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Gateway Gazette Referral Program

Not only is the Gateway Gazette all about Good News for readers…

It’s Good News for businesses too!

The Gateway Gazette Referral Program is a great way to free up your marketing dollars to make them go further.

Call today to learn more or visit: http://referrals.gatewaygazette.ca!

For information on advertising, web design, packages or other marketing products and services available call: 403-933-4283 or 403-938-2469

I'm not getting any calls!

For most businesses, their first reaction is “That media isn’t working for me.

” But let’s face it, “that” media has an audience or it wouldn’t exist.

So why isn’t that audience calling you?

1. They don’t want what you’re offering;
2. Your ad didn’t grab their attention;
3. Your target customers aren’t part of that audience;

So the question becomes – is the answer to your problem to keep switching Medias? Or is it perhaps time to take a close look at what your ads are saying (or not saying)? And exactly who your customers are.

Let’s start with your customers. If you don’t know who your customers are, then you don’t stand a chance in selecting the right Media for your marketing.

I hear from different people all the time:

• “I won’t even look at the Wheel because it’s negative; it’s full of mistakes and mis-quotes. I don’t like it.”
• “I only read the Gazette because it’s a great read, local, fun, positive and interesting.”
• “I’m not interested in the Gazette because it doesn’t cover any hard news.”
• “I turn to the Wheel because that’s where I can get the real “newsy” news.”
• “I love Facebook, it keeps me in touch with so many people, some I haven’t talked to in years.”
• “I hate Facebook, it is such a complete waste of time.”
• “I do all my research online, it’s the best way to get detailed information at my convenience.”
• “I hate researching online, I can never find what I want, Google always gives me a bunch of crap results.”
• “I love well-built business websites that provide me with the information I’m looking for.”
• “I’ve given up looking at business' websites because they are so cluttered, I get lost looking for stuff and they’ve got so much flashy crap that it takes forever to load on my computer.”
• “I love country music.” / “I hate country music.” / “Classic Rock is my favourite.”
• “I can’t stand CJAY, their jokes are in bad taste.” / “Forbes is freakin’ hilarious.”

I could probably go on forever with thoughts and comments such as these. My point is, people are different. What one person loves another person will hate. In order to choose the best Media for your business, you absolutely MUST know your customer. Until you profile your customers you can’t even begin to hope that you’re advertising effectively. Instead of asking customers where they saw/heard your ads – try asking them what newspapers they read; what radio stations they listen to; are they low, moderate or high Internet users; do they like Facebook or other social media sites. This is the information that is going to tell you “where” you should be advertising. For sure it is possible that you’re going to get quite a mix, in fact I can almost guarantee it, but if you gather enough information from enough people you’re going to be able to come up with some statistics. 50% of your customers love Facebook, 10% never heard of it, 10% don’t care, 30% hate it. 50% of your customers read the Gazette, 20% read the Wheel, 20% read both, 10% don’t read either. Are you starting to see the kind of information these type of statistics can give you about how you should be handling your advertising/marketing? But remember, this example doesn’t mean that you would put half of your marketing budget into Facebook and half of it into the Gazette and that’s it. It simply indicates how much weight to put into each level of Media. Facebook is free (unless you choose to do some of their paid advertising, which is a viable option to consider), so for the most part, your Facebook (or other Social Media site) is primarily going to cost you time rather than money. A larger percentage of your customers are reading the Gazette, but some of them are also reading the Wheel – so divide your print advertising dollars on something like a 70/30 split, or 50/30/20 and include another publication.

Profiling your customers is the ONLY way to determine WHERE you should be advertising. Running an ad and then saying “It didn’t work, must be the Media.” Plain and simple, is wrong and if you choose to continue to think about your advertising that way, your advertising will never work for you successfully on a consistent basis. I do apologize if that comes across a bit bold and blunt – but it’s the truth and sometimes we need to hear that truth in its raw form (not all prettied up) for the realization to dawn.

So let’s assume that you’ve got the customer profile taken care of, you know where your customer media “hang-outs” are. But damn it, you’re still not getting the calls. This will be due to one of two factors: either your ads aren’t getting anyone’s attention, or nobody wants what you’re offering (badly enough). Some pretty strong statements again, but at the end of the day, despite the economy, people are still spending money. At this point in time perhaps they’re not spending as much as they were 3 years ago, but all that means is that you have to try a little bit harder to get your piece of the pie because the pie isn’t quite as big and thick as it used to be – but there is still a pie!

So how do you go about doing that? You need to take a hard look at what you’re offering to people and what you’re saying to them (or not saying). You need to find the right words and images that are going to grab their attention in the first place, then you need to find the right words to keep their attention and get them excited, then you need to give them a reason to take some action. Here are some suggestions:

1. Come up with a catchy headline that will grab a person’s attention that possesses an emotion;
2. Tie your headline into the “body” of your ad through the emotion you introduced in your headline;
3. Close your ad with how your business will appeal to the emotion you’ve tapped into in steps 1 and 2.

You’ve also heard it described as “Start by giving them a problem, finish by being the solution to that problem.”

Once you’ve got a de-cluttered ad that is designed to get people’s attention, then you need to test and measure that ad. You must make sure that you are cross-marketing with the same message, presented consistently, that you are using appropriate tracking methods, that you give the ad enough exposure in enough places for long enough before you can make the decision of “this ad isn’t working”. If that is the outcome in the end, then you need to rework your message to something different then test and measure again. Like I said at the start of this article, existing Media’s have an audience – once you’ve determined where your customers hang out, your challenge becomes getting their attention. There is nothing wrong with the Media – you are simply either not getting their attention or are saying the wrong thing(s).

WHY you should advertise . . . #10

The key to any successful business, small or large, is advertising. Your potential clients need to be aware of your business and products. This is the KEY!

10. Advertise Maintain Employee Morale.

When advertising and promotion are suddenly cut or cancelled, salespeople may become alarmed and demoralized. They may start false rumours in an honest belief that your business is in trouble. Positive advertising boosts morale. It gives your staff strong additional support.

Happy Family Day Alberta!!!!

I hope you are all able to take a day to be with your loved ones.

They deserve it.... and so do you!

Plan, Cross-Market, Track … 1, 2, 3

For today I’m going to review the various information you’ve received over the last week and try to summarize it a bit.

Three key elements of your marketing should be:

1. Plan
2. Cross-Market
3. Track

Advertising and marketing is one of THE most undervalued and emphasized components of most small businesses.  Lack of advertising/marketing is on many Top Ten lists of why small businesses fail. Of course it goes deeper than that and there are often very valid reasons why businesses don’t sufficiently advertise. The most common being a lack of funds another common reason being a lack of know-how.

But with a bit of effort, perhaps a bit of help and mixed with a bit of creativity, every small business can improve their marketing.

Planning - I recommend starting with an outline for the year, followed by a bit more detail for the next six months and then a complete breakdown, full detail and creation of your initiatives for the next three months.  There isn’t a whole lot of point in fully creating all of your marketing for the full year simply because things will change and then you’ve wasted time and possibly money.  However, leaving each piece of marketing to the last minute is also a bad idea as it simply won’t end up being as good as it could be if more time and thought had been put into it.  Allowing a month to get setup for each three month segment should be sufficient in most cases, however, do be heads up if you are planning to use something that may take a longer production time – like imprinted promotional products.  Order and book everything you need in advance so that when it comes time for implementation, you’re ready and waiting and can make it happen with very little effort. 

Here’s an example of outlining the year:

March

– Plan and create initiatives for April, May & June

June

– Plan and create initiatives for July, August & September

September

– Plan and create initiatives for October, November & December

December

– Plan and create initiatives for January, February & March

For your initial planning, keep doing whatever you have been doing during your first planning month – something is better than nothing, you don’t want to stop everything just so you can plan.

Now list out the key events/focus related to each particular quarter that either directly or indirectly relate to your business.

For example:

April, May & June
- Spring
- Easter
- May long-weekend
- Home clean up (spring clean)
- Auto seasonal checkup, tune-up etc
- Last stretch of school

Also note any annual sales or events that are already part of your business – perhaps your business’ anniversary is in June.

By outlining this for the year you stand a much better chance of being pre-prepared for important things to come rather than scrambling at the last minute to throw something together for something as important as your anniversary.

I’ll come back to detailing your plan in a future article - I’m almost at 600 words again!  lol

Cross-Market – At very least, aim for three different marketing methods, but better yet, try for six and just remember the more the merrier. Repetition and saturation are two very important elements in all marketing initiatives.  But smart marketing takes time and research to ensure you are getting the best possible deals with the most effective application.  When you’ve picked your methods, map them out in your plan with a timeline and topic/focus for each thing you do. 

Tracking – Focus your tracking on the bigger picture to start with and put more emphasis on tracking whole campaigns rather than individual initiatives – otherwise you’ll drive yourself nuts and inevitably arrive at the conclusion that this media or that media doesn’t work and all you’ll do is thwart your own marketing efforts resulting in no marketing working because you stop doing it.  Trust in numbers, trust in your customers and give everything you try a fighting chance to prove itself.  Most importantly, if you feel a particular campaign isn’t working, question your message/focus BEFORE you question your choice of media.  At the end of the day, EVERY form of media works for advertising/marketing – gimmicks that “don’t” work fade away never to be heard from again.  But methods that have been around for centuries, or even decades, still exist for a reason.

Remember, the point of your advertising/marketing is to increase traffic/inquiries.  NOT to directly and immediately increase “sales”.  If you’re receiving more phone calls or more visitors, then your advertising IS working.  If that increase is not resulting in an increase in sales, then something else is wrong – your advertising methods are not to blame.