So many marketing and advertising efforts tap into this sense of urgency. If you don’t act right now, you’re going to miss out on a great product, a great deal, or both. This is a limited time offer, so we might pull it at any time. Are you sure you don’t want it? This really is your last chance.

We’ve seen all sorts of limited time offers in the context of infomercials and even print ads, but this phenomenon is becoming increasingly prevalent with online advertising too. In fact, many landing pages seem to employ this technique, even if the offer isn’t really all that limited. It’s always on sale, but the potential customer doesn’t know that. This is deceiving and is a practice that should be avoided.

On the flip side, we’ve seen group-buying websites like Groupon positively make fortunes with this approach. Here is a great deal, giving you something that you might want for 50% off or more, and you only have 24 hours to buy it. If you don’t, the offer is gone forever and you’ve missed out. Woot operates in much the same way.

Utilizing this technique in a slightly different way are online stores like TeeFury. In that case, the t-shirt design is only available for 24 hours. If you don’t buy this shirt today, you won’t have any opportunity to do so ever again. It’s not a deal, but it is a limited edition product that won’t be sold again.

Have you considered using similar tactics in your own marketing efforts? Were they successful?