Chapter 15 This is Marketing

Part 2

Reaching the Right people

Everything has its cost. Attention comes at a cost too. There’s no such thing as free attention. It will either cost you money, time or effort.

If you are going to buy an ad, you will need to ask, “What’s it worth?” Advertising is a shortcut and if you want to make change happen but don’t have the persistence and focus to make it successful then whatever you have invested would all go to waste.

Let’s talk about online direct marketing. With the introduction of google and others the direct marketing flourished.

So when you run an ad you can measure direct marketing, it’s action oriented but brand marketing can’t be measured as it’s culturally oriented.

You can count the number of views you got on your online ad, that’s direct marketing. A billboard, however is a sign of brand marketing, it’s in hope that a person will remember you when they need what you offer.

The possibility of your direct marketing changing the culture and your brand marketing to lead some more orders is always there but you can’t be confused with it. Some brands work well with direct marketing while some have made a name for themselves through brand marketing. And these brands struggle with shifting to a direct marketing environment online as they haven’t done it before and vice versa.

There’s a way to approach both forms. If you are going for direct marketing, measure everything. Compute and calculate and if you are not able to measure it, it doesn’t count.

Whereas, you have to be patient with brand marketing and engage with the culture. You should know that you will have to pay a lot for brand marketing and the effort must be consistent and if it isn’t then it will all be wasted.

You will think that small businesses will profit if they run direct ads online. Well, it may work if you are approaching an audience who is willing to click on those ads. Then only you will get a sale that will lead to a word of mouth and then another sale and the cycle goes on. But it won’t work if your audience isn’t even the type to click on ads.

So remember, with direct marketing, always measure otherwise, it doesn’t count.

With brand Marketing, every step or action you take counts. You might not be able to see or measure it at the moment, but it matters.

You don’t want to be spending your time, money or attention on everyone. Your brand isn’t built for everyone so be specific about who you are going to interact with or who are you going to spend money on. So your marketing should reflect upon those people you are making your brand for.

The one thing that marketers frequently forget is being familiar is normal and if you are familiar with a product you trust it. So if someone sees your product and story again and again, they will remember you and they will trust you.

There’s a saying, “ Don’t change your ads when you are tired of them, change when your accountant is tired of them.”

So be frequent, even when you are bored with it as people will get your message, just be patient and understand the dip. Frequency helps a marketer in earning the audience’s trust but it won’t work if you just quit in the middle of it.

You are here to stand out as a brand, something people will remember. You are not just another general alternative that relies on Google’s algorithm to come up on the feed with some key words.

The key is to be trusted enough that someone cares about you enough to type in your name, so that they will look for you specifically. So create something that will actually make a difference. So that you always win in a specific search not a generic one.

And then just be the one they want to find when they go looking for it on the web or anywhere else.