What do Cyndi Lauper and WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) have in common?
My mind began to ponder this question after recently watching Goonies (one of my favorite movies as a kid) with my daughter. The DVD had bonus material and there was a Cyndi Lauper video “Good Enough” – the main title track for the movie. When I was watching the music video, I noticed that Lou Albano (a famous WWE Wrestler) plays her father in the music video AND there are a bunch of wrestler personalities in the video too. I recently watched Cyndi’s music video – “Girls Just Wanna to Have Fun” and Lou also plays Cyndi Lauper’s Dad in that video.
I had to know why there are so many WWE Wrestlers in Cyndi Lauper’s music videos? The answer is because of cross promotion!
Cyndi Lauper and Lou Albano connected on a flight to Puerto Rico in the early 80’s, Cyndi’s manager was a huge WWE fan and they started casting Lou as Cyndi’s “dad” in her music videos.
by Ron Cogswell
WWE hadn’t become mainstream and Cyndi was just starting to peak with her first album “She’s So UnUsual”. The cross promotion of the WWE and Cyndi looked like this. Cyndi would mention Lou and the wrestlers when she went on late night talk shows to promote her album and touring. The WWE would promote Cyndi by playing her music at events and even have her attend WWE events and be in the ring with the wrestlers. What also worked well is the bright, loud personalities they both shared; Cyndi was pretty vocal, wearing bright clothes and her signature bold red/yellow hairstyle. The wrestlers also had “costumes” and loud personas.
In 1985, WWE went mainstream on primetime TV, having a special TV event that was hosted by Cyndi and other big celebs at the time. This is when Hulk Hogan and other WWE celebs became household names. 1985 is also the year the movie Goonies came out and Cyndi hit it big creating the theme song for the movie. (If you want to learn more details about Cyndi and WWE, here’s a good read: https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2687433-how-cyndi-lauper-was-essential-in-the-launch-of-wwe-wrestlemania)
Now you are asking, why should I care about this Nedra?! I don’t like WWE or Cyndi Lauper. It can be truly effective when you have good partners who have common interests and goals in mind. It can be one of the most effective ways to market yourself and right now in the time of COVID, one of the most powerful ways.
I want to challenge you today to consider a colleague that has a product or service that compliments what you do and consider an alliance you could have. How could you promote them and they promote you? Here are a bunch of ideas to try out: https://www.thryv.com/blog/7-cross-promotion-ideas-small-business/