Marketing Strategies - How to Stop Wasting Money on Advertising
Sunday, November 24, 2013
Small businesses often have limited advertising budgets relative to larger corporations. Therefore, you can't afford to waste dollars on ineffective or inefficient ads. No company is ever going to operate a completely foolproof plan with zero waste. However, a few critical steps can improve your overall investment in advertising.
Research
It may seem counterintuitive to invest time and money to research when your goal is to minimize ad expenditures. However, the time and money spent upfront on ad research can put you in a better position to understand your customers and develop products,services and ad messages that have greater impact. Knowing what customers want from your brand helps you develop messages that appeal to their particular buying motives in an influential way.
Target Discrete Markets
You can't be all things to all people, especially as a small business. You have to identify particular customer market segments that your business and solutions best appeal to in a way that can generate profit. Your primary target market is the segment of customers that would spend top dollar on the products and services that you specialize in selling. Identifying targeted customers also allows you to better select media that customers use for efficient message delivery.
Assess the Results
To continually reduce your wasted ad expenditures, you need to track ad messages that attract customers most effectively to your business. You can ask customers when they first visit your store or website how they heard about your company. As you discover which advertising strategies and messages work the best, you can focus more of your ad dollars in those approaches and eliminate or minimize investments in less effective approaches.
Get Discounts
One of the more straight-forward ways to save money on advertising is to look for discount opportunities just as consumers do. Many media providers offer discounts of 10 to 15 percent when you submit an ad well ahead of the deadline. Magazines, for instance, offer discounts because early submission gives them more flexibility in layout. You can also buy ads in bulk once you know what works. Buying in bulk or paying in advance for several months or a year can lead to discounts relative to single or limited timeframe purchases.
Tags:
Marketing, Marketing Strategies
Research
It may seem counterintuitive to invest time and money to research when your goal is to minimize ad expenditures. However, the time and money spent upfront on ad research can put you in a better position to understand your customers and develop products,services and ad messages that have greater impact. Knowing what customers want from your brand helps you develop messages that appeal to their particular buying motives in an influential way.
Target Discrete Markets
You can't be all things to all people, especially as a small business. You have to identify particular customer market segments that your business and solutions best appeal to in a way that can generate profit. Your primary target market is the segment of customers that would spend top dollar on the products and services that you specialize in selling. Identifying targeted customers also allows you to better select media that customers use for efficient message delivery.
Assess the Results
To continually reduce your wasted ad expenditures, you need to track ad messages that attract customers most effectively to your business. You can ask customers when they first visit your store or website how they heard about your company. As you discover which advertising strategies and messages work the best, you can focus more of your ad dollars in those approaches and eliminate or minimize investments in less effective approaches.
Get Discounts
One of the more straight-forward ways to save money on advertising is to look for discount opportunities just as consumers do. Many media providers offer discounts of 10 to 15 percent when you submit an ad well ahead of the deadline. Magazines, for instance, offer discounts because early submission gives them more flexibility in layout. You can also buy ads in bulk once you know what works. Buying in bulk or paying in advance for several months or a year can lead to discounts relative to single or limited timeframe purchases.
