Cooperative Adverstising

About.com has this definition of cooperative advertising:

A system by which ad costs are divided between two or more parties. Usually, such programs are offered by manufacturers to their wholesalers or retailers, as a means of encouraging those parties to advertise the product.

It doesn't say much more about it than that. And if you google it, you'll get lots of websites of companies who will take your money to help you do it. About.com gives synonyms for it: Co-op Advertising, Co-op program.

Cooperative advertising is a very cost-effective tactic for growing a business. Whether it's you and your distributor (if you have one), or two or three people in complementary lines of work going in together. For example, attorneys who are solo practitioners but who share a suite of offices, have advertised cooperatively for years. A realtor, title officer, and mortgage consultant might go together and advertise for all three. The cooperators have to be willing to cooperate, however. The egos have to be subordinated to the common good.

What do you think about this? Does this mean anything to you? I'd like to know. Post a comment.

Entrepreneurship 2.0 is my entrepreneurship course. It supplies the life's blood of my professional activities: teaching, writing, and real estate. For entrepreneurial real estate go to www.yourstopforrealestate.com/blog and for entrepreneurial writing to www.kearneymusicschoolmurders.blogspot/com.