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Most small businesses have limited marketing communication, aka advertising, budgets making it even more crucial to research thoroughly; select the best medium(s) and target prospects carefully.

The following list contains seven suggestions for achieving “champagne” results on a “beer” budget!

1. Develop one or several, robust customer referral programs

Although most business owners acknowledge that customer referrals generate a great deal of their new business, very few have implemented a “formal” referral incentive program, even though this is one of the most effective, least risky way to acquire valuable customers particularly if you’re a service professional!

Example: Offer current customers who refer a friend a free month/hour of service; instant “bottom of the bill” credit; or free merchandise AND a “spiff” for the “referee”! The details are up to you I go into much greater detail of types of referral programs in my book, “Marketing, The Art and Science of Getting and Keeping Profitable Customers” if you’d like to learn more.

2. Dance with the Guy Who Brought You

There is absolutely no reason to ditch old marketing collateral (marketing lingo for brochures; direct mail letters; signs; point-of-sale displays; ad copy; promotions, etc.) if they still work! It’s okay to use the very same creative, send it to the very same prospects and/or run it in the very same publications over and over again, as long as it generates the desired results. However, it’s always a great idea to continually conduct small, statically valid tests of new looks, offers and messages.

3. Don’t overdo the quality and quantity of your advertising pieces or media mix

Smart marketers know when to “put on the dog” and when it’s a waste of money. Falling in love with fancy four-colored brochures; glitzy magazine ads; primetime TV spots; or silver-embossed letterhead is a huge mistake.

The sales vehicles, look and feel, and quality of all of your marketing communications must be appropriate for your product or service and most importantly, have a measurable impact on its effectiveness.

For example, variables like paper quality and graphics on a direct mail letter are far less important than the offer, so you could potentially save thousands of dollars by cutting back on the frills. The opposite is true when you’re developing a professional brochure meant to represent your company to the outside world.

Bottom line: Don’t do fancy for fancy’s sake it’s a waste of money; unproductive and may even be totally inappropriate for your target audience.

4. Use studies, reports and articles to assist in educating potential customers about your products or services

This is a wonderful, low-cost way to add clout! Can you imagine including a New York Times article on obesity with your nutritional services direct mail piece? What an impact! Or perhaps the same nutritionist would enclose a reprint of a medical report that linked certain childhood diseases with poor eating habits?

5.Use Boiler-Plated Literature Templates

What a simple, but powerful, tip! A very perplexing, and often expensive problem is how to develop market-appropriate material for diverse audiences without going broke.

The solution is simple. For instance, you can develop various sales letters using a “boiler plated” template; identical layout and content that are suitable for any audience. However, several predetermined sections are left blank for personalization. This is often called “modular literature”

6. Don’t change your own car oil

How do you think I know this? You’ve probably had similar experiences You know the ones trying to save a few bucks by doing it yourself? So off you go drive to the store; wait in line; ask questions; look at the merchandise; select the oil, pan, funnel; wait in line to check-out; pay the cashier $24.97; drive back home; try to jack up the car so you can get underneath it to put the pan in place; undo the screw; get some oil in the pan; get most of the oil on you; get the funnel and fill it with the new oil; close everything down; throw your oil-laden shirt in the trash; and take a shower.

Cost? $24.97 in stuff; $1.32 in gas; $25.00 ruined shirt; 3.25 hours of your time; $1,000,000 in frustration All this, when you could have had it done for you for $32.00!!

Lesson learned: Know what’s best left in the hands of professionals. Low cost is not always best cost!

However, there are times when doing it yourself is smart! If you’ve got better than average computer skills or design talents it’s easy to create things like business cards, letterhead and bill stuffers but please, unless you’re an ad buyer by trade, do not try to buy, book or design ANY media (especially TV and radio) by yourself! Trust me, you’ll waste more money than you’ll save!

7. Pay suppliers on time

Not only will you endear yourself to vendors, but you can take advantage of your suppliers’ standard early pay discounts or create your own! This also saves money on late fees and will surely make vendors more likely to extend even better prices and offer you ongoing top notch service.

Mary Eule specializes in helping small and medium-sized businesses get and keep profitable customers. Formerly a Fortune 500 marketing executive; founder of two successful small businesses and award-winning speaker, Ms. Eule is President of Strategic Marketing Advisors, LLC. and co-author of a new book, “Marketing: What it Really Means and How to Make it Work for Your Business”. She holds a master degree in marketing from Johns Hopkins University. Log onto http://www.StrategicMarketingAdvisors.com for free articles, newsletter and helpful tools, tips and templates .

Tags: adv, Advertising tips, marketing tips, small business, Small business marketing, small business tipsadv, Advertising tips, marketing tips, small business, Small business marketing, small business tips

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Advertising, when done well is a very effective way to increase your customer base and ultimately grow your bottom line.

Many businesses have no idea how to advertise; they do a little bit here and a little bit there and end up saying that advertising doesn’t work. Advertising, like everything else in business, requires a systematic, consistent approach. Even when you are getting results, tweaking a good message can make it a great message.

Fundamentals of good advertising:

1. Use a great titlenot a cute title but one that grabs attention and communicates what the purpose of the ad is. If you start the ad with the name of your business, you will discourage a large portion of prospective customers from reading your ad because if they don’t know what you do they will often assume you are not speaking to them.

2. Test titles and messages on an on-going basis and measure the response, small adjustments in the ad can increase response by 100% or much more.

3. Take the response you got from an ad and divide the cost by the response to see if it was worthwhile. An ad that doesn’t elicit a response is too expensive no matter how little you spent on the advertising. Give it time don’t just advertise once.

4. Don’t advertise everywhere. Initially choose one medium and one company for your advertising and stick with it. Once you have figured out what works add another medium or company to the mix.

5. Before you place your ad, look at the characteristics of the audience and consider if it matches your target market. Don’t make the mistake of assuming everyone is your target market because they are not. Even if your product has a broad appeal when you consider all factors of who buys you will be able to identify demographic or specialized interest groups that will provide a better return on your advertising investment.

6. Don’t always blame the medium for your lack of result. Once you have identified the unique characteristics of your market it’s incumbent on you to speak to that market using phrases, and communication styles that they relate to. If the publication, radio station, TV station etc. has thousands or hundreds of thousands in their audience and no one responds after a few weeks of advertising, take a good look at what you are advertising and more importantly how you are communicating the information.

7. When you have developed an ad that is working, test small changes to see if you can boost the ad response even more. Make one change at a time to ensure you can identify what the strongest pluses of the ad are.

8. Have you ever heard someone say that they turned their money over to a money manager of some sort and before they knew it, they had lost thousands or hundreds of thousands of dollars? You wouldn’t do anything that foolish would you? Well then why would you turn full control of your advertising dollars to a media sales person for them decide what to advertise and how to communicate it in an ad? Most media reps have your best interest at heartthey want you to get results because it will make their next sale to you that much easier but the ultimate beneficiary of successful advertising is you and you had better be involved. Ask your rep to educate you about their medium and give you some information on their audience. Take the time to read it. Advertising is not an expense; it’s an investment and requires attention to ensure success.

9. If a prospect reads your ad, is there something in the ad that says what you expect them to do? Do you ask them to call and give an accurate phone number or do you want them to come into your store and you give them the address. I don’t know how many times I have seen ads that left off the address or the phone number has a wrong digit or isn’t there at all. If they need to make an appointment, clearly articulate that in the ad.

10. When someone responds to your advertising, make it easy for him or her to do what you expect. If they have to keep playing telephone tag to try to connect with you then it’s going to reduce the effectiveness of your advertising dramatically.

Nancy Fraser is the President of Nota Bene Consulting. She has been helping clients improve their advertising results and grow their businesses for over 20 years. Free advertising and marketing information in Notable News http://www.notable-marketing.com

Tags: adv, advertising response, great titles, how to advertise, improve advertising results, test messageadv, advertising response, great titles, how to advertise, improve advertising results, test message

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