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Effective Advertising - The Basics

Guest post by: brian bijdeveldt

Article Overview: Don't waste your advertising budget on poorly thought out campaigns. Stick to the basics and ensure you maximize your return on investment.

Effective Advertising - The Basics

The sole purpose of advertising is to be interesting enough to sell products and services at such a level as to justify its expense. Do not spend any money on any advertising or marketing strategies unless you can establish an accurate and highly acceptable return on investment. No exceptions or excuses.

Here are four principles about advertising to keep in mind when creating your own advertising campaigns or evaluating a campaign designed for you by an advertising firm.

Know Your Market

You have to know the exact reasons why people buy your product, not why you think they buy it. So ask them! The answers they give you will point you to the main selling points you need to highlight in all your advertising. You may find that they really appreciate your customer service, your product quality or your great value for money offers. What ever it is, this is what you need to point out in your advertising.

What is the profile of your target audience? As a minimum you need to know:

• Their age range
• Where they live
• What is their income
• Their buying patterns

Know Your Objectives

Without clear objectives in your mind, it will be difficult if not impossible to formulate strategies. Do you want people to buy your product over the telephone, or come in to your shop? Are you educating your prospects or do you want a direct and immediate response to your advertising message? Advertising has to be specific to be effective. Be sure about what you are trying to achieve before you start.

Write It the Way You Would Say It

Knowing who to target, what medium to utilise to reach your audience and the best offer to present allows you to craft an effective and compelling advertisement. Apply the AIDA test to all your advertisements before spending money on printing leaflets or approving a newspaper ad. AIDA stands for:

Attention - Does it grab the readers attention?

Interest - Does it stimulate interest?

Desire - Does it create desire for your products?

Action - Does it demand that the reader takes action?

Avoid using big words or complicated messages, keep it simple. Avoid boasting - this is all about them, not you.

Ask For the Order

This is the Action part of AIDA and this is the component that 63% of sales staff do not complete. You have gone to the trouble of selecting your target audience, crafting a compelling message and presenting an irresistible offer. Now you have to convert that prospect to a customer. This will never happen if you miss the step of "asking for the order" and making the sale. After all, that's what you are in business for. Isn't it?

Remember, marketing is what brings prospects to your business; the sales process is what converts them to customers. Although not the subject of this article, the sales process deserves a mention. It is, after all, a critical component for any business.

To ensure that you have every chance at successfully converting prospects to customers, consider creating sales scripts. I am not talking about robotic phrases that grate on the nerves. More a well thought out set of questions and offers practiced by all staff until they are delivered smoothly and effectively.

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Article Tags: advertising, advertising budget, marketing campaigns



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