It is a casual Tuesday afternoon and your secretary transfers a call to you. On the phone is ________. Fill in the blank with whatever you want, whether it is the billboard rep just checking in on to see how things are going, to a radio rep to tell you about the new promotion of the month…again, to the newspaper rep trying to up-sell your current advertising listings…sigh.
After the enviable “coffee meeting”, the endless correspondence, and another phone call from the competing rep, at the end of the month the time spent buying media and planning can equate to hours and hours of lost time over the course of a year.
What if things could be different?
What if the overhead time lost, could have been reinvested into efforts to expanding the business or managing day-to-day activities or making way on the paperwork rather than being succumb to the infinite time suck of media buying?
Advertising agencies are able to take these meetings and contacts off your plate, without additional cost to your business. How? Where’s the catch? It is isn’t a ploy, it is just how the system works.
From the beginning, advertising agencies began by helping business owners solve this problem. Here’s how it works…when a media sales rep such as a outdoor, print, or radio rep is dealing with an agency on your behalf, it is almost as if they are dealing with 20 clients. It is kind of like pooling your money together and your purchasing power is now multiplied. This means that the you get the best rate minus the overhead. In addition to this, we have specific software and experience that allows us to efficiently streamlined communications so all ads from print, to radio, to outdoor have the same look and feel. In addition, our media buying tools and experience allow us to negotiate the best pricing.
For our clients, we oftentimes meet once every couple of weeks or once a month to go over the new schedule and approve new ads. Any and all correspondence from every media outlet is directed to us.
If you spend time meeting with radio, outdoor, or print reps wouldn’t it be worth it to have an experienced media buyer on your side to do the negotiating, placement, and creation of the ads? All you need to do is ok’m, meaning less overhead and better results.
To see if a media buying relationship would be a good fit for you and your business feel free to call me. I would be more than willing to talk with you take over a lunch or coffee and discuss ways to help free up your time, call 701-952-7586 or email pat@redplummedia.com
I am literally getting evil glances from the creative staff at the other end of office as I write this blarticle to you. The reason I am writing this Plum Truck article is because advertising is both a creative skill and also based off of logic, research, and sound marketing principles. The right part of the brain meets the left…the yin and the yang of marketing.
Can you smell it? Yep. It’s fear.
If you ever have the good fortune to create a great advertising campaign, you will soon see another agency or company steal it. “This is irritating, but don’t let it worry you; nobody has ever built a brand by imitating somebody else’s advertising” David Ogilvy.
Remember the old game of copycat. It is when your younger brother or sister couldn’t think of a comeback so they just decided to repeat everything you said. The great thing is when the competition is beginning to mimic your campaign; it is like blood in the water. Desperation has but one name and it is copycat.
When your competitor decides to take the role of follower, it means you are the leader. Proactive, innovative thoughts and strategic marketing strategies propel a business toward the top.
by Pat Yatskis – Marketing Strategist
Welcome to the first Plum Truck blarticle (part blog, part article).
Here’s the scoop on this article. I did some research last March when the recession was hitting hard. I thought, “I know businesses are cutting in pretty much every facet of their operations, but what does history tell us about the impact of cutting, maintaining or increasing a marketing/advertising budget during financially difficult times?” I know I am a nerd, but hey that’s why I do what I do.
So here you go if you are interested in this type of stuff:
Many lives have been altered and spending habits have shifted since the market has fallen out. In our area, North Dakota and Jamestown businesses have not felt the brunt of the recession, when compared with other states. All businesses are now faced with the challenge of adjusting to recession-minded customers who have lost investments or 401Ks and are loaded with fear. Businesses have a couple options.
Option One: Go into state of hibernation slashing any budget in effort to store a little fat for the winter. This is the road many take yet some are forced to. It only feels natural, not just because hibernation is normal for us living in North Dakota, but also, when fear hits our human nature has us look shortsightedly. The problem with this approach is slashing budgets allows businesses to save a little fat, but there is no guarantee that fat will last the winter months.
Option Two: take the road less traveled and capture the market.
Study after study has confirmed that maintaining and even increasing advertising efforts during a recession is best course of action not just for the longrun, but also the short run. Need proof?
During the recession of 1923 Roland Vaile, an advertising guru, tracked 200 companies and in the April 1927th issue of Harvard Business Review, the companies with the largest increases in sales were the ones who advertised the most. After World War II, Buchen Advertising, Inc. decided to plot the sales of a large number of advertisers through successive recessions. In 1947, it began measuring the annual advertising expenditures of each company. When they correlated the figures with sales and profit trends before, during and after the recessions of 1949, 1954, 1958 and 1961, they found that almost without exception, sales and profits dropped off at companies that cut back on advertising (Clark Company, 2008). Their studies also revealed that after the recessions ended, those companies continued to lag behind the ones that had maintained their advertising budgets. In 1979 another study by ABP/Meldrum & Fewsmith, covering the recession of 1974-75 and post-recession years, showed similar findings. They found that “companies which did not cut advertising expenditures during the recession years (1974-1975), experienced higher sales and net income during those two years and the two years following than companies which cut ad budgets in either or both recession years.”
Yesterday’s luxuries have become today’s expenditures for recession-minded consumers. It is important to point out that it doesn’t matter if you view your product/service as a luxury or necessity, it matters how your customers see your product or service. If your customers see your product or service as an expenditure, time to reposition.
Here is a guide for successfully implementing of this concept
Focus less on image, self-completion and self-actualization and instead focus more on relaxation, comfort and peace-emotion based advertising.
People still have money to spend on things, but they just need to be convinced that your product or service is right.