Which advertising medium works the best

Armed with the information and having completed your Marketing Plan you must be wondering.

Where do I begin?

Well, as promised we will take a look at various factors that will guide you to pinpoint the exact medium to use. The factors include:

1). Cost

This is the budget your small business marketing department wishes to spend. This can be calculated by asking yourself, how much you are willing to spend per new customer? It is important to consider the amount the average customer spends on your product or services at a given time then multiply that with the years this person will be a customer. Not to mention the plenty of referral if he/she is satisfied.

2) Your Product / Service

A high end product should be presented in high end, elitist media with prime slots.  This will position the brand and achieve desired effect. The marketing campaign must be sophisticated.

3) Target Market

To reach your target audience one must do a research to ascertain their behavior, where they hang out, what they watch, read, listen to and who their peers are. For instance if you intend to sell an energy drink brand to the youth. You need to know where they hang or take their drinks and thus ensure your product will be available there with the right communication. If it is targeted to certain geographical locations consider using local media i.e. vernacular FM stations.

4) Reach

It is important to determine the number of people your medium of choice will reach. If it is print, the circulation figures including the intricacies like the most popular days of the week if it is a Daily Newspaper. If it’s Radio; the number of listeners of a specific show and the demographic. Same applies to TV.

There are various Advertising mediums available to your small business. Depending on the advertising budget prescribed on your marketing plan you may use a combination of the medium below:

1. Posters
2. Brochure / Fliers
3. Notice boards
4. Signs
5. Banners
6. Bus Shelter
7. Branded Merchandise
8. Social Media
9. Websites
10. Online Advertising
11. Email Advertising

All this medium should be used systematically. Your message should run over a period of time to ensure you get your market share and maintain it. The message should also be somewhat consistent. It can be tweaked but there has to be a common denominator. Most blue chip companies with a larger ad spend use another set of medium. If you have a larger budget you can consider the following:

• TV Ads
• Radio Ads
• Newspaper / Magazine Ads
• Billboards

In South Africa we have the privilege of having several design and development agencies, which specialize, on various forms of Marketing as stated above, Seoland Design studios is one of them. When selecting the agency you can scrutinize their Case Studies / Portfolio to gauge them against competitors. Also ensure you get value for your money in terms of actual conversions. Feel free to pay us a visit or contact us for any inquiries on Advertising in particular or Marketing as a whole.