When deciding what medium to use in a marketing campaign, it is very important to consider your objective. The two main objectives of any campaign can be broken down into Brand-Building and Traffic Now. Are you looking to build brand awareness or to increase your sales this month? The answer to that question helps determine your media mix for the campaign. Branding lasts a long time (over years if done well) and can be completely cut off for a while in down markets with little to no negative effects. Traffic Now should NOT be reduced during slow economic times. If you cut off your Traffic Now sources, you will notice an immediate decrease in leads and then sales.
All too often I see managers and small business owners getting confused about this. The message should fit the media which should fit the objective. An example would be car dealerships running TV commercials pointing at cars while shouting out prices, “only $19,995″. A few others seem to better understand the value of TV commercials and run ads with happy customers talking about how great their buying experience was – building the brand.
Is there some overlap here? ABSOLUTELY. In fact, your website should do both well. The main point here is that the better your message fits the media being used, the more effective you will be.
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interesting – never thought of the difference before. Thanks for sharing your insight!
Thanks for posting Lisa! This is one of the biggest confusion points I see with small business owners.