At Intrigue Media, we believe local businesses deserved to get noticed. But in today’s world it is tough to stand out of the crowd and get noticed in your community.
This article is about how to get noticed in your community. First of all, we should distinguish the three forms of getting noticed.
- Promotional Advertising – This includes print, radio, video advertising (that’s us!), billboards, or anything that is being placed in front of people.
- Search Advertising – This includes Google search rankings, paid search rankings, Yellow Pages, or anything else that shows up when people are looking for something to purchase.
- Word of Mouth – this includes friends telling friends about you, people writing recommendations about you, or people sharing your content online through social media.
The key to successful marketing is finding an effective and affordable mix of these three types of advertising. The first method, promotional, is necessary to let people know you exist. If no one knows about you, how can they buy from you? Finding media sources that can offer repetitive impressions on the same viewer is critical in order to build familiarity (Click here to read more about creating familiarity in your marketplace). Here is a breakdown of the investment that can be associated with different promotional advertising media:
| Ad Type | Ad Price | Duration | Impact |
| Newspaper – 1/8 Page | $300 | One Day | Up to 40,000 impressions |
| Radio | $120 | 30 Seconds | Up to 60,000 listeners |
| Intrigue TV’s | $300 | Entire Month | Up to 120,000 viewers |
The second method, search, is critical in order to be found when someone is ready to buy and they do not know where to buy from. Knowing where to be is easy, just ask your customers. If 9 out of 10 use Google to find local businesses, and 1 out of 10 use Yellow Pages, 411, or Goldbook, then make sure your budget reflects this. This typically requires shifting dollars from print or directories to Search Engine Optimization (We can help!) or Paid Search (Yep, we can also help with that!) rather than growing your current marketing budget. So, ask yourself, have you asked your customers how they find information and have you shifted your budget to match their response?
The third method, word of mouth, is a major part of any successful business and needs to be looked at today differently than even 5 years ago. Doing a great job and satisfying your customers is the easiest way to spread the word about your business. They like the experience, then tell their friends, and their friends come to your business, and so on. The difference today is that we can encourage this type of behaviour through different channels. Social Media like Facebook, Twitter, and now Google+ give consumers a chance to spread the word to hundreds, even thousands of people instantly. By using these tools and giving people a chance to connect with you through these channels, you give them a chance to spread your message effortlessly through their social and professional networks. Using customer oriented contests like photo contests, video submission contests, or trivia contests, to name a few, you can increase engagement with your customers and their friends, helping you spread the word to new people.
In the end, we all need to be proactive in order to create visibility and engagement with our existing and potential customers so that we can increase loyalty and sales in our business. Whether you use promotional, search, or word of mouth advertising, the idea is the same- grow your bottom line. So, what are you doing differently this year versus last year to create visibility for your business?
At Intrigue Media, we believe local businesses deserve to get noticed. Visit Intrigue Media's Facebook Page, check out the Intrigue Media Blog, follow Intrigue Media on Twitter and visit the new Intrigue Media website and watch our videos to see what we are doing to make this happen. If you like what you experience, give us a call so we can begin the conversation to see how we can help you get noticed!
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