Had the company spent $2500 on the commercial and $2500 on air time, the viewer would have recognized the commercial and actually watched it. It would not have shown on as many channels, but the number of people watching the ad would have increased.
Now imagine if you could have the best of both worlds; a high quality ad that covers a large audience. Today's technology makes that possible.
Let's say you sell bicycles. You have been in business for 20 years. Your father started it and you continue the family business with your kids and wife. Now let's say you have a total budget of $2000 for advertising. You could spend $500 on a cheesy commercial with a few graphics and your phone number with horrific background music and then spend $1500 putting it on local channels. It will run about 50 times over a period of 4 weeks. Yep, the average cost for non-peak hours on local cable is $20 per 30 second spot. That's not a lot of coverage and considering you only spent $500 on the production of the ad, most people aren't going to watch it anyway.
Now let's say you took that same $2000 and spent $1500 on the production. You created a 2 minute video that showed the old building, your dad when he was young and interviewed you and your father in short documentary style that showcases the philosophy of your business and the quality of your product. The result is a captivating, highly professional production that plays more like a movie than a TV commercial.
Now upload that video to YouTube and Blip.TV and iTunes for FREE. Enter a few keywords so people searching for Bicycles in your area will see the results in their web browser. Already you have access to millions of viewers and it didn't cost you a dime.
Of course, just because we have this great video on YouTube, it doesn't mean someone in your neighborhood is going to look for it. That is where web targeted advertising, like Google's Adwords, comes into play.
Setup an Adwords account with Google. Yep, it's FREE. You can set the amount of money you want to spend, so let's say $100 a month. Google will then take your ad and place it on any webpage that uses the keywords you specify. When someone searches for Bicycles, your ad will show up on the screen. The best part is that you don't pay for that ad unless they click on it. that means your ad could show up on 5000 web pages in a month and if no one clicks on the ad, you don't pay a dime. Adwords also works with Gmail, Google's email. If someone receives an email and the word Bicycle is present, your ad will show up on the side of the screen. What better way to get direct advertising? At the very worst, it would cost you $500 for 5 months, assuming everyone clicked on your ad. It is very possible that you will never hit your limit and stretch that $500 over an entire 12 month period.
That is just one of many examples of how today's media technology can help you stretch your advertising dollar and reach more customers than ever before. Just be sure that when they do reach your ad, you spend the money on a professionally produced video. Otherwise you are back to square one.
