site myself. Twitter sucks
Dang you people can be negative. I wish more local small businesses would adopt forward thinking ideas like this. Their website is fine is better than most local pizza joints. Sure Cuban just signed on to bring them to the masses, but he JUST signed on. Give it time.
NakedPizza…Olympia, WA would go nuts over your stuff. Seriously!
Being a small business owner, I sympathize with Naked Pizza in these comments. I think this is a tough market & they were willing to try something other than push marketing. Most businesses are just dumping their marketing budget into push at the hope of pulling out conversions for their company. I like Naked Pizza’s idea & think they’re on the right path.
My only suggestion to Naked Pizza is that it may be more effective to have said “Connect with Us on Twitter (for great deals, optional).” This is where most companies miss the boat regarding Twitter – it’s about connecting with your consumers, not just a free advertising service.
Very interesting post; business popularity means nothing to me regarding it’s success, especially when it’s young & trying new things.
This is fantastic.
Twitter is the new 1-800 number less the fees associated with it, and companies can actually use it to broadcast messages directly to interested followers in real time.
The more we take a moment to think about Twitter, this is the brick and mortars dream tool in helping reach new audiences. And Naked Pizza on the right path.
Odd, that for an apparently technically-aware company, that their on-line menu is a picture with no “alt” text. Perhaps blind people only eat unhealthy pizza?
wow. looking forward to all you hatters starting your own business instead of complaining about others who have. for the others, thx for the support.
Whinging about valid criticism won’t deflect that criticism; it just makes you look petty. Why isn’t your site accessible?
And who said anything about hats?
I think it’s a great idea for the business. I don’t understand the criticism. While 90% of businesses don’t get it at all when it comes to marketing, and end up closing down. Nakedpizza is taking advantage of the power of the web and trying to do something with it. What’s wrong with that? People are on the web, and Twitter is a media that reaches those people. I think they’re doing great giving that a shot. I’ve yet to see or hear about another brick and mortar pizza place doing stuff like that. Nakedpizza obviously is creating buzz (look at this post).
I’m in no way affiliated with nakedpizza, but I would definitely give their product a shot simple because I like the fact that they Twitter. And then I’d spend the extra minute to type a Yelp.com review about it…
what would be really fun – pizza orders via twitter!
I’m blown away by all the haters. Good luck nakedpizza!
Wow… I can’t believe people are really sitting here and bitching about the way a company is marketing. What difference does it make? All that matters is now you know about them–whereas before you had no clue about their existence. Genius idea, and the more you give them reasons as to why it was a “bad” idea, the more you justify the genius-ness behind it.
And a comment about their alt tags and using a pic for their menu? You’ve got to be shitting me.
Absolutely ridiculous… and to those complaining, you are a cancer to society. You are putting those down that are bettering themselves (and possibly even local neighborhoods) instead of applauding their entrepreneurial characteristics.
How about we leave the small guy alone and go f*ck around with CNN for using Twitter? GFDI. People these days.
Can you give a more specific reason why having textual web content in an image with no text equivalent is acceptable, or even sensible, than “You’ve got to be shitting me”?
Seems like this advertising has paid off, because a smart bill board and they got publicity here
publicity here does not sell pizzas in new orleans.
Sign of the times in terms of how advertising is changing to reflect changing consumer behavior. As more people become active on Twitter, then it makes sense to engage them through this channel.
Looks like an adaption on changing consumer behaviour…a must to succeed thumbs up.
Just imagine the next pizza ad,
Itll have a woman dancing on the crust planted in a wheat farm vertically.
….you know what I mean!
It is good marketing idea I appreciate them to apply this kind of idea.I’m in no way affiliated with naked pizza, but I would definitely give their product a shot simple because I like the fact that they Twitter. And then I’d spend the extra minute to type a Yelp.com review about it…
I think it’s a great marketing idea and the pizza is great too. We eat there all the time and it’s refreshing to have healthy food options. I do have to say we much preferred the old WHP moniker though.
Well, I eat at NakedPizza every chance I get because the food is actually good. I joined their twitter feed for the specials, which are pretty good. Plus they post links to interesting health-related news stories from time to time. Once I added NP, a lot of my friends added them as well after I ordered them one night and tweeted about how good it was. I also like the NP twitter feed because unlike some bigger company twitter, if you ask something, you actually get a response.
Yeah, it only has 2 yelp reviews, but hardly anyone in NOLA uses yelp, but seeing it mentioned reminded me that I have a yelp account and I’mma go post a NP review lol
naked pizza is the best pizza joint in new orleans. we have a few really good places locally, but they are great. and you can get a large specialty pizza for 12.95. they offer a high quality product at a better price than the crappy places like papa johns, pizza hut and dominos. but you get gourmet. and its much healthier than the rest. hell you could eat 2 large pizzas and only feel mlike you ate a slice from a large 1 topping pizza from the other guys
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