Okay... I touched a nerve. A friend of mine who owns a successful weekly newspaper took offense to my implications that print advertising wasn't producing results. Apologies...
The fact of the matter is local businesses who need to get the word out have no better vehicle than the local paper. But be smart in you implementation.
You gotta' have a plan. Don't think that just because you drop a business card ad in the paper, customers are gonna line up outside your store.
You need to know who your customers are, and what you are trying to sell them. Then you need to craft a message that will work in print.
One of the biggest mistakes I see when people run print ads, is T. M. I.
They try and disseminate waaaaaay to much information.
For example... you bought a large quantity widgets from a supplier at a great price. You regularly sell these for $50 a piece, but got them a such a great price you can afford to undercut your widget competition and sell them for $25. Great strategy so far, right?
So you contact the paper and set up an advertising plan that spans the next couple of months and involves a quarter page ad a week. This represents a significant investment, but if you can move all those widgets, you'll turn a healthy profit, gain some new customers, get local exposure and do some vitally important local branding for your company.
A simple, white-space intensive ad that says in BIG block letters...
The fact of the matter is local businesses who need to get the word out have no better vehicle than the local paper. But be smart in you implementation.
You gotta' have a plan. Don't think that just because you drop a business card ad in the paper, customers are gonna line up outside your store.
You need to know who your customers are, and what you are trying to sell them. Then you need to craft a message that will work in print.
One of the biggest mistakes I see when people run print ads, is T. M. I.
They try and disseminate waaaaaay to much information.
For example... you bought a large quantity widgets from a supplier at a great price. You regularly sell these for $50 a piece, but got them a such a great price you can afford to undercut your widget competition and sell them for $25. Great strategy so far, right?
So you contact the paper and set up an advertising plan that spans the next couple of months and involves a quarter page ad a week. This represents a significant investment, but if you can move all those widgets, you'll turn a healthy profit, gain some new customers, get local exposure and do some vitally important local branding for your company.
A simple, white-space intensive ad that says in BIG block letters...
WIDGETS, $25 each, Limit 2, Bubba's Gadget Emporium.
Good stuff. It'll pop off the page. It'll talk directly to the people who buy widgets with a clear and concise message.
Here is where the best laid plans generally go awry. A wise man once told me that you should never... ever... let the owner of the company dictate the advertising content... ever.
Why?
Because the owner, who is the person parting company with those hard-earned marketing dollars suddenly realizes that he is going to be spending money... a lot of money... and has decided that he is going to get the biggest bang for the buck. That this ad is his magic bullet to get rid of all those woozles, heffalumps, gidgets, and fifteen other items he has left over from Christmas. Oh yeah, he also needs to let everyone know that he also offers repairs on all of that stuff. Now he figures the ad is a way to win one with the grand kids and offers to have their photos appear in the ad as well..
Now what you have is a quarter page ad crammed with so much information that readers will take one look at it and run screaming from it's scrolled borders. The original message about the great deal on the widgets is lost in the confusion of cute grand kids, and the offers on the heffalumps, woozles, gidgets and repair service. And that pretty white-space ad that popped out its simple message is now just another gray box in a newspaper full of gray boxes.
Keep it simple. Keep it concise. Keep it clean.
Print advertising works, especially in the local publications. The weekly papers that get read from cover to cover are by far the best venue for delivering a specific advertising message.
Get them in the store. Then you can show them all the Heffalumps you have left over from Christmas.
Good stuff. It'll pop off the page. It'll talk directly to the people who buy widgets with a clear and concise message.
Here is where the best laid plans generally go awry. A wise man once told me that you should never... ever... let the owner of the company dictate the advertising content... ever.
Why?
Because the owner, who is the person parting company with those hard-earned marketing dollars suddenly realizes that he is going to be spending money... a lot of money... and has decided that he is going to get the biggest bang for the buck. That this ad is his magic bullet to get rid of all those woozles, heffalumps, gidgets, and fifteen other items he has left over from Christmas. Oh yeah, he also needs to let everyone know that he also offers repairs on all of that stuff. Now he figures the ad is a way to win one with the grand kids and offers to have their photos appear in the ad as well..
Now what you have is a quarter page ad crammed with so much information that readers will take one look at it and run screaming from it's scrolled borders. The original message about the great deal on the widgets is lost in the confusion of cute grand kids, and the offers on the heffalumps, woozles, gidgets and repair service. And that pretty white-space ad that popped out its simple message is now just another gray box in a newspaper full of gray boxes.
Keep it simple. Keep it concise. Keep it clean.
Print advertising works, especially in the local publications. The weekly papers that get read from cover to cover are by far the best venue for delivering a specific advertising message.
Get them in the store. Then you can show them all the Heffalumps you have left over from Christmas.
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