Advertise

Content

To step
Part 1 of 3: Planning the ad campaign
Part 2 of 3: Using internet advertising
Part 3 of 3: Using traditional advertising
Tips
Warnings

Advertising is essential to any successful business - but only if it is done effectively. Although it takes time and money, a good ad campaign will bring in more money than any other action. It's about making people familiar with your product or service, increasing sales and achieving brand loyalty. When it comes to advertising, there are many things to consider, but it can also be a fun process that gives your company the chance to show its creative side. This article will provide you with some general guidelines that can help you advertise your business effectively.

To step

Part 1 of 3: Planning the ad campaign

Know your audience. When it comes to effective advertising, knowing your audience is the most important thing. Think about it. The advertisement that a retired man is attracted to is very different from the one designed for teenage girls.
- If you don't know your audience, you will never be able to come up with an ad that sticks with them in any way. If you don't know your audience, much of the key market will be closed to your business as you pass unnoticed. Be smart with your advertising campaign, and tailor it specifically to your audience. Otherwise you are just throwing money away.
- The most important demographics to consider are gender and age. In terms of gender, you need to match the campaign to men, women or adults (if the number of men and women is roughly equal). When it comes to age, your customers usually fall within one or more of the standardized margins used by the advertising industry. These are as follows: 12-24, 8-34, 18-49, 25-54, or 50+.
- Know that the customer base can shift over time due to external factors (such as opening or closing similar businesses) and the changing age demographics of the local community. It's important to be aware of those shifts because your advertising needs must change with them.
Determine the target location. Once you've mapped the audience, the next step is to make sure the ads are properly placed so that they reach that audience.
- It could be that your ad is perfectly attuned to the target market, but if the location is not right it could just be that the audience will never see or hear the ad. A radio ad for adhesive paste probably doesn't work very well on a station where they play Top 40 music, while an ad focusing on teenage girl hair products is probably less effective in a newspaper.
- Think about where the target audience is likely to see the ad. Do not base the decision on your personal preferences. Don't advertise on the radio because you likes to listen to the radio; do not opt for online advertisements just because it is hip. Investigate and base your choice on the customers - and someone else.
- Know that there is not one type of advertising that is necessarily more effective than all others - this is illustrated by the fact that newspapers advertise on billboards, magazines on television, and radio stations on the Internet. It's about your potential customers using the medium you choose.
- Using this strategy will also give you value for money. If you place your ads in places you know your audience will see them, then you don't have to advertise anywhere else - and just hope the right people will see the ad. And that is why it is so important to be well informed about the target audience.
Draw up a budget. Your budget will obviously play a big role in the quality and distribution of the ad. There are not many companies (except for the large sample companies) that have an inexhaustible budget for their advertising campaigns. That's why it's important to think strategically about your ads and plan carefully - to get the most out of your money.
Keep in mind that advertising is essential to any successful business - even if you'd rather not spend your money on it. Maybe you deliver the best products or services in the world, but if no one knows, you won't make a cent.
- A well-designed and targeted ad will allow your business to grow - advertising has no equal. Therefore, spend as much money as you can afford on your advertising campaign. Think of it as an investment. The initial costs may be high, but the returns (in terms of new customers and potential sales) will be more than worth that investment. When it comes to advertising, you have to spend money to make money.
- Incidentally, this kite only applies to good advertising campaigns. Above all, bad campaigns plunder your bank account, and you will never see that investment again. It is therefore vital to research and invest time in creating a great advertisement.
Think of a company image. Brand recognition among potential customers is one of the main goals of advertising. This is because market research has shown time and again that customers are much more likely to choose products and services that they know, than less well-known or brand-less alternatives.
- When you set up an advertising campaign for your company, product or service, it is therefore important to create a simple yet eye-catching image that customers recognize immediately.
- When you think of a company image, think of the "look and feel" of their ads. Depending on the type of ad, these include things like the colors used, the fonts, the music, and / or the spokespersons / celebrities representing the company.
- For a great image it is therefore important to come up with a recognizable logo, a good slogan or a catchy jingle. This way, customers can immediately associate them with your brand. Consider, for example, McDonald's golden “M”, Coca-Cola's Santa Claus advertisement, or L'Oreal's slogan, “Because you're worth it.” These things today are synonymous with the companies who invented them, and are therefore worth their weight in gold.
- It is not only important to come up with a great image, but it is also important to deal with it consistently. All advertisements must have the same look and feel, regardless of the medium.
- If you continuously experiment with different images, you will confuse your customers. The chance of brand loyalty will also be limited. Come up with a unique, easily recognizable image and stick with it.
Think about your message. The message your ad conveys can make or break the campaign. A good advertisement will bring in potential customers from the start, and hold their attention long enough to convince them that Company X's product is a lot better / tastier than Company Y's.
- Emphasize your competitive advantage. Make sure that the message behind your ad draws attention to the benefits of purchasing your product or service, and that competitors cannot provide those benefits. Too many advertisements and commercials focus mainly on the visual aspect or on humor; and fail to convey compelling arguments for why their product or service is the best.
- Avoid advertising clichés. Your advertising must be unique. If the ad looks like a hundred other ads, the customer will lose attention and you will lose a potential customer. It is therefore important to avoid worn-out clichés. Consider, for example, prices ending in ".95" or ".99" using "Our world famous products ..." and "Now temporarily 50% discount ...". Also avoid content that has nothing to do with the product.
Don't try to please everyone. To please everyone, the message of the ad would be rather bland and noncommittal. That approach hardly ever works. Think again about your target audience and use your advertising to convey a message specifically aimed at them.
- The message of the ad should appeal to the customer on a personal level. This can be done in two ways: by responding to emotional concerns and the heart of the customer; or by entertaining the customer with something you think appeals to their sense of humor.
- Consider, for example, the advertising campaigns of Ax. Ax tries to sell young men as many body sprays, shower gels, and deodorants as possible.The brand is so successful because it conveys a message that is precisely tailored to the desire of the target group - “if you use our products you will get all the hot girls”. Ax doesn't mind that women and married men don't like their products; they are the market leader in deodorants for boys from twelve to twenty-four.
- Another, quite different example of emotional advertising is ads for cleaning products that address the fears of mothers (and fathers) of very young children and babies. These advertisements emphasize the products' ability to “protect” families from bacteria and germs. The underlying message is: if you are a good parent who cares about the safety and health of his / her children, then buy this cleaning product.
- This type of advertising, while somewhat manipulative, can be very effective for the target audience. However, people without children, or just about anyone under their twenties, won't be that impressed. You have to be willing to make these kinds of sacrifices.
Test the commercial for you throwing out into the world. Before launching the ads out into the world, it is wise to have them tested. This way you can be sure that your audience will understand and appreciate the advertising.
- Although it takes time and money, putting together a focus group is extremely useful. This way you can get feedback on your advertising. You can ask the group members about the ad: whether they liked it, whether it appealed to them, what they liked about it, what they didn't like about it, etc.
- This can help you determine if the ad is ready to send, if it needs some tweaking, or if the ad should go all the way back to the drawing board. You can also collect feedback by means of questionnaires.
- Even if the ad has already appeared, you should do your best to monitor customer responses. This doesn't have to be too difficult. All you need to do is ask new customers where they heard about your business. When they submit your new ad, you know it works.
- You can also ask them more focused questions about what they liked about the ad and which elements caught their attention. If they criticize, consider it constructive. Consider the suggestions of your customers in your next ad.
- Even if you have placed the ad through multiple media, you can ask customers for feedback. This way you can find out which medium (printed media, television, internet, radio) has the highest return. In subsequent advertisements you can then allocate more budget to the most profitable media.

Part 2 of 3: Using internet advertising

Make a great website. Creating a great website is the most important and effective way to advertise your business online. A professional looking, informative website can work wonders because websites are easily accessible by customers. A website is also relatively cheap to make or have made and managed. In addition, the company will appear a lot more legitimate with a good website.
- Once you have a website, you can print the url anywhere - on the business cards, on the shop window, on the company car, anywhere. Put the url in all places where customers can see it quickly. Nowadays almost everyone has a smartphone, so people can visit you on the spot!
- If you provide tangible goods, consider selling those directly from the website as well. Online shopping is an incredibly large market, and it can provide a huge boost to sales.
- To make the whole process even easier, and not worry about shipping and handling, you can partner up with an Amazon Store that will take care of all that for you. All you have to do is place a link to your products on your website.
- It is also important to work on SEO (search engine optimization) or search engine optimization. This way, as many people as possible will end up on your website when they search for certain search terms on Google or other search engines. This increases the visitor traffic to your site.
Make use of social media. The use of social media is a must if you want to advertise your company - after all, we live in the twenty-first century. Focus on the big four: Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and Instagram.
- Facebook, Twitter and Instagram all have three a lot users, which increases your reach a lot. Google+ allows you to display your business profile in local search results, hopefully outpacing direct competition.
- If you are very handy, or can afford to hire someone who specializes in social media marketing, you can reap the benefits of other social media as well. Think for example of Tumblr, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Reddit and other more localized sites such as Yelp, FourSquare and Level Up.
- Keep in mind that you mainly use social media to strengthen the bond with your (potential) customers. This way they can familiarize themselves with your products and / or services. Do not use social media to bombard your followers with commercials and advertisements; if you do, they will start rating your account as spam, and you will quickly lose followers and likes.
- You should, of course, use your social media accounts to advertise special offers and promotions - that's the main reason people start following you at all. You can even create special “Facebook only” offers, where customers get a special offer or discount in exchange for a “like”!
- In addition, you should try to use social media as a way to maintain personal contact with your customers. Be interactive: ask questions, provide responses, and try to take customer feedback and suggestions to heart. This can help you establish brand loyalty among your followers - which is important for any business.
Reap the benefits of blogging. Blogging is another branch of social media that can be used as an extremely effective form of advertising. You can of course post articles and advertisements on your own company's blog, but it's also a good idea to forward articles to other bloggers in your industry. Ask them to post the articles on their sites as well.
- Since these blogs already have a loyal readership that trusts the content on the site, the readers will be a lot more likely to read your pieces. As a result, you can tap into a completely new market that would otherwise never belong to your company.
- The articles you write for the blog posts should be interesting and informative. If it only contains open commercials urging readers to “buy our products now!”, Readers will not take the article seriously and will likely skip it.
- Articles must have a purpose. They should stimulate discussion and provoke thoughts. For example, consider writing about the successes and failures of your business, think about user manuals for your products, or write about interactions with customers, including funny anecdotes.
- Another strategy is to send individual bloggers samples of your products and ask them to review those products on their blog. This is a bit more risky, because you have no influence on what the blogger will write. But if you are sure that the blogger will like the product and he / she will write a positive review, this could be excellent advertisement. That's because people are more likely to believe an independent reviewer than an advertisement from a company. Many cosmetics companies have been extremely successful using this strategy.
Buy Internet Ads. Buying advertising space online is a great way to communicate your company's name and image. It can also attract a huge amount of users to your website with a single click of the mouse. While it can be quite pricey to buy a lot of ad space, there are also several ways smaller businesses can reduce their costs:
- Google Adwords is one of the best ways to advertise relatively cheaply. With Google Adwords, your ads will appear on Google search pages, on Gmail accounts, and on Google's partner sites such as AOL. Best of all, Adwords works on a “pay-per-click” basis - you only pay for the ad when someone clicks on it, making it a win-win situation for you and Google.
- Google Adwords Express is a newer service that focuses your ads more specifically on the people in your area who are looking for search terms related to your products / services. Even if they don't click on the ad, they will see your ad. This increases the “exposure”, and your brand becomes better known in your area - and you don't have to pay a cent for that!
- Banner Swapping is another service offered by several companies (such as 123Banners). Banner swapping costs you nothing at all. All you need to do is post a banner ad from a partner company on your own website. In return, they do the same for you.
- Before entering into an agreement, you must ensure that you maintain control over the type of ads that appear on your website. Of course you don't want ads for viagra pills on your supposedly child-friendly website!

Part 3 of 3: Using traditional advertising

Opt for print ads. Print ads, such as those in newspapers or magazines, are the more traditional form of advertising - yet it can still generate a lot of customers
- With print ads, visual appeal is most important. An ad with only words will not grab the reader's attention; the ad is also surrounded by patches and even more pieces of text.
- When it comes to print ads, digital photography and artwork are your best bet. Thanks to the high resolutions of cameras and software like Photoshop, these types of ads can be more visually engaging than ever today.
- The concept of the ad is also extremely important. The idea should linger with the readers, and should be instantly recognizable when people come across it.
- While the ads you place in newspapers and magazines may be the same, there are some differences in the way the ads are perceived in different media. So carefully weigh the pros and cons before making a choice.
- Newspapers are usually read only once and then thrown away. So you only have one chance to get the reader's attention. In addition, advertisements in the newspaper are especially effective with people who are currently in the market for something; the ads are usually ignored by people who are not. Newspapers, however, reach a large audience, and are perfect if you want to target people in specific locations.
- Advertisements in magazines are extremely effective and ideal for addressing a specific group of consumers. That's because magazines exist for just about any market - such as gardening, cooking, football, lifestyle, etc. Magazine advertising space can be incredibly pricey. It could just be that advertising in magazines deprives you of the opportunity to advertise elsewhere.
Try television commercials. Anyone who ever watches TV knows the convincing powers of television commercials.
- Commercials on TV are especially successful because they can combine visual appeal with music and the spoken word. Thus, these advertisements can be both memorable and informative. In addition, the commercials are often broadcast in the commercial breaks between your favorite programs, and are therefore almost impossible to ignore!
- In television advertising you can choose between regional and national television. Both forms bring advantages, but the choice will mainly depend on the advertising budget.
- Advertisements on the regional channels are a lot cheaper than advertisements on a national level. This way you can run the ad more often, and you will get more exposure. It is also easy to focus your advertising on specific geographic locations - for example, you can run the advertisements on the regional and local television channels in your area. The disadvantage of these commercials is that they often look like they were made by themselves, on a not too high budget.
- Advertisements at a national level usually look a lot more professional, which enhances the legitimacy and prestige of your company. Naturally, national advertisements are a lot more expensive than regional ones. On national TV, however, you can address a specific customer base by matching your advertising to psychographic data.
- For example, if you advertise a fashion magazine, you can broadcast your advertisements in the commercial breaks of Goede Tijden, Bad Tijden; or run your commercials for animal feed right after the Cesar Milan broadcast. This way you can save money by only broadcasting the ads when they will have the most impact.
Make use of billboards and outdoor advertising. It may sound crazy, but billboards and other types of outdoor advertising (such as those at bus stops, posters, etc.) can be incredibly effective - if done properly.
- In fact, billboards reach more people per euro spent than any form of advertising. This can be explained by two facts. First, most billboards are next to busy highways. Second, most people spend (on average) more than 20 hours a week in the car. This gives billboard ads enough time to get noticed by potential customers.
- The disadvantage of billboards is that you are somewhat limited in the freedom of choice of the content. Effective billboard ads typically consist of no more than a single image and no more than eight words of text.
- However, this can also be positive, as it forces you to get creative. You're forced to come up with something that catches the eye and gets straight to the point.
Advertise on the radio. After billboards, radio has the best price-range ratio.
- Unlike the other advertising formats described, radio advertising cannot use visual images or text. As a result, you need to get a little more creative with your ads, and use things like jingles and slogans more.
- Radio advertising can provide more information about your business than most other types of advertising. So see them as an opportunity to tell your customers about your company and as an opportunity to convince them of your products or services.
- Humor always thrives on the radio, but don't overdo it. Make sure the advertising is always relevant. A funny radio ad is great, but if the humor isn't focused on your company, the listeners will be confused - they won't have a clue true the ad is actually ahead of it. Especially if there are no images or brand logos that can provide context.
- The disadvantage of radio advertising is that it is difficult to target the ads specifically to a particular geographic location, or to a specific demographic audience. As a result, companies with delivery services and those for which customers are willing to drive a long way fare better on the radio, such as antique and furniture stores.
Make use of flyers and postcards. Using flyers and postcards is probably the most old-fashioned way of advertising, but it can still be extremely effective - especially if you're promoting your business locally. You can give the flyers to people on the street, and you can send the postcards to nearby business addresses.
- Make sure that the flyers and postcards look attractive, that they are easy to understand, and that they offer a certain reward - such as an offer or discount. For example, you can give a 10% discount to people who hand over the flyer in the store.
- These rewards don't even have to be monetary. If you run a store that sells personal care products, your flyers can be a voucher for a free hand massage with every purchase. It's meant to get more people into your store - once they're there, you're more likely to sell them something!
- Make sure the person handing out the flyers is friendly and approachable. They must be knowledgeable about the company and be able to answer questions about the products. Anyone who receives a flyer is a potential customer!