For people to know who you are, what you have to sell and where they can find you requires you to do something very basic — you need to advertise.
Sounds relatively simple and once upon a time it used to be a little less complex than it is today. In its base form it involved the traditional mediums of print, broadcast, outdoor, direct mail and specialty products.
The ad world revolved around newspapers, magazines, television, radio, billboards, hand delivered flyers and those ubiquitous items such as pens, mugs and T-shirts.
While all of these media are still around and can play an integral role in an advertising campaign, the rise of new media has created tremendous opportunities to communicate with consumers. The key to becoming successful with using the new media is understanding how it works and who is most likely to use it.
To a great degree, choosing where to advertise or what medium to use is still a numbers game. Without going into too much detail, let’s take a look at the two most dominant social media sites, Facebook and Twitter.
According to Digitalbuzz, an online industry news source, Facebook has a worldwide user base of over 500 million while Twitter has just over 100 million. The female-to-male ratio is just about even but the largest age group users are different with Facebook’s largest user group falling in the 18 to 25 category while Twitter’s is 24 to 34.
In terms of usage, 41 per cent of Facebook users log in every day while only 27 per cent of Twitter users visit the site on a daily basis.
These numbers of course will change from region to region and town to town but the point being made is that it is still essential as a business owner or manager to try and get all the facts before making a decision on where you will place your advertising efforts.
With this influx of new media and more coming on stream in the near future, it is also essential that you develop the right media mix to get your message across.
Your choice of media will be determined by how well you know your customer base. Are they male or female, young or old, well established or just starting out?
The ability to integrate all the aspects of an advertising strategy still depends on your knowledge of the demographics in your target community.
While social media advertising is all the rage, as a business you cannot afford to put all your advertising dollars in the proverbial “one basket.” A good advertising campaign relies on a number of media to reach your selected target group.
Another important advertising concept to remember is the fact that research tells us that most people need to be reminded about your offer or even who you are at least seven times before they will make a decision. This seems to be human nature for these numbers have not changed since advertising research became common practice in the industry.
One last point about advertising that I will cover off and this relates to the message. Whatever you are selling your message must be consistent, clearly stated and above all memorable.
A good ad campaign should reflect not only the quality of your product or service but the very core of your business — what makes you different and why people should do business with you.
Perhaps the best way to illustrate this is to give you a test and see if you can identify the product or company mentioned in some famous ad campaigns: “A different kind of company. A different kind of car.”
“With a name like _______ it has to be good.”
“It just keeps going and going and going.”
How about a few from the past?
“The Greatest Show on Earth.”
“Nothing runs like a _____.”
“Good to the last drop,” which was first used in a 1915 ad campaign.
Joe Smith is a communications consultant and an accomplished fine artist living in the Comox Valley. He can be reached via e-mail at joesmith@shaw.ca.
