Month: September 2022
Walk down a suburban street in any developed industrialized nation and one thing will be remarkably constant: The letterboxes will be full, often overflowing. And they won’t just contain addressed, posted mail. The bulk of the material will often be brochures and flyers advertising businesses and services, many of them local.
Certainly, many people find this fact of modern life extremely annoying. Sometimes more than half the houses in a street will have signs angrily demanding that there be no junk mail!.
But this phenomenon proves something: Those flyers and brochures must be working! Otherwise businesses wouldn’t be paying to have them produced and distributed.
Without a doubt flyers and brochures have distinct advantages over other methods of advertising: Here are a few:
1) They are comparatively cheap to produce flyers particularly so. Certainly, glossy multi-page brochures can be very costly, but basic one page black and white flyers are very inexpensive and can still work well. As long as they are clear and large enough to catch the resident’s eye, they can get your product or service noticed.
2) You can target the geographic areas that you want. Ultimately all business is local business. But some businesses are more local than others! Businesses that cater to a geographically specific market tend to get a very good response from flyers and brochures.
An example would be a pub or bar wanting to promote a one-off or regular theme night. Placing several thousand flyers in letterboxes around the venue would be a great way of telling people about this event. People do tend to be more likely to go to something that is close to where they live, after all.
3) Just as you can target runs geographically, you can also target them demographically. Say a pool table company is using brochures to get leads. There would be little point in targeting units, since they generally wouldn’t be large enough to contain the product. And pool tables are not cheap! So, the best results would come from a large run through middle to high income suburbs — houses only.
Of course it can be difficult finding distributors who can do a drop in this way. Most of the big distribution companies offer value but on a large scale. You must pay for a large drop, your promotional material is rolled up with several others, and no thought is put into which letterboxes are chosen! However, there are smaller distributors who can thoughtfully target your material. They are just less well known, and harder to find, that’s all.
4) You can put special offers on them. A flyer that says something like, Present this and get a ten percent discount on any item in the store! is a good choice. The incentive itself can increase sales. Secondly, it’s a great way of tracking the campaign, since the number of actual discounts can be recorded accurately.
5) People hang onto them. This is one definite advantage over newspaper advertising. Of course, many more people will see an ad placed in the paper. But to keep your contact details they have to cut the ad out, highlight it, or write it down usually along with a lot of others. A flyer or brochure, however, contains all the details and can be kept indefinitely. Businesses often get leads from flyers or brochures that have been left on the tops of fridges or in desk drawers for months, even years!
Certainly, particular circumstances dictate that flyers and brochures are not always the best advertising method. But the above advantages make them a remarkably reliable, cost effective way of raising awareness and generating leads for most businesses.
The objective of each advertising campaign differs from another. Keeping this point in mind, advertisers adopt various mediums of advertising which best suit the requirements of their brand promotion campaign. Outdoor advertising is one of the oldest mediums of brand promotion. Advertising brands through outdoor media vehicles such as billboards, hoardings, kiosks, posters etc have been in vogue ever since the advent of advertising in India. Five important features/ advantages of outdoor advertising are explained below-
-Cost efficiency: Out of home advertising methods are cost effective ways to promote a brand or service because OOH advertising is mostly one time investment. One outdoor ad can be kept for weeks, months or even years (provided the ad is not deteriorated by weather or alike factors). Hence, in out of home advertising one doesn’t need to invest again and again. Just invest once and wait and watch to observe the impact.
-Better reach: Outdoor ads provide better reach to customers as compared to other advertising practices. This is because outdoor ads cannot be switched off like television or print ads. One can avoid a television ad by changing the channel but one cannot avoid an outdoor ad by staying inside home and not going out. The bottom line is that everyone moves out of home and while moving out of home, one happens to watch all those outdoor ads about various brands. The compelling viewership provided to audiences is one of the major advantages or features of an OOH advertising campaign.
-Potential to reach intended customers: Outdoor brand promotion practices such as airport advertising, mall advertising etc have potentials to reach the targeted customers. Airport advertising is one of the most common practices of outdoor brand promotion. Any advertising campaign whether home based or outdoor is successful if it reaches out to the target audience. In such case, outdoor ads have the ability to reach and influence a defined target group with an affluent brand experience.
-Scope for creativity and longevity: Outdoor advertising provides more scope for creativity and longevity while promoting a brand, service, idea or business activity. This scope for creativity and longevity makes outdoor advertising an effective and reliable tool for brand promotion.
-Constant or non-stop exposure to public: Outdoor ads whether airport advertising or mall advertising provide constant exposure about the brand to the general public. This is another striking feature/ benefit of outdoor advertising. Maximum exposure in the market place means attracting a larger number of target audiences. Advertising is a customer-centric affair and attracting old/new pool of customers is equally important for an advertiser to promote his brand or service.
Outdoor advertising India is becoming trendy day by day. Especially with the advent of digital technology, outdoor advertising has undergone a radical change as compared to the conventional modes and techniques of brand promotion. The trends of outdoor advertising India are yet to revamp and renovate further with a touch of technological sophistication.
Reference Website: – www.tdiindia.com
We are a unique breed.
Talk of bounce rates, A/B split testing, conversions, affiliate marketing and page impressions gets us excited (maybe a bit TOO excited).
In our free-time, pulling out a Seth Godin book, re-reading training material from Ryan Deiss, or checking out the latest post on Mashable sounds about as good as it gets.
We are hard-core. Do you have what it takes?
If youre not sure whether youre TRULY an internet marketing superstar, Id encourage you to take this short quiz and see how you do (answers below).
Define the following online marketing acronyms:
CTR ________________________
CPM ________________________
SEO_________________________
PPC_________________________
CPA _________________________
SEM_________________________
B2B__________________________
B2C__________________________
CPL __________________________
CPC __________________________
CPS__________________________
CR___________________________
PPI___________________________
PPS__________________________
KPI__________________________
SERP_________________________
URL__________________________
ASV__________________________
CTR = Click Through Rate. Number of clicks on an ad divided by the number of times the ad was shown. Eg: 100 clicks / 10000 impressions = 1% CTR
CPM = Cost per 1000 Impressions. Cost expressed in dollars of an ad per 1000 impressions or pageviews. Eg: $5.00 CPM = $5.00 for every 1000 impressions.
SEO = Search Engine Optimization. Improving the ranking of a website through the use of organic techniques.
PPC = Pay-per-Click. Method of online advertising where the advertiser pays based on how many click throughs there are to their website.
CPA = Cost per Action. Method of online advertising where the advertiser pays based on how many of a particular action is taken (eg. Subscriptions, leads, sales, etc.)
SEM = Search Engine Marketing. Increasing traffic to a website through the use of organic and paid online advertising.
B2B = Business to Business (marketing). Marketing exclusively to other businesses.
B2C = Business to Consumer (marketing). Marketing exclusively to the consumer.
CPL = Cost per Lead. Amount advertiser pays for each lead generated by ad (registrations, subscriptions, etc.).
CPC = Cost per Click. Amount advertiser pays for each click generated by ad.
CPS = Cost per Sale. Amount advertiser pays for each sale generated by ad.
CR = Conversion Rate. Number of conversions an ad or website gets divided by total number of visits. Eg: 100 sales / 10000 visits = 1% CR
PPI = Pay per Impression. Advertiser pays based for each ad impression.
PPS = Pay per Sale. Advertiser pays for each sale generated through the ad.
KPI = Key Performance Indicator. Way of measuring progress towards specific goals. KPIs are decided on within an organization and then tracked to ensure company is meeting its goals.
SERP = Search Engine Results Page. The list of sites a search engine returns when you request a search.
URL = Uniform Resource Locator. Address of a website on the web.
ASV = Average Subscriber Value. On average, the cash value generated by each email or website subscriber.
So, how did you do? Are you an internet marketing superstar?
Weve even written about some of these acronyms
Facebook Advertising: CPC vs CPM for my Facebook Ads?
10 Tips for an Effective Facebook PPC Campaign
5 SEO Tips for Your Facebook Fan Page
Guild recruiters cannot be shy. Post in recruiting forums, erect a guild Web site, use in game recruiting tools, such as those in EQ2, these activities all promote your guild and you probably should avail yourself of them. However the fastest, cheapest, easiest most effective way to get new members for your guild is to simply ask in a general chat channel.
Before You Hit the Chat Channels You Need to Know…
…what benefit people will receive by joining your guild and at what cost? Do you provide help with grouping? Do you help people level? Are you a PvP guild? If so what kind of PvP guild? If you provide groups for members is joining guild groups required? If you help people level, is helping other members required? If you are an MMORPG PvP guild, does this mean you don’t do content or that you do organized battlegrounds?
Once you know the major benefit of joining your guild, create your message around that. Know the cost however, because you’ll need new members to understand that if you want to retain themmore about that in my next article for PlayerVox.
To construct your message take the big focus on your major benefit and combine it with one of two possible actions you want the interested party to take:
1. PST for membership info. Contact you immediately in (PST for Please Send Tell is fairly universal).
Be prepared to answer questions and potentially talk to multiple people at the same time. I like to either use a text file to cut and paste common answers, or setup macros when available.
2. URL. Save yourself a lot of typing by sending people to a special recruiting page setup in advance. Lazy people won’t take the time to go look however, so if you are zerg recruiting, don’t use this method. Using a Web page is ideal if there is a lot of information for potential members to consider.
* Present your guild as active and up-to-date. Do NOT send potentials to your inactive guild forums or glommed together site for info. Instead create a special page just for potential new recruits.
* Get the easiest URL possible. Example: “s1.guildcafe.com” is the domain name I use for the Section One guild.
* Always use the http:// so that people understand it is a web site you want them to look at.
Recruiting Message Samples
Helper PvE guild:
Learn the ropes and level fast with XYZ guild. PST for membership info.
Guild with funny people:
Laugh your way to level 50 with XYZ guild. Casual players welcome. PST for membership info.
Guild with serious PvErs:
XYZ guild seeks pro-PvE members. Do dungeons right with us. Ventrilo required. PST for membership info.
End game looters:
The PvE veterans of XYZ raid guild LFM for teamwork and achieving long term goals. http://www.blahblah.com
Adult social guild:
Like to play and chat? Join the lively world of XYZ guild on Ventrilo. http://www.blahblah.com Not kid friendly.
Crafting guild:
Attention crafters: Join with other crafters in XYZ guild to build an economic powerhouse and rule the server. PST for more info.
Player-killing guild:
Join for the Rep. Stay for the people who’d rather fight than switch. RPK all the way. PST for membership info.
Advertise, but don’t spam
Some old fashioned net-etiquette should be employed while advertising in chat channels:
* Use appropriate channels. Find out what channels are acceptable for guild recruiting. It’s different in every game. For instance, in Guild Wars, one uses the all channel. In some MMORPGs the regional chat channels are acceptable. Some games have special recruiting channels.
* Keep it short and sweet. Don’t attempt to explain every membership detail in your message. Things scroll away fast and people don’t have time to deal with long textheck, they don’t even read quest descriptions most of the time! More on this later.
* Don’t spam. The reason you repeat your message is to give busy people another chance to read it as well present yourself to new people who haven’t seen it. It is not to bore and aggravate people with your endless droning of e-garbage.
o How often you repeat your message is game dependent. In games like WoW, EQ2 and Vanguard, the number of new people coming into and going out of a channel is small, so repeat sparingly. Observe how frequently others repeat and repeat less than they do. If you get complaints, reduce your frequency even more. Being perceived as spam will get you on people’s ignore-list.
o In Guild Wars where people hop in and out of districts constantly, your best bet is to move around from place to place, repeat your message once per district then move on, repeating your cycle every five minutes or so.
* Change it up. Vary your message from time to time, test new messages, be clever, entertain. Boring messages equates to a boring guild.
Advertise eloquently…
…or at least avoid looking stupid:
* DON’T USE ALL CAPS.
* Do not load up your message with **l337** symbols and other #$%^& crap. Your potential recruits don’t have time or desire to decipher, so just use plain English.
* Stay away from over-used terms so ubiquitous that they are now meaningless. Ever seen anyone advertising for unfriendly, immature and inactive members? Almost all guilds are friendly, mature and active, so don’t use up precious space talking about it.
* Use goood speeling. You may not care about every day chat spelling and grammar, but nothing makes you look more like a stupid n00b than spamming the same error over and over. Check it first then store it in a macro or text file.
People want to join guilds that are active. They like to be able to login and find things are happening. One of the best things to do recruiting-wise is put together PUGs, then pitch guild membership to the better players.
You can take this idea a step further by organizing server events and advertising them in spam. Depending on how much creativity the game supports you can do a lot. Character weddings, PvP king of the hill events, PvP tournaments, PvE and PvP raids, crafting fairs, scavenger hunts, races and costume contests are all popular.
Worst Guild Recruiting Spam Ever
XYZ GUILD RECUTING friendly active players. All levels, races, classses and ages. Mature PvE and PvP. Have hall and cape. –
This is a pretty typical zerg guild spamhard to read, packed full of errors and easy to ignore. It attempts to attract people by sounding friendly, but undermines itself by trying to be all things to all peoplewhich equates to nothing for nobody. If you want to offer zillions of players a temporary spot in your revolving door clan, use this ad. (The have hall and cape is a Guild Wars thing. Since every guild has those, it amazes me that people even mention it. If they advertised a guild hall with all perks or silver cape that would be different.)
XYZ guild looking for members. 50 gold paid on joining.
Why not just say, attention leeches, come get 50gp then leave me for another guild If you are this desperate for members, consider calling it quits and joining an established guild.
UberAwesome guild looking for members. Raiding right now, come get your endgame loot!
This ad isn’t much better than the previous one. It’s just another opportunity for people to leech off your generosity. Inviting people to join your raids is a good way to impress people, but it’s best to keep those opportunities and your recruiting separate.
Conclusion
Don’t be shy! Speak up and use chat to let people know that you’re out there. Be wise with your messages, don’t abuse it, and you’ll be rewarded with plenty of interest.