In these changing and challenging times, with the Internet more pervasive than ever and marketing budgets facing a crunch, the time is perfect for looking at your marketing mix to determine if you are putting your marketing dollars where they can get the biggest bang. Marketing organizations find themselves having to strike a balance between the three key areas they manage: lead generation, brand awareness, and the budget available. So, how do you do that? Looking at some of the trends in the marketplace can help.
More Ways to Advertise than Ever Before The ways in which a company can reach its market seems to be limited only by the imagination. While the more traditional means of advertising such as radio, TV, tradeshows and outdoor media still serve a valuable function, use of new media, typically described as media that is either based on or enabled by the Internet, is taking its place side-by-side with the more traditional mediums. A recent study by Marketing Profs Research Insights (B-to-B Marketing in 2008: Trends in Strategies and Spending, 2007) queried a group of over 400 marketing and management professionals about what different marketing tactics they use. The one with the greatest response? E-mail!
Marketing Tactics Employed
When I first started in the business, most advertising efforts focused on the three biggies: TV, radio and print. The proliferation of Internet-based mediums has resulted in so many new ways to reach out to our audiences. Now I encourage businesses to consider the use of social networks, like Facebook, to further promote their products and build brand awareness. Creating a Facebook page is an easy and free way of letting customers and potential customers keep up-to-date with what you’re doing or what you, as a business leader or entrepreneur, think about what’s happening in the business world. And, it can be a great tool for driving more traffic to your website. Who knows what might be next!
How Do You Know Which to Use? With so many choices, how do you know you are using the best medium for the task? There is no definitive answer to that, but you can look at what others are doing to determine the trend and see if you are in line with the marketplace. The Marketing Profs Study cited above showed that the mix changes according to the marketing area, with the traditional means of advertising best meeting the needs in the Brand Advertising arena while some of the new, Internet-based media are more effective in areas such as Corporate Communications and Product Marketing:
Marketing Mix by Target Area
Branding
Channel
Corporate
Field
Product
Advertising
Mktg
Comm.
Mktg.
Mktg
Other
TV Advertising
60%
0%
22%
4%
13%
2%
Print Advertising
50%
3%
22%
5%
15%
5%
Search Marketing
25%
7%
30%
9%
22%
8%
Direct Mail
14%
8%
20%
21%
30%
7%
Email
12%
10%
28%
19%
24%
8%
Webinars
8%
7%
22%
23%
34%
6%
Executive Events
9%
10%
27%
31%
14%
9%
What’s the Impact to Your Bottom Line? Expenditures on the different types of mediums can vary widely which is why it’s so important to know what your goal is and what’s the best medium for that area. If Corporate Communications is where you’ve decided to focus this year, then, based on the above chart, you may want to reduce your spending on TV ads and print advertising and consider email and search marketing. . . it’s certainly less expensive! Direct mail coupled with inside sales may eat up more of the marketing budget, but I have found it to be an excellent means for lead generation. The chart below shows the results from the Marketing Profs Research regarding how much of the surveyed companies’ marketing budget was spent on the various media:
Expenditures as % of Total Marketing Budget
Having a sound marketing plan in place in terms of your company’s goals and objectives can go a long way in helping you define the best marketing mix for your company, be it large or small. As those plans change to adjust to current marketplace conditions, so might your media mix, especially in times of budget cuts. It will really pay off for you to know about all the different mediums out there so that as the overall plan changes, you can respond quickly and effectively with a new advertising plan. And, let’s face it, you need to keep up-to-date on emerging trends so that you can find your customers, wherever they might be!
Next Month: What are the most popular mediums planned in 2008 for lead generation, communicating messages and building brand awareness?
