Advertise Small Business

Small business advertising shouldn’t be done like most of the

admin — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 04:29:39 +0000

Small business advertising shouldn't be done like most of the advertising you see on T.V. ... or hear on the radio. There ARE exceptions, of course. But for the most part, small businesses shouldn't do much of the following:
1) Institutional advertising (a.k.a. "Madison Avenue" type advertising).
2) Public relations or simply publicity seeking.
3) Any type of response advertising that's non-measurable.
The kind of advertising you SHOULD be doing is measurable. By this I mean you can ...
a) ... control costs.
b) ... measure results.
Small business advertising that doesn't fit these criteria is mostly like throwing money down a hole. (Like I said, there are exceptions. But if you try to promote your business using public relations you'd better have a business that can benefit from that ...plus get the help of a professional who specializes in it.)
Institutional ... Madison Avenue type stuff ... doesn't work in small business advertising any more than it effectively works for big companies using it. It's just that big companies typically have big budgets they can spend on bad advertising without going under financially.
That's a luxury most of us don't have.
Direct marketing is different. You can control its costs. Taylor it to your ad budget. And measure its effectiveness based on response to the offer in the ad or sales letter.
Examples of response triggers used in effective small business advertising include:
* Phone calls asking for a direct response ... like a sales appointment ... or a purchase ... or an invitation to come into the store with a certain customer "code" one can use to receive a gift or purchase discount.
* A TV or radio commercial that asks for a direct response ... like having the customer write or call in and tell what station they heard the ad on to get a free gift or special discount.
* Any type of media that asks for a direct response ... like redeemable coupons sent through the mail ... a sales letter send through the post or Email, with an invitation attached for a special "after hours" sale ... a postcard offering a 2 for 1 restaurant special ... or an invitation to call in and ask for free information.
Your small business advertising is going to be very wasteful unless you make the right offers to the right people. Being in tune with the needs, desires and motivations of your potential customers is crucial.
For example ... if Jack's Sporting Goods store advertises a 30% discount sale on all golf equipment by sending 5,000 brochures through the mail to nearby residents the waste-factor is going to be extremely high.
After all, how many of those residents are golfers? Probably only a small percentage. And of those who are golfers, how many of them will come in for Jack's sale?
In this case, most of his small business advertising dollars are wasted.
However ... if Jack takes that same offer ... and sends it directly to 500 golfers in his area the response will be much higher. He's able to get the names and addresses of likely golfers from a list broker by renting the names of people in his area who receive golf magazines.
See the difference?
Jack doesn't even have to mail out all 500 letters at once. If his budget is a little tight, he can stagger his mailing over a period of days. Or even limit the sale to those bringing in a coupon received through his mailing to test the effectiveness of his direct mail campaign.
Any small business advertising failing to ...
* offer a free gift(s)
* give a time limit on the offer so buyers will be motivated to act quickly
* award a bonus or premium of some sort just for coming into the store
* present a sale or discounted pricing
* announce something new (i.e., product, service, price)
... should be avoided. As a matter of fact ... the more of these elements in your advertising the better.
An ad containing each of the above ingredients ... targeting prospects known to be interested in the product/service... stands a very good chance of being a winner.
Your small business advertising doesn't have to fail. Once you learn the key ingredients you'll never again worry about throwing advertising dollars away.

If you want to effectively market your small business, you

admin — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 08:39:23 +0000

If you want to effectively market your small business, you need to follow six simple steps. They are as follows: f you want to effectively market your small business, you need to follow six simple steps. They are as follows:
Rule 1: Make your message very straightforward.
Just concentrate on what you want to say with your advertisement. If you overload your ad with all your ideas, it'll be a jumbled mess. If you can get your message across in the first 3 seconds of your advertisement, you can pull in your target audience and get them to follow you.
Rule 2: Don't exaggerate your accomplishments and abilities.
Many people have come to fear advertisements or the idea of them. Your clients might be wary of any advertisement you put in front of them. If you even look dishonest, they will shut you down right away. Don't claim things that don't seem realistic or feasible, even if you think you can do them. Don't try any sort of wise guy advertising games, as your audience will notice.
Rule 3: Test, Test, Test
If you don't have a lot of money to work with, don't put forth effort on something that might not work. Get plenty of testing and research done before you spend a penny on production, so you can find out if it'll work or not. Just ask people who have heard about your product how they heard about it, and focus your attempts on that arena.
Rule 4: Tell Them How To Get It
No matter what you use to advertise, whether it's stills or video, make sure that there's something in the advertisement that will tell your audience how to contact you or your company for your services or product. While this may seem very obvious, you may be shocked to know how many people don't enter their contact information in the ad.
Rule 5: Target your demographics with appropriate content.
Not only will you not waste materials on things that your target audience doesn't care about, you can make sure that it's exactly what they want. Make sure that the message is geared toward the people you want to reach.
Rule 6: Make your customers want more after the ad.
Don't completely sell the product with your ad. All you need to do with is is pique people's interest, so they are inspired to learn more. All successful ads do this.
Each of these six rules follow one facet of advertising: the message is paramount to any advertising campaign, so work on it before anything else. Keep your message simple, and you'll get more successful customer conversions from people who know what you're about and want to learn more.

Small business advertising seems to change in some important way

admin — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 18:35:23 +0000

Small business advertising seems to change in some important way almost every week. As the economy remains tight, making smart choices about advertising becomes increasingly important. The rate of technological change, and the increasing affordability of electronic devices, continually alters the advertising landscape.
Smart small business advertising must weigh in the balance a number of considerations before locking into a plan. These include:
The struggle of print media to remain viable
The continuing popularity and importance of social media
The proliferation of new communication devices
The equally rapid proliferation of new ways of communicating with these devices
The growing importance of video
The shift from such traditional standards as the Yellow Pages to online search
These are only a few of the changes businesses must learn to deal with when planning marketing and sales efforts. At the very least, smart small business advertising today must include far more than traditional advertising, even if the ads are moved from print to electronic media.
What is Smart for Small Businesses Advertising Today?
In the digital age, smart small businesses' advertising must invest the time in understanding the advertising and marketing channels available today. Even more important, they must learn what makes these new channels different, how they are used differently, and which channels are most likely to reach their target customers. Then they must make choices and decisions about how to use each channel most effectively and most cost-efficiently to meet their goals. These are the critical tasks in smart advertising.
The flat space ads used in newspapers and magazines will attract only limited attention online unless it is very special. Today's ads need to move and speak and interact with potential customers. Even a banner ad on a website really needs to do more than just sit there. Small business advertising has changed in important and far-reaching ways.
Smart small business advertising must also note that a website must also be more than a three or four page brochure. Every page must be designed and written to grab the attention of the visitor in as little as 1.5 seconds, or that visitor is gone. Every page has a job to do. Moving people from page to page until they are asked to make a decision is what converts a visitor into a sales lead.
If you operate a brick-and-mortar store, you have the opportunity to take advantage of some very exciting small business advertising tactics to get people into your store, but you must figure out not only the right message and the right offer, but also the right medium, the right device and the platform used by that device. You need to be ready to use location-based email and on-the-spot coupons and special offers delivered by text message when someone is outside your store or in a place where your beverage is served.
What is smart for small business advertising today is discovering the right mix of lead generation tactics, the right amount of advertising, the right focus on providing information and benefits your target market wants, and keeping everything within the budget. When you find the people who can do each of those things for you will be ready to construct a viable advertising campaign.

If you want to effectively market your small business, you

admin — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 17:19:38 +0000

For the small businessman, notoriety and name recognition are two

admin — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 01:14:56 +0000

For the small businessman, notoriety and name recognition are two sides of the same indispensable coin to success. Print and television sources are your best options for those first initial advertising excursions. Avoid the all-too-common mistake of over-selling your product or service and instead treat the first ad spot as an introduction to your company- not as an "all-or-nothing" proposition.
When first starting out, it is wise to begin advertising your product in your area via media outlets such as local newspapers and public access television. These types of advertising outlets do not come back with big, immediate returns but are necessary to making your company appear legitimate. What separates a well-run hardware store that fails from a mediocre hardware store with longevity is that fact that the successful company has found a way to convince the consumer that they have what they are looking for. This is not to suggest that you should spend less time perfecting your product and more time advertising, but it is definitely important to realize that not only are you selling a service, a product or an idea, but you are in the market of symbols as well, and symbols are extremely persuasive.
For your first time advertising in a print publication, stick with something simple that introduces your company and your guiding marketing concept. The guiding marketing concept can be anything from a particular attitude to a logo or slogan. Since you are not seeking to create a national brand at this step, you should stick to focusing on just one aspect of the ad that you want to play up with slick marketing tactics. Readers and consumers will not be swayed by overuse of logos, slogans, and attitude for a company that they are unfamiliar with. Instead, treat your first entry into the world as advertising as you might treat an introduction to a friend at a party; you would not immediately tell a new acquaintance everything about your life history, likewise do not employ every marketing tactic in your initial advertisement.
Your first advertisement in a print or televised medium should not be your one and only ad, it should instead set the stage for a series of advertisements. Now, as a small business you are certainly not in the position to be stretching for expensive ad campaigns and building an "audience" for your product or service, but you should not neglect the fact that two or three successive advertisements in a series can be more persuasive as a "story" of your company far more than a single ad can. With a single ad as an introduction, you need not worry about encapsulating everything about your company that you want to advertise, instead, treat this first advertisement as an opening handshake or opening pitch. In baseball, the pitcher sets up the batter he is facing not by repeatedly throwing his same, best pitch, but by creating a series of pitches to keep the hitter off balance and achieve strikes. Such is the method that you should employ for your ad campaign.
Keep your first advertisements simple and try to put your company in a position to build on the notoriety and respect you gain in those initial print and television spots. You need not spend too much money in advertising and need not plan on making an extensive series of ads so long as you can effectively "tell the story" of your company through a small number of ads.

When times get tough for small businesses there are a

admin — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 17:15:41 +0000

When times get tough for small businesses there are a few things that the owner can do to reduce cost. There are so many costs in your business that are fixed costs, like your rent, phone bill, inventory, and your employee labor cost. There are only a few areas in which you really has any control over and they are the owner's salary and advertising cost.
Now, nobody wants to make less money so usually one of the first expenses that gets reduced, or sometimes even cut out, is advertising cost. When you see your revenues dropping the most common reaction is to reduce, or even cancel, planned advertising. This is usually a big mistake. Without an aggressive advertising program attracting new customers your small business revenues will drop even further.
But you have to be smart about how you spend your advertising budget. High cost media sources like television, radio, and even some print media can be effective, but they tend to not give you the biggest return on your advertising dollar. There are more cost effective ways to spend your ad budget in areas like Online Pay-Per-Click with the larger search engines on the internet.
Also, if you don't have a website for your business this would be a good time to expand your online presence. If your business is really small then maybe instead of a website you could start a free blog from Blogger.com or WordPress.com and tell people about what you have to offer. Social marketing can be an inexpensive way of reaching new customers and letting them know the services or products that are offered by your small business.
Since reducing advertising cost during business down turns is a common reaction from most small business owners then it is more than likely your competition will be cutting their advertising budget giving you an open door to attract new customers and gain market share for your business.
Going against the trend is not an easy thing to do, but if you can do it you will see rewards while other are wondering what happened to their small business.

Options are often limited when it comes to advertising for

admin — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 04:40:15 +0000

Options are often limited when it comes to advertising for small businesses. Consider a large company that has a relatively large advertising budget: several different mediums are available for them to explore, including radio, television commercials, product placements, print ads in magazines, and so on. Small businesses that have a very limited advertising budget do not even have some of these as options at all, simply because they do not have enough sales and volume to reach that kind of scale. And yet there is still a need for them to advertise and get the word out about their products or services.
The marketing director for a small business needs to work with whatever limitations are imposed in this situation. This might mean that they will end up doing local advertising for much cheaper rates than what could be done at a national level. Or, they might look into internet advertising and either putting together a company website or possibly paying for traffic from search engines through pay-per-click. This is an especially enticing option because you can simply buy as much traffic and business as you want for yourself, and if it is not profitable, then you can change the keywords that you are bidding on until it becomes profitable.
In this way a small business can generally advertise as much or as little as they want to and get themselves more work as it is needed. Internet advertising is thus flexible enough to accommodate a small company that is scaling up in growth, while at the same time be able to provide as much traffic as they need in order to stay busy and stay profitable.

Many people get into business having a very good understanding

admin — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 05:34:19 +0000

Many people get into business having a very good understanding of a product or service, yet have no idea how to actually market it.
Over the last several years, I've sold advertising for a small publisher in Georgia. It has never ceased to amaze me the reaction that small business owners have to an advertising salesman.
In reality, small business owners should embrace the very people that help to promote their business. That does not mean that small businesses should always take every opportunity presented, however there is a great advantage to taking a moment and getting to know your advertising salespeople.
For those business people that have a small business and are looking for some creative ideas to advertise without having to spend much, I'll outline a short list for you.
#1) Your business card is one of the most overlooked advertising mediums that you can use. Invest in some really good color business cards that can be purchased online for less than you can normally buy them locally. Your business card ends up in many places and it makes a big impression in small places.
#2 Don't buy phone book cover ads. Phone book cover ads are a ripoff. They are typically sold by a telemarketer on the phone promising to put you on 10,000 phone books in the area. The truth is that the phone book covers rarely ever get used.
#3 Invest in restaurant menu advertising. You can advertise your small business in restaurant menus very inexpensively and the cost per impression is very inexpensive. Restaurant menu advertising is one of the best methods that a small business can use to get cost effective advertising.
#4 Co-op a flyer. Have a business next door or across town that is not a competitor, however you wouldn't mind sharing some advertising space with? Have them agree to share ad space on a printed flyer to be distributed around town. This works really well to get your flyer placed on checkout counters that might otherwise frown on a single advertiser flyer.
#5 Invest in hotel directory advertising. This is a low cost, effective way to get your business known to new people in the area.
There you have it, a few ways that a small business can save money on advertising and still get great local exposure.

You must have heard ’bout Dan Kennedy, the famous guru

admin — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 06:49:29 +0000

You must have heard 'bout Dan Kennedy, the famous guru of small business marketing and advertisement. Go ask your neighbor Tom, an established online home-based small business entrepreneur, and he will recite you the whole life story of the famous Dan Kennedy.
Anyway, just so you know, this is what his website says about him:
"Dan S. Kennedy is the provocative, truth-telling author of seven popular No B.S. books, thirteen business books total; a serial, successful, multi-millionaire entrepreneur; trusted marketing advisor, consultant and coach to hundreds of private entrepreneurial clients running businesses from $1-million to $1-billion in size; and he influences well over 1-million independent business owners annually through his newsletters, tele-coaching programs, local Chapters and Kennedy Study Groups meeting in over 100 cities, and a network of top niche consultants in nearly 150 different business and industry categories and professions."
So, what Dan says about small business advertisement and marketing is that you have got to possess three factors to succeed:

Right Message
Right Market
Right Media
Explaining on the above points, you should always throw the right message. Sometimes, the message is too factual or unoriginal. Remember, it is advertisement, and neither slipping your business card into someone's pocket or shouting your product's name at the top of your voice (that might be an interesting idea though!).
You got to get original and learn to think the unique selling point (USP) of your product or service. You have to understand why a customer would want to buy your service, why you are special for him. Remember, your sales copy sells!
Secondly, you have to target the right market. Some people just don't want to buy. Some people just want something else for their problem. You have to understand your competition, your audience and your own stand. Remember, you should always stand out from your competition and should cater to the need of your market. If you are selling cricket bats, you cannot send fliers to office-goers. That's never going to work!
Right media is the last point that needs to be reiterated. Choosing the right media depends on your market, scale of operation and needless to say, your budget. If you are selling books, advertising them on TV may not work that much! Moreover, are you going for a local town business, whole country or international? Think about it. You cannot go for a television ad with a few hundred bucks in your pocket. Think before you leap, my friend.
That's what you seriously need to keep in mind. Hey, are you even listening? Then tell me something.

Guess what, if you are searching passionately for proven small

admin — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 03:31:20 +0000

Guess what, if you are searching passionately for proven small business advertising ideas, you could not be in a better place.
The mighty Google that you know and love has very much come out and revealed that local search will eventually be the biggest revenue stream for them.
That is a massive statement. And it means that if you are not putting into place even a small business SEO campaign that features your top keywords based on location, you are handing money to your local competitors. Pity.
Knowing that momentum is coming, it is your job to jump on board. And one of the best and fastest ways to do that is to start am article marketing process that features your top, localized keywords.
A whopping 70% of all clicks on any given Google page are being gotten by the top four spots on that page. Everything after the bottom of Google page one is useless, but can you imagine that 70% of all the organic clicks are going only to those top 4 spots?
Now, if you also knew that a man by the name of Bill Gates saw local search coming and predicted the demise of the Yellow Pages industry, how would that factor in?
Gates knew. Google knows. Local small business search is where it is at and where it will stay. So you need to find the best way in.
So how best to approach this? One of the top, most affordable small business SEO methods out there is article marketing. But this is article marketing done perfectly, creating tens of thousands of in-pointing links from quality sites that feature your localized keywords.
With all of those links out there, all using your local keywords, your web page will not so slowly assume one of those top 4 spots for that keyword. It is a simple yet amazing SEO game that's played by the best small business SEO services companies.
Honestly, of all the small business advertising ideas out there, this is one that you can bank on.
It is not easy to find an article marketing services company that will start with your best keywords and publish them in mass and then publish them and then point to those articles. But that is what you must demand.
The real factor here is that all of those articles mean not a thing to you if they do not get found.