6 Keys To Successful Advertising

6 Keys to Successful Advertising:

Most businesses don’t really understand how advertising works. Even the ones that are advertising successfully are not understanding the why behind their advertising success and so they just happen to be doing enough of the right things to counter the wrong things that they shouldn’t be doing.

First off, we have to understand the purpose of advertising and that’s summed up easily:

Advertising is paid invitations to invite people to spend money with your business.

Some business people say that Word of Mouth is their best form of advertising, which is sort of correct except you don’t pay for that.  Word of Mouth is the organic messaging that happens when your business has a good reputation and one person tells another about your business.

The problem with Word Of Mouth is that it is slow and most businesses can’t survive let alone grow if they only rely on this organic word of mouth messaging to bring in enough customers to sustain a  business.

That’s where paid advertising plays a part in amplifying your messaging of inviting people to become your customers.

In todays terminology it’s the difference between a regular social media post and a boosted social media post.

One more important bit of information to share before I dive into the 6 Keys of Successful Advertising is Expectations.

If you expect that when someone sees or hears your ad, that alone will make them buy your stuff at that moment, your expectations are wrong.  Only a very few companies are successful with what is know as direct response advertising

The True Direct Response Advertising I’m referring to is usually set up as a profit sharing arrangement between the business and advertising medium.  Instead of paying for the ad, the business and the advertising medium agree that a set dollar amount or set percentage of sales attributed to a specific ad is what the advertising medium receives.

I’ve worked with one company where we get 50% of the sales as our advertising fee instead of a set price per commercial.  This is a national company that I work with and they already have a brand name recognition so the people who respond to the ads we air for them are in the final stages of the consumer journey to buy this product and if they use the special promo code exclusive to us, we get credit for the sale and are paid accordingly.

99% of advertising works to create Brand Awareness.  Even though the ads mention prices and sales and stuff that are trying to get us to buy now, all they are really doing is reminding us as consumers of their brand.

Why do I say this?

Because advertising is only one side of the equation.

It’s the invitation to you and me to spend money.

You and I have to have a reason in our lives to spend the money and it has very little to do with the specific ads we see and hear.

If I just stuffed myself with a delicious meal and I see an ad for another one of my favorite foods, but I’m not only not hungry but I’m stuffed, there is no way I’m going to make myself sick by eating more no matter how much I normally would enjoy that other food.

Same goes with nearly anything we do. 

We are not going to respond unless we have a need or desire.

However, the more we are exposed to something, our brains retain that information and it builds up to create a brand preference.  Then, sometime in the future if we need or want something that we’ve already been exposed to because of advertising, we will often have one or two places that come to mind to spend our money with.  That’s Top Of Mind Awareness and when organic Word Of Mouth referrals for your business come about, it’s because your business is Top Of Mind.

Now with all of this as a foundation, here are the 6 Keys to Successful Advertising:

1. Define your customer. Not everyone is going to be your customer. What are the characteristics of the people you want as customers and that you can successfully serve with your business.
2. Define your brand. Too many businesses are not unique in the way they present themselves.  Family owned with 56 years of combined experience is pretty generic and doesn’t really mean that much.  I have a client that has been using the branding statement, On Time, Done Right, Or It’s Free for years and while they are a family owned multi-generational company with years of experience, it’s their branding statement that defines them.
3. Invite your desired customers to get to know your brand over and over again, consistently over time. Pick an advertising medium that allows you to make that connection and be patient.  Know the buying cycle of your business.  We eat every day.  We may buy a roof once or twice in our lives.  Make sure your invitation to me is there so when I’m ready to start the buying process, you will stay Top Of Mind with Me.
4. Your Message has to be focused on your Customer, not just you. It’s the What’s In It For Me as a consumer principle.
5. Plan for a long-term investment in your advertising. If you expect instant results, you’re being foolish, or just fooling yourself.  When I was 42 years old, I had central air installed in a house I just bought and the two companies I called are ones that I remembered from 25 years ago.  I never was in need of an HVAC company but when a triggering moment came in my life, I got quotes from the two companies that were Top Of Mind from my youth.  One of those companies got nearly $20,000 of my money.
6. Remember it is impossible to be 100% accurate when you attempt to track your advertising investments. Even if you ask me as a new customer why I am spending money with your company, I won’t remember all of the ads I’ve seen or heard.  And Google is not the right answer, that’s just how I found you online to get your number.

And here’s a bonus key to success…

Most any form of advertising can help if you do it right and have realistic expectations.  However, the ad is only the invite.  It’s up to you and your business to close the sale, not the ad.