How Do You Make Advertising Work for You?
Multiplying Advertising Media Makes Advertisement Planning Essential
Jan 2, 2009
Creating awareness about your business is best done initially in an indirect manner through news about you in the press and other forms of inexpensive publicity. These have greater credibility value than advertisements. However, you have less control over this kind of publicity and will ultimately need paid advertisements to generate needed volumes of business.
Why Do You Advertise?
You advertise with different objectives such as the following:
- To support your field sales force who will find their tasks easier if the product and its benefits are widely known
- To introduce a new product into the market
- To increase demand for the product and utilize available production capacity
- To maintain demand for the product in a competitive market
Advertising can be direct consumer advertising or for building brands that create brand loyalty and sustain sales volumes.
How Do You Advertise?
To be effective, you have to design the advertisements purposefully and skillfully. You start by researching the market to identify the specific needs your product satisfies. The advertisement copy should convey in an expressive manner how your brand satisfies these needs.
The most effective way to do this is by appealing to human emotions and drives. Merely stating that your product satisfies so-and-so needs is unlikely to produce results in a competitive market.
Your campaign has to work within a given ad budget. This means that you have to get the maximum results with minimum expense. The steps listed below should help.
- Do the market research mentioned above and develop a profile of your customer
- Identify the media that reaches this customer group
- Design ad copy with the help of ad professionals with demonstrated results, preferably those with specific experience in your industry
- In each advertisement campaign, select one particular niche and target the ad copy to their needs and preferences. Deliver a consistent message through all the media.
- Select less expensive media such as direct consumer advertising and online advertising wherever possible
- Take the trouble to run a test campaign (and track results) before deciding whether to go ahead with that campaign or not
Proceeding systematically as above will help you get maximum value for your advertisement money.
Where Do You Advertise?
You can place your advertisements on amazingly varied media. The list below is just for illustration. With imagination and creativity, you can find numerous other media.
- Newspapers and magazines
- TV and radio
- Billboards at public places such as roadsides
- Mobile billboards such as trucks, trains and planes
- In the sky through floating blimps or sky-written messages
- On cinema screens
- On bus stop benches and railway station stalls
- On cellphone screens
- Walking human billboards
- On free giveaways and your company documents
Advertising is the form of publicity that you can control. If you run your ad campaigns in a systematic (but creative) manner, it can produce great results at low costs. Profile your customer and identify the media that reaches the person. Create ad copy with professional help. Choose low cost media like on-line media where possible.
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