The advertising strategies that not one
UK agency in a hundred understand...
Business facts for effective advertising:
1) Effective advertising campaigns begin by demanding the reader's attention.
2) Your advertising has only got 5 seconds maximum to capture your prospect's interest.
3) Often it's even less! Just one or two seconds.
Before you've even been noticed, your prospect turns the page. So in this short space of time, you must capture your prospects' interest, or your advertising investment will inevitably produce a ZERO RETURN.
So whether you're a seasoned advertiser in trade magazines, the local newspaper, or just once a year in the Yellow Pages this advice is critical to your business. Lets begin…
The key to profitable advertising for your company
In order to get the most from this article, go grab a copy of your current advert. If you haven't got one at hand, don't worry; open up any magazine you happen to have on your desk.
Now, tell me what you see. Actually STOP RIGHT THERE, I already know what you're going to say. You're looking at an ‘image and awareness' ad. What I mean is that it's got an inward focus that shouts about the company or product, and what it does (i.e. its features). As a result, it fails to describe the benefits or results the prospect will enjoy when they own your product or service.
Indeed, virtually 99% of advertisements I see are institutional, and are losing their owners thousands of pounds every day. They are simply a cost with no prospect of ever generating any form of return.
Business Owners, Marketing Directors and Managers will try to defend this type of advertising by saying “ah, but we are just trying to maintain awareness of our company in the marketplace, so when somebody is ready to buy they know about us”. This is a hugely wasteful form of marketing, as I will explain.
Forget everything you've ever been told about
advertising and listen to some expert advice
Advertising is not about creating an image or awareness. It's about selling stuff. Brand awareness simply means I have heard of your product or service but it doesn't mean I trust you, or I'm going to buy from you.
Given that, it's a mystery why publications are full of what I call ‘we are the greatest' ads. As uncomfortable as this may sound, nobody really cares about how great your company is. A prospective buyer - for the most part - only cares about how your products and services will make their life better.
Everyone else, including your prospects and clients, are also preoccupied with themselves. Frankly they don't care much about what you have, or what you do, or what you know. In fact, they're downright indifferent about you.
Now can you see why the majority of magazine, newspaper and trade press advertisements fail to have any impact on your prospects, and consequently any effect on your sales?
Do your ads answer the prospect's question “what's in it for me?” If so, you will - at the very least - have an opportunity to win their business. If not, they will already have turned the page.
How to recognise if your advertising is institutional
Institutional advertising is advertising that doesn't directly ask for a specific response. It is characterised by ads that either have the company name or a glib play on words as the headline at the top of the ad. Very little copy appears on the page, only a list of products or services provided by the company. There is no incentive to call now, etc.
Advertising is the salesmanship of goods and services through media. However, institutional or image adverts don't directly try to educate prospects or sell products or make specific offers. What business can afford to pay a salesman who doesn't sell products or even ask for the order? These types of adverts only produce results for the media and the representatives who sell you space.
You must change your mindset from GETTING TO GIVING
Just think about how your own mind works when you are in the market to buy something. Say you want a new television or car or holiday, or you need to hire a new accountant or plumber. Suddenly you want as much information as possible.
You become a sponge for relevant facts or figures about the product or service. You consciously or sub-consciously make comparisons, evaluate your options and consider the worse case scenario before you can make an educated decision.
So use all the space available to you to talk to your customers. Ironically, you will create more ‘brand awareness', a higher ‘company profile' or greater ‘trade presence' as a side effect of running informative ‘what's in it for the reader' advertisements that educate, inform and persuade the reader to take some form of direct action.
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Marketing Common-Sense You haven't got money to burn. Creating awareness and building brand values can be done as a consequence of following a direct response strategy that generates sales. You spend virtually no time talking about what you do or what you know. (Remember, prospects don't care about this). Instead, learn about what they need and what problems they want solving. Instead of pushing people away, they will be attracted to you in droves because you have something they want – the promise of a solution that works. Give your prospect or customer enough of your full sales story in your advertising to compel him or her to take action and inquire about, or buy whatever it is you are selling. |
If you're serious about growing your business, you now know the single most important change you should make to your advertising strategy.
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