Our logo is a horse’s head. You’ll see it in various formats on all our websites, business cards, headed paper, adverts and everthing else..
Now we’ve been sent not one, not two but four horse’s heads in our logo’s style, but made of polystyrene foam (big thanks to MadeInHollywood)
Now let’s be honest, they are cool. You can say what you like, but they are fun objects.
The problem is now that I’ve got four horse’s heads sitting in my office I honestly don’t know what to do with them:
So here’s what we’ll do….
We’re inviting you to make suggestions on what we can do with them via the comments here and we’ll give something “nice and shiny” to the winner.
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About the Author: Michele Neylon
Known for his outspoken opinions on technology and the Internet, Michele Neylon is the award winning author of several blogs and co-host of the Technology.ie podcast. A thought leader in the Internet community, Neylon is active within ICANN and an expert on policy, security, domains, ICANN, Nominet and Internet Governance. You can stalk him on various social media networks including Twitter and Instagram
65 Comments
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Well Michele,
I think you need to store them away and if staff start giving you any headaches at all about low wages etc! Just leave a horses head on their bed, let them know never to mess with The Don.
Leave them in the beds of your biggest debtors. Ok…..won’t be quite as dramatic as The Godfather but it still sends a message. Capiche.
Michele … My suggestion based on that image … is to get yourselves a mannequin hand … some string 2 bits of wood and make what you’ve got in the godfather poster 😀 … then you’ve got some kinda even weirder object d’art 😀
(yes … I’ve been heavily on the coffee today)
Stick broomhandles up their necks [think I was going to say something else?] and then ride ’em around Carlow Town firing six-guns in the air.
Do some crazy guerrilla marketing! 🙂 Put them places they won’t be expected, just make sure you stick your domain name on it!
oh grandad stole my idea….
.. playing the theme from the good the bad and the ugly
Register ShergarWasHere.com and start a competition where people have to spot the horses head in various locations around Ireland!!!
I like McAWilliam’s suggestion, but is perhaps a little too obvious – the ‘Il Padrino’ poster in the background leaves no doubt who the boss is!
The pieces look to me like the start of a very interesting chess set, though?
Or perhaps, oh, here’s an idea: how much exercise do your staff get? Pick up a few broom handles at your local hardware store (isn’t there a ‘4Home’ just down the road?) and create some hobby-horses… racing around on a hobby horse is so much healthier than taking a cigarette break… be careful though… all that fresh air and adrenalin could lead to over-exuberance, and, dare I say it, HORSE play 🙂
Hi Michele,
glad to see you got the foam heads.
I suppose I’m excluded from entering …….. I think I read in the small print about employee’s of Blacknight and Made in Hollywood weren’t allowed to enter. 🙁
Hi Michele,
Nice head(s)!
Stick on on the front bonnet of your car and be even better then those old Mercedes, Jag and Rolls Royce drivers.
Send one up and I’ll attach it to my 159 and send you a pic 😉
Pawn them?
Leave them on the pillows of four naughty clients whose accounts are in arrears, obviously.
Sponsor Twestival, we’ll have a Blacknight national race 🙂
Some great ideas guys and girls – keep ’em coming 🙂
Michele
The next switcher you get from another Irish host, send the old host a head. Take pictures outside their office when delivering 🙂
How about giving them to staff when they go on their holidays and get pictures of the logo at famous places ?
I think you should get a few more done up but this time in green, maybe 20, 30, 40 or so. Then cut out a hole from the bottom into the inside of them so a hand can fit in. Then, you should go to the Ireland v England rugby match in Croker on the 28th and bring them with you and hand them out to all the people in the surrounding seats. You can then have 50 green blacknight heads waving in the crowd – I’m sure that would get on telly at some point and you could have your web address on them too. I’ll go with you to give you a hand of course!!! Any excuse to go to a match! 😀
Remember the Bring Back the Fat Frog campaign – something like that!
Dave
Not sure about the large foam heads but I like the Guerrila style marketing idea…you should definitely print stickers in the shape of your horses head logo with “I’m hosted with Blacknight” printed on them and send out to clients to stick on laptops etc. Easy branding opportunity, like the WordPress and Qik stickers (which currently grace MY laptop!)
Stick elastic on the back of one and make the Sales Manager wear it when he goes out to see clients!
Strike that….. I might need a bed soon!
add a broomhandle and make a fake horse for people to ride around the office on.
Contact MadeInHollywood again, and order some Pawns, Rooks, Bishops, Kings and Queens. Oh, and a bunch of squares.
Get some local kids with bikes, stuff the horse heads into the front wheel between the spokes to twhirl around and send em off around the place.
Be sure to give the kids plenty of Blacknight business cards too in case they get stopped by someone
Go to a local halting site and ask them do they want to buy four horses.
Selling points:
* Cheap
* Clean
* Good name
* Various colours
* Toilet trained
* No noise
* Does not need to be fed
* Or groomed
* Or anything really. They just sit there.
Sorted.
Alternatively, you could jam a stick in it’s forehead, then ring a tabloid and claim you have the last remaining unicorn. And it’s Oirish.
Send them on a postal daisy chain journey to your customers and get them to send in photos of them in weird/fun places (or even just on their premises).
Publish the photos and offer a prize and fame to the best photos.
Attach four men and hey presto you’re all set for an apocalypse !
Geoff
Nice poster placement in the background. I’d put them in your biggest competitors’ beds as opposed to the Sabrina’s naughty clients.
Find four gorgeous young women and tell them you want to reenact Lady Godiva?
host a tv show which is all about somewhat intriguing trivia, and whenever a question of equestrian nature comes up, one of the contestants should wave their horses head on a lolly stick shouting “there’s a horse in the room!”
Or…
How about an re-enactment of ‘Into The West’?
“Tayto?! Tayto?! Where ar ya?”
I’ll get my coat…
* The child’s name is actually Tito but Tayto sounds much better…
With the weather looking like it’s going to effect the The Hennessy Gold Cup @ Leopardstown.
I suggest that you stick magnets to the horses heads and put 4 small employees, with magnets, under the table and run the Blacknight Solutions shiny cup race. Paint them a different colour on the other side and you could run a couple of races Online betting could be setup on ShergarWasHere.com. Syndicates arranged for horse ownership.
NB Need to order 30’long benches 5′ high.
Paul says to Michele “Who’s gonna taking the horse heads to France?”
Stick them to dogs to confuse people
28 pieces shy of a giant chess match!
Get a big cardboard box. Put the 4 heads in it. Tie a bit of rope to it- attach the other the end to a car and now you have a horse box. ?You can use this when employees are late or lazy or hungover. Just pull them round the car park at full speed and they won’t do it again.
Use wire or dark string to make them into a mobile.
This saves space, displays them attractively and had the added bonus of annoying tall people!
Don’t do the Godfather jokes,
Use the black one and some editing to make BatHorse: The Black Knight (and the white one can be the joker)
Or simply use the heads to recreate various posters. (or youtube vids)
The Good, The Bad and the Horsey
The Horse with no name
Horse in the City (well your logo does look like Sarah Jessica Parker)
Horse Gump (life is like a corrupt dns, you never know what site you’re going to get)
SlumHorse Millionaire (or milliner as it keeps being said in the movie)
The Curious Case of Darknight
Horse on a wire (have the logo wire-walking between two servers)
Almost a pity that the heads aren’t flexible, you could animate a pixar logo type jumping head. But somehow I think a giant game of chess would be your thing (complete with that audio clip from Wargames)
Merchandising….
“Buy your mini-blacknight horse-head today or get one free with a year of hosting at blacknight!”
With all these ideas it seems like everyone needs to get their hands on an authentic Blacknight polystyrene Horsehead.
Whether it be used for office decor, chess, broom-stick horse-races, or a replacement for the “Spirit of Ecstasy” on your Rolls-Royce Corniche, your timeless collection of authentic Irish merchandise will not be complete without a limited edition horsehead from Blacknight.
These horseheads are a great physical rendering of the Blacknight insignia and make great gifts for Blacknight fans and Horse-lovers alike.
The connections are obvious, (godfather, chess, etc…) with tons of opportunity for branding Blacknight. There is the geico lizard, the travelocity garden gnome, the Jack-in-the-Box “Jack” and now, the Blacknight Horse.
I already love the name and branding of Blacknight, and I think the horseheads are genious. Sell them on the site 🙂
I’m really enjoying the comments and ideas 🙂
Some real gems in there – keep ’em coming!
Michele
God knows its probably been done several times over in that office, but attach a strap to a head, then wrap the strap around you so the horses head is on your back. Then do a Jaws style scene to unsuspecting staff members!
But seriously I think they are cool and would be coveted by clients / readers of the blog. Maybe do a feature on some of your (willing) clients. Explain what they do and how BK assists them. Different client every month. Every featured client gets a “shiny” head and some nice publicity.
Gary
The heads were only delivered yesterday, so we haven’t had time to abuse staff with them as yet 🙂
Michele
Get MadeinHollywood to make you another 20 or so, all white. Stick a black one in the middle and you’ve got yet another one of those bleedin’ stand-out-from-the-crowd photos for the homepage.
Bring one to meetings and use it as the conch.
Addition to the hobby horse theme, ride it around while doing the “Black Beauty” theme (showing my age!).
Count their teeth.
Bring them along to your local Paddy’s day parade.
Why not give one to me to carry where-ever I go and give me an iPhone in exchange? 😀
They would make a great prop for the next Godfather film..assuming there is one
Put a red led in an eye position and place them around dublin and other large cities,the media will get involved and soon you’ll have to come clean,But hey presto some free advertising 🙂
Stick the two grey ones “mouth-to-mouth” and attach to a grey band on your head.
Hey-presto you now have the hat ready to recreate Aretha Franklin’s performance at Obama’s first Presidential Inauguration ceremony.
Make a hole up through it, insert snorkel, add snorkeller, multiply by x, send to the beach, et voila, ‘White horses at sea’.
Or just use as swimming floats
First you can use them at the next Webmaster meeting (of course stick “Sponsored by Blacknight.com”) standing in the middle of the choosen table, or any other places that your company sponsors.
Other option is the stick one beside your servers in Dublin or any other places your company has servers located.
Put one on the front door of your office [“your apartment” 🙂 ] or on the back-shelf of your car like “Churchill Insurance – Oh yeah!!!”
I think you should offer them to clients, I know one would look nice in my office anyway!
Or you could auction them off for charity if your feeling extra nice
Richard Toolan Said: Put a red led in an eye position and place them around dublin and other large cities,the media will get involved and soon you’ll have to come clean,But hey presto some free advertising 🙂
Lol , they wouldnt be left sitting around long enough for the media or anyone else to get a glimpse of them !
Hey Michele, Why dont you tape them to the heads of your staff (one on each side of their head for extra realism) and when visitors arrive to reception , bring your “horsie staff” member with you to carry the important visitor to your office on their back ? The second staff memeber could make hoof noises with two coconut shells (Yes, like the Monty Python sketch!!)
I bet your visitor would be well impressed !!
They have to be trophies. Over the next 4 months run a competition for something like best new website or best new domain name. Allow people to vote for the winner which has the bonus of providing free advertising for new websites which will in turn encourage people to register domains with you. Then the winner gets a free domain or even free hosting and the prize is delivered along with the horses head trophy 🙂
Em, should I be worried that a lot of the suggestions involve making the staff suffer?
Helium balloons – attach head to same . Release – with note offering free hosting to whoever finds it, wherever it is in the world . Ta da.
We would love to have them!…as a social network for horsey people with a lot of members in Ireland and UK…I’m sure we could auction them off to our members with the proceeds going to suitable horse charity…
….or maybe ( more ambitious) organise a geocache trip for each one around the world see here http://www.geocaching.com/
Could be publicity for all of us…recycling/ reason to be cheerful etc etc ?
I suggest having your art dept, decorate them, and put them up for auction for a good cause. OR you could weight down the bottoms and use them as book-ends!
Love the broom-handle pony idea too!
stick em to the wall, use them as new idea of the week, or employee of the month sticky boards. Or even name and shame the slacker of the day.
Create paving slabs from them (ala Hollywood stars) and replace some ordinary ones on the streets. Guerrilla marketing FTW.
Hi
How about starting a new currency?
CJ
Give them to the ‘fire horses’ staff. They should be getting 43 soon and calming down. That would be a nice gesture, else to the ones that are going to be 31 this year or 19….although they are not as special as the fire horses.
A fire horse only happens every 60 years. They are weird and you should be aware of them so you can use them to your advantage. Don’t fired the horse.
Get a load more printed up and send them out to your customers, inviting them to join a competition.
All they have to do is photograph the horses head in a cool (or shiney) place, create a blog post or page on their site saying why they host with you and link back to your website.
The top 5 get a VPS server for a year and overall winner a dedicated server for a year!
—– or —–
Do a promotion that every new customer in March gets a horses head but there’s 5 golden horses heads sent out randomly (willy wonka style), and whoever gets the golden ones get a tour of the Blacknight offices and data centre where all the cool stuff and magic happens. There should be a flying elevator as well and lots of chocolate too! 😀
Thanks for all the wonderful input and ideas.
I’ve asked our team to choose the ones they like the most and we’ll be in touch with the winners in due course.
Michele
We’ve emailed the four winners that our staff choose.
Thanks to everyone
Any chance to see the winning comments?
After all, the rest participated as well.
Thank you.
You use them as rest room signs , black male white female . or you get bricks and make book ends