You look at some of your competitors and other businesses and think, “They must be doing better than I suspected. Their commercials are always on TV and the radio.” Or, “They have billboards all over the place — how do they do it? They must have a huge ad budget.” You’ve even heard that they work with an ad agency … how can anybody afford that?
Well, maybe those businesses do indeed have a Midas chest for an ad budget, or maybe they just use their marketing dollars more wisely and devote them to messages that are targeted and memorable.
Let’s assume your budget is tighter than your jeans after the holidays. You still want your marketing message to be fresh and to generate traffic through the door. In most instances, the reality of your budget and your marketing desire are not at odds. But, you need to use experts to make the two work together.
Marketing People Leave The Nits To You
An ad agency has people who specialize in planning, media buying, graphic design, and copywriting. They are not experts in the nits of shoes, accounting services, medical devices, crop genetics, hair care, construction tools or whatever expertise you’ve turned into a business. They do, however, know how to market your business or they would be out of business.
Here’s a real-life example of how a savvy media buy coupled with an effective, eye-catching message is powerful: A small business that had experimented with print ads and radio hired an agency, which soon discovered that billboards resonated the strongest with the market for the business. The messages developed by the agency struck just the right tone with the clientele. Customers and prospects regularly commented to the owners how much they liked the messages, some of which had not run for over a year. These people also thought the business had 10 or 12 billboards around Springfield. They had three.
The take-away: In tandem with the agency, the business controlled its budget much better because of targeted media buys, the medium aligned strongly with the clientele of the business, and arresting messages professionally produced had staying power. It all added up to a cost-effective, impacting way to reach the market of the business.
In that example, outdoor worked best. For other businesses, other mediums will be the answer. Be certain to consider all options before committing dollars. Newspaper, radio, and TV are ones most people think of first. Push yourself harder. What about weekly papers in the area around a larger city? Direct mail? (Myriad forms of direct mail exist. It’s only junk mail if messages are bad and uninviting.) Targeted cable stations? E-blasts? Blogs? Podcasts?
Been There, Done That, Let’s Do It Again
Another self-assessment to sell shoes on a shoestring budget is to re-think marketing you’ve done forever “because we’ve done that forever.” For instance, does your company need a brochure just because your friend’s business has a brochure? Perhaps directing the brochure money to a Web site that’s kept up to date would be better. Would you be better to direct charitable ad dollars to the three of four entities where you see real impact instead of dispersing a little to 25? A common lament from small to mid-size business owners is, “I don’t do any advertising, yet I spend $10,000 on advertising. And nobody sees it.”
One memorable ad packs more wallop than 10 bland ads. You might feel good that your message is “safe.” Your market won’t feel anything.
In tandem with a professional, you’ll want to establish an annual marketing plan. That doesn’t mean you’re spending dollars every week of the year. It does mean that you know what you’re doing for the next 12 months. Your business might be a seasonal one requiring that the bulk of your budget be compressed into three months. By establishing an annual plan, you’ll control your budget better, avoid scampering at the last moment to pull together an ad to meet a deadline, and you’ll be able to say “no” easier to the multitudes who call on you for a piece of your marketing budget.
Always factor in PR/publicity to your annual plan. It’s free, but must be done correctly to be effective. Your marketing professional of choice ought to have capabilities in this area. It mainly takes a bit of old-fashioned hard thinking to determine what might be newsworthy or unique about your business, and then selling it to the media in a way that their readers or listeners will find interesting. Establish a PR calendar so you know which topics will be promoted when, and the deadlines you face.