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STRATEGIC INSIGHT, INC. |
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| m a r k e t i n g c o n s u l t i n g |
PROMOTING YOUR BUSINESS |
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10 THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW
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Someone once described “Marketing”
as the function of “catching and keeping customers”. Advertising is one of the proven strategies for
“catching” customers. The
following 10 tips should help you to become a better “marketer” and to
“catch more customers”.
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The first step is to define your most likely customers. Are they consumers or
other businesses ? If consumers, what is their age, gender, marital status,
geographic location, religion, political affiliation, occupation, educational level, etc.
? If other businesses, what is their size, number of employees, industry, geographic
location, decision maker, etc. ? How are they different from the general population
? The more precise you can be in defining
your most likely customer, the easier it will be for you to refine your message and select
the appropriate media to reach them.
While the range of your most likely
customers may be very wide, you will probably learn that different sub-segments of your
target audience have different reasons (wants and needs) for buying your products or
services.
For example, some people buy cellular
phones because they want to be able to easily contact their clients or their office,
whereas, some people may buy a cellular phone primarily for security (for when their
vehicle breaks down on a lonely road in the middle of nowhere).
Some of your customers may want
“bigger, faster, stronger, more colorful”, while others may want “smaller,
easier to use, easier to store, more economical”.
Your customers’ different wants
& needs will affect what message you want to send them. |
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Your message
should include: “who” you are, “what” you do, and “why” the reader/listener should buy from you. Your message should also tell them what to do next
if they are interested in what you sell – the “call to action” (i.e., call
for more information, or place an order). Many media
channels (e.g., radio, tv, newspapers, etc.) will talk about their “reach”. By “reach” they are referring to the
total number of readers, listeners, etc. that read/listen to their broadcasts,
publications, etc. For example, with
newspapers and magazines, their “reach” is often defined by their total
circulation, or total number of subscribers.
Generally,
media with large audiences (a large “reach”) will charge higher rates for their
ads than other media with a smaller reach. But
be careful.
The key factor you want to consider is how many (what percentage)
of the media’s total “reach” are actually your target market ?
For example,
if you sell a product or service that is primarily purchased and/or used by females, an ad
in a “general circulation” newspaper with a total readership of 300,000 (males
and females) may not be as good a choice for
your ad message as a female-oriented newspaper or magazine with a total readership of
200,000 females. In the “general
circulation” newspaper, you will be spending (wasting) your ad dollars to reach
150,000 males (half the readership of the publication) who are not your target audience. The closer you can match a media’s total
“reach” to your own target audience, the more effectively and efficiently you
can invest your hard-earned ad dollars. |
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The term
“frequency” refers to the total number of times your ad runs in a
specific media and the length of time between each ad.
Many publications, broadcasters, etc. will offer discounted rates if you
purchase a higher frequency (more ads) during a specific time period. Many
businesses with limited advertising dollars will use a “flighting” schedule for
their ads. That is, they will run a series of
ads very close together (e.g., every week for 8 weeks) in order to quickly generate
awareness, then spread their remaining ads over a longer period of time (e.g., one ad
every 2 weeks, or one ad per month) in order to “maintain” their level of
awareness. This type of frequency pattern is
often used for time-related events (e.g., Valentine’s Day or Christmas), or for
special events (e.g., new product introductions).
People are
constantly bombarded by literally thousands of ad messages every day. They have developed a subconscious “filtering
system” to filter out most of these ads. You
must run your ads enough times in order to “break through” your customers’
awareness level. If not, all of your ad
dollars will have been wasted. A general
“rule of thumb” is that you must run the same ad at least 3 times before it will
begin to register with your audience. And,
depending upon your industry, your current market position, and your specific sales goals,
as a general guideline, you should devote 3% to 8% of your annual sales to your total
advertising and promotional budget. When buying
media, you’ll often hear the term “CPM”.
It stands for “cost per thousand”. It
is a mathematical formula that makes it easier to compare the cost of different media
channels. “CPM” is the total ad
cost divided by the total circulation (or listeners, if buying broadcast media) in
thousands. The lower the CPM, the lower it is
costing you to reach your audience.
For example,
an ad that costs $ 2,000 and reaches 80,000 people will have a CPM of $ 25.00 (i.e., 2,000
¸
80). This means it’s costing you $ 25.00 to reach
1,000 of their readers. An ad that costs only
$ 300, but reaches an audience of only 10,000 people will have a CPM of $ 30.00 (300
¸ 10), or a $ 5.00 higher CPM than the first choice of media. In this example, the first media choice is the better (more efficient) buy, if they have the same target audience as the
second media choice. |
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A
“salesforce” is represented by all those people (or things) that
“close” the sale. In some cases,
it may be the owner of the company. In other
cases, it may be a team of outside sales people who make face-to-face sales calls on
prospects and clients. It could be the people
who answer all incoming phone calls. Or, it could even be your mail order catalog or
flyers, or an outsourced telemarketing firm that actually prompt people to make a
purchase. The important thing for you to identify is
“who” is your sales force. Because,
after generating prospect inquiries, it is the next most important step of the buying
process. Whether it’s people, or things,
you must make the “closing” step of the process the most effective you can. This might require additional sales skills
training for your people, or it might require a “tune-up” of your ads, and other
marketing materials, by an outside professional.
There are 5
factors that can influence the impact of your ad. The
first is Size/Placement of your ad. Larger ads, of course, generally have more impact
(because they dominate the eye and have more room for persuasive text & graphics). Requesting placement of your ad so that it does
not compete with other ads (you want it surrounded by editorial) will also make your ad
stand out on the page. But, smaller ads can
also have significant impact if they contain the next 4 elements of a successful ad.
Graphics within an ad play an important role – they help to
grab the attention of the reader and they can help to explain a complicated concept or
deliver your message faster than text. Photos
of people draw the eye to an ad faster than any other type of graphic.
Ad Copy must be precise, persuasive, and point to a call for
action. You want to talk
“benefits”, not “features” in your ad copy. Don’t tell your prospects what size or speed
your product is – tell them how the size or speed will benefit them.
Including
“Special Offers” in your ads (e.g., “buy 3,
get the next 1 free”) help to create a sense of urgency (e.g., “offer expires
March 31”). Special Offers turn
prospects into customers more quickly. It
helps to persuade them to act now, rather than later. Finally,
your successful ad needs a “Call to Action”. That is, tell the reader/listener what they should
do next if they are interested in your product or service (e.g., “call for our free
report”, or “check out the details of our special offer on our web site at
…”).
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The key to
selecting the right media for your company is to match the qualities of each medium with
the Customer Profile you created in the first step.
For example, if you want to target adults, you wouldn’t want to advertise in a
magazine devoted to teenagers.
Radio is a tightly focused medium.
It is the most appropriate channel for your message if you sell a product or
service designed for a very specific audience (e.g., you’d want to advertise on a
Country & Western station if you sold western-style clothing).
Television can also
be a good medium (especially cable programming) if you want to reach a large, but
sub-segmented, portion of the general public. If
you want to reach businesses, a business-oriented newspaper or
magazine would be an ideal choice. If
you want to reach women, a women-oriented publication would
then be the right choice. Direct mail can be effective if you can tightly describe your
target market and can find a mailing list that closely matches your customer profile. While not recommended for most businesses,
Paying for space to have your product featured in a multi-brand mail
order catalog may be a good choice for your company if the reader profile is
appropriate. Finally, the Internet may be an excellent choice for you, especially if you want
to reach a national audience.
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