Leave the Brand Advertising to Companies With Big Pockets

[Aletheides]

First off I didn't write this to promote anything, I don't have any affiliate sig link I want you to follow and I don't recommend any service in particular in this article. It's just some practical knowledge I put together to give back to you guys. No theory BS - I hope you'll get some good ideas out of it.

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As a small business owner the very last type of marketing you should be thinking about is brand marketing.

Leave this kind of marketing for huge companies with huge pockets.

If you want to see what kind of advertising you shouldn't be doing just open up the yellow pages or any magazine and look at 95% of the advertising done on there.

What do you see? Logo, company name, service, phone number.

It just doesn't work.

Why?

The reason brand advertising no longer works is because consumers get literally beaten senseless with ads every single day - I believe the number of ads per day is somewhere around 3,000. Trying to vy for the consumers attention with this type of marketing will quickly turn into a non-performing money pit for you.

3 Benefits of Direct Response Marketing

1. It's easy to track and results are highly measureable.
2. You'll get more results from your marketing because you're not asking for the sale right off the bat, just permission to market to them over time and BUILD A LIFETIME CUSTOMER.
3. You can get a more accurate projection on revenue and costs. Results from your advertising become pretty predictable and it's easier to run a business like this.

How to Put It Together in 3 Easy Steps

1. Offer an incentive, a selfish reason for the prospect to act.

A good example of this is done by Ben Glass who teaches marketing for lawyers. He preaches EVERY time you pay for advertising it should include some kind of offer "FREE REPORT: What You Need to Know Before You Hire a Personal Injury Lawyer"

2. Set up an automatic way to "touch" your prospect at least every week over the next couple of months.

Send them relevant content and teach them about your business and what you offer at the same time. This does two ultra important things:

1. It builds trust and a relationship with your prospect.
2. It shows you know what the hell you're talking about. Reputation.

On average it will take about 7 "touches" before a prospect sends you any $$$$.

No Extra Effort - Put It On Autopilot

You can get all this done on autopilot with a simple email autoresponder like Getresponse.

Or automatic postcard mailings + autoresponder like Sendpepper.

Or something like Infusionsoft which is recommended if you have the budget.

There's also Automated Marketing Solutions, they have some pretty cool tools and if anything you'll get some good info from the reports you can download from them. Their autoresponder SUCKS though (only 1 step autoresponder - wtf?).

More Info

If you ever read any of Seth Godin's books he calls this Permission Marketing. If you want to learn more practical info on Direct Response marketing then I recommend picking up a couple cheap books off of Amazon by Dan Kennedy.

In Conclusion

So the next time you're advertising somewhere ALWAYS INCLUDE SOME KIND OF OFFER.

And before you pay a couple hundred bucks to get your logo stamped on a box of ball point pens ask yourself, "Is this really going to bring me new customers?"

[affinity1]

Cool. Does this sound like a nice offer: "Initial set-up fee waived if you sign up before January 1st!"

[Aletheides]

Affinity not really but if you give me what industry you're in maybe I can give you some better ideas.

The idea is to get your customer to volunteer their contact info in exchange for something valuable you can give them - typically information.

Another example is Russel Brunson's Free CD. You pay $4.95 for shipping (which covers the shipping AND production of the CD) and in exchange you get a fresh "self-liquidating" lead from a potential prospect.

I would actually suggest signing up for the free cd offer from Russel Brunson just so you can see how well crafted his follow up is and for how long he follows up with you.

It's a measly price for some good first-hand marketing education.

[inle]

Great Insights and I agree with most of the stuff here...

Except that BRANDING is NOT about logo, ads etc....

Branding is about bringing the business essence to reach the targetted customers to "seduce" them in developing an psychological experience and interaction with the business and its offerings.....

Question: How MANY businesses out there are even aware of their own BUSINESS ESSENCE????

[Aletheides]

Branding is about bringing the business essence to reach the targetted customers to "seduce" them in developing an psychological experience and interaction with the business and its offerings.....

Question: How MANY businesses out there are even aware of their own BUSINESS ESSENCE????

Yeah I think the borderline metaphysical stuff might apply to huge corporations fighting each other for mindshare but this realm of thinking has no practical use for a small business owner just trying to get sales.

[armenh]

Great Post, very informative and simple!

[Michy]

I love the Businesses Essence comment - I had not thought about that before and am new to this. That sort of post is exactly why I join things like this forum - it really helps me out. I will think about this. Thank you.