Adverising Questions

<<moved to PR and Marketing>>

Ok i am looking to do some launch advertising.....But i cannot decide whether to put my money into local print advertising, or local radio advertising.....your opinions are appreciated.

Surely the answer to this question would be based, in no small way on what message you want to deliver and who you want to deliver it to.

If you don't believe me, what would happen if you had a print ad in a magazine that none of your prospects read?

It may be that you have a very clear idea of what you want to say and who you want to say it to, but you're asking us to just guess at an answer to your question which won't give you a meaningful and helpful answer.

Also Rather than sending out a sales letters to prospects..business prospects not private...Would it be beter to send an A4 brocher/leaflet showing what we can do, with some screen shots from the website etc on it?

Which of these 2 options best explains the benefits of using your service?

Steve

I want to raise general public awareness within my region...East Anglia and Essex of the service we provide. I am looking to do this to the general public, rather than businesses.

So, is it going to be like most ads, just "hey, we exist"?

If so, the chances of your ad paying for itself are minimal. The average person is bombarded by hundreds of these messages every day and, unless there's either some perceived need for the service or massive repitition, is almost certain to forget all about it.

If I were you, I'd forget about "awareness" and target those with a want/need and make them an offer to respond to.

Steve

In a previous incarnation I did some retail sales across East Anglian papers and found the response rate fairly poor. The Essex Chronicle especially was expensive per conversion.

Given the nature of your business I would suggest the following as a course of action...

1. Do some serious market research (in Colchester town centre perhaps) on where people look for motors. Lots of people use free papers because they get them every week and (apart from houses) the motor section is the only other thing worth looking at.

2. Properly price up your different options in each of the papers. Most of them will have circulation figures, but obviously the free ones do not accurately portray their readership as they just stick em through your door.

3. Define your audiences particularly clearly. You might have general 2nd hand and new and used for retail. For businesses you are probably looking to be more of a vendor but also selling trade vehicles. Whatever, just be clear about who is going to buy what.

4. Work out the most cost effective way of reaching them. I think for trade advertisers you will have to offer them some amount of time for free to demonstrate the cost-effectiveness of the product. Also give due consideration to travelling distances: start working e.g. in Colchester and surrounding villages so that all of your buyers and sellers are close to each other. It also means your promotional and advertising costs will be much lower. You could hand out flyers in the town for a few weekends on the trot and during a couple of rush hours - these would cost you less per conversion than posting flyers. For your smaller number of higher-value clients you should contact them directly by phone and then perhaps send through a pack if there are a enough of them to justify it.

Look into digital as well as litho printing. If you only have 10-20 high-value customers needing packs then it is better to spend £10 each for 25 of them than to spend £1 each for 1000 which will then spend the next year kicking round your office!