I've been given £1000 to spend on offline marketing/advertising but it cannot be magazine advertising. Could you make any suggestions as to how to spend the money? Thanks.
Are you saying that a company hired you to do offline advertising for them and you do not know how to do it for them? If so, be honest about it and let them know that they should consult with someone who is an expert in offline advertising. If you want to build a good company, do what you do well and be honest about what you don't do. Even if you are trying to learn about it so you can provide the service in the future, let them know that you are still working on adding that services but are not ready to start accepting work in that area yet. You can view it as a service that you are missing out on collecting a fee for, or you can view it as something that is outside your wheelhouse and something that could hurt your business's reputation, costing you more in the long run than you would gain short term.
I'll be honest. I'm an expert in my field. The thread was started as a means to garner ideas and inspiration. Your reply is most disappointing; your know-it-all arrogant preachy tone is not called for and completely unproductive - not at all what I've come to expect in this forum (save for the over-important (that's self-important) plop excreted by one of the larger contributors who I've learnt to avoid). You obviously have not noticed that advertising and marketing are develop new approaches and methods. Why? Because people turn off form them, edit them out. For example using the remote control to channel hop during commercial breaks is typical TV watching behavior. I'd still like to hear ideas or read about methods witnessed - good and bad. The £1,000 was spent but I've now another £2,000 to spend (from the same company).
That's a bit of a thin skinned over-reaction don't you think? The reply was warranted given that you were not very specific in your post and the number of new marketers posing threads like this. It will also serve as good advice for those new marketers if they stop by this thread. Dan
Hi Friend, If I have an Offline Marketing Plan with £1000 to spend on it then the offline marketing activities need to complement. Branding is one of the major tools to accomplish this. Having all of your marketing materials present a unified message through the use of taglines, colors, symbols, wordmarks or logos, and images can make your marketing pounds go further. During the review of your current marketing activities, we can look at your materials to determine if they present a unified message or theme to your target audience. Often, having an outsider look at your marketing materials can help strengthen them by bringing to light any unclear messages or calls-to-action that an industry insider would take for granted. If you have any questions further then please let me know I will be happy to assist you. Thanks, Prakash Joshi
. Actually the question was very specific and, as the next comment shows, can be answered directly. Here's a direct question to you: why bother with your comment?
Can you give us a broad idea of what kind of niche you're in? You don't have to give the product or service name, but tell us what you are offering? This would make a difference in what I would do.
I was thinking about viral marketing - a great offline viral marketing stunt will get you going. For example, one company that I know made the next thing: they purchased ad spaces in the centre of their city. The spots for the ads were great, but we all know that people already got accustomed to bill boards - a lot of people don't read them at all. So they took a lot of spray paint, stencil made out of cardboard...And had the pavements in the area spray painted with signatures like "Wait stop, look up...bla-bla-bla"...the texts were wittier than my interpretation. They had a couple of ad spaces like this around the town. The campaign was quite successful. They were highlighted in a couple of posts by local marketers and received a bonus from the client. Of course, this will work for a local business, but the point is that the idea was quite simple, cheap (except for the ad spaces) and paid off...You don't have to be a marketing genius to generate great ideas....Maybe this will give you a hint about your next marketing investment. Good luck!
IMO it depends on the kind of business. Store front with walk in traffic? buy a giant sign. Is it a website with offline marketing?