An advertising strategy is a plan to
reach and persuade a customer to buy a product or a service. The basic elements
of the plan are:
1)
The product itself and its advantages
2) The customer and
his or her characteristics,
3) The relative advantages of alternative routes
whereby the customer can be informed of the product, and
4) The optimization of resulting choices given
budgetary constraints.
In effect this means
that aims must be clear, the environment must be understood, the means must be ranked, and choices must be made
based on available resources. Effective product assessment, market definition,
media analysis, and budgetary choices result in an optimum plan—never the
perfect plan because resources are always limited.
DEVELOPING
THE STRATEGY
Positioning
Statement
Formal advertising strategies are
based on a "positioning statement," a technical term the meaning of
which, simply, is what the company's product or service is, how it is
differentiated from competing products and services, and by which means it will
reach the customer. The positioning statement covers the first two items in the
listing above.
Target
Consumer
The target consumer is a complex
combination of persons. First of all, it includes the person who ultimately
buys the product. Next it includes those who, in certain circumstances, decide
what product will be bought (but do not physically buy it). Finally, it
includes those who influence product purchases (children, spouse, and friends).
In practice the small business owner, being close to his or her customers,
probably knows exactly how to advise the advertising agency on the target
consumer.
Communication
Media
Once the product and its environment are
understood and the target consumer has been specified, the routes of reaching the
consumer must be assessed—the media of communication. Five major channels are
available to the business owner:
- Print—primarily newspapers (both weekly and daily) and
magazines.
- Audio—FM and AM radio.
- Video—Promotional videos, infomercials.
- World Wide Web.
- Direct mail.
- Outdoor advertising—Billboards, advertisements on
public transportation (cabs, buses).
Each of the channels available has its
advantages, disadvantages, and cost patterns. A crucial stage in developing the
advertising strategy, therefore, is the fourth point made at the outset: how to
choose the optimum means, given budgetary constraints, to reach the largest
number of target consumers with the appropriately formulated message.
Implementation
The advertising campaign itself is
distinct from the strategy, but the strategy is meant to guide implementation.
Therefore across-the-board consistency is highly desirable. Copy, artwork,
images, music—indeed all aspects of the campaign—should reflect the strategy throughout.
This is especially important when multiple channels are used: print,
television, and direct mail, for instance. To achieve a maximum coherence, many
effective advertisers develop a unifying thematic expressed as an image, a
slogan, or a combination which is central to all the elements that ultimately
reach the consumer.
Objectives
and importance
Let’s take a look on
these various types of objectives.
- Trial:
the companies which are in their introduction stage generally work for
this objective. The trial objective is the one which involves convincing
the customers to buy the new product introduced in the market. Here, the
advertisers use flashy and attractive ads to make customers take a look on
the products and purchase for trials.
- Continuity:
this objective is concerned about keeping the existing customers to stick
on to the product. The advertisers here generally keep on bringing
something new in the product and the advertisement so that the existing
customers keep buying their products.
- Brand switch:
this objective is basically for those companies who want to attract the
customers of the competitors. Here, the advertisers try to convince the
customers to switch from the existing brand they are using to their
product.
- Switching back:
this objective is for the companies who want their previous customers
back, who have switched to their competitors. The advertisers use
different ways to attract the customers back like discount sale, new
advertise, some reworking done on packaging, etc.
Basically, advertising is a very
artistic way of communicating with the customers. The main characteristics one
should have to get on their objectives are great communication skills and very
good convincing power.
Importance
of Advertising
Advertising plays a very important
role in today’s age of competition. Advertising is one thing which has become a
necessity for everybody in today’s day to day life, be it the producer, the
traders, or the customer. Advertising is an important part. Lets have a look on
how and where is advertising important:
- Advertising is important for the customers
Just
imagine television or a newspaper or a radio channel without an advertisement!
No, no one can any day imagine this. Advertising plays a very important role in
customers life. Customers are the people who buy the product only after they
are made aware of the products available in the market. If the product is not
advertised, no customer will come to know what products are available and will
not buy the product even if the product was for their benefit. One more thing
is that advertising helps people find the best products for themselves, their
kids, and their family. When they come to know about the range of products,
they are able to compare the products and buy so that they get what they desire
after spending their valuable money. Thus, advertising is important for the
customers.
- Advertising is important for the seller and companies
producing the products
Yes,
advertising plays very important role for the producers and the sellers of the
products, because
- Advertising helps increasing sales
- Advertising helps producers or the companies to know
their competitors and plan accordingly to meet up the level of
competition.
- If any company wants to introduce or launch a new
product in the market, advertising will make a ground for the product.
Advertising helps making people aware of the new product so that the
consumers come and try the product.
- Advertising helps creating goodwill for the company
and gains customer loyalty after reaching a mature age.
- The demand for the product keeps on coming with the
help of advertising and demand and supply become a never ending process.
3) Advertising is important for the
society
Advertising
helps educating people. There are some social issues also which advertising
deals with like child labour, liquor consumption, girl child killing, smoking,
family planning education, etc. thus, advertising plays a very important role
in society.
Elements of an
adervertising plan and an advertising strategy:
An advertising plan and an advertising
strategy provide the framework for small businesses and their advertising
agencies to develop, review and measure the effectiveness of advertising
campaigns in line with advertising and marketing objectives. An advertising
strategy sets out the method by which advertising meets the advertising
objectives. The advertising plan describes the creative and media tactics,
budget, schedule and other elements of the strategy.
Strategy
An
advertising strategy provides an overview and broad direction for the
advertising campaign. If the advertising objective is to increase New York
consumers' awareness of a local food brand by 25 percent, for example, the
strategy will describe how advertising can meet that objective. The strategy
recommendation might be to build brand awareness through high levels of
exposure, position the brand as a high-quality product and encourage retailers
to stock the product.
Review
The
client team and the advertising agency team review the strategy document to
ensure that it can meet the advertising objectives. The agency team can then
develop a detailed advertising plan to put the strategy into practice. Simply
creating advertising for its own sake, without a strategy, is unlikely to
deliver the best return on marketing expenditure. According to advertising
agency Adcracker, the advertising brief is like a road map that helps a team
get quickly to the right solution
7 Types of Ad Strategies Every Copywriter Should Know
Advertisers use various advertising
strategies to deliver unique product proposition and increase brand awareness
and sales.
Here are seven common ad strategies
advertisers use that every copywriter should know:
1. “Before and After” Strategy. Use this strategy to show life without the product and then
life with the product. Generally, you’d show a negative visual image of life
before the product and then a positive one after. This technique helps you show
the value and importance of your products.
2. “Advice” Strategy. This is a lateral, “we can help you” ad strategy. Use it to
express the benefit of your product or service. For example, you can emphasize
that everyone needs to consume protein everyday so you can sell more milk.
3. “Empathy” Strategy. Use this strategy to develop the audience’s empathy towards
a targeted audience. For example, a non-profit organization can show images of
ill children to make people feel sympathetic towards the kids. This approach
can help the non-profit organization raise funds.
4. “Testimonial” Strategy. This approach leverages a famous or non-famous consumer to
support the quality or benefits of a brand’s product. For example, a
professional basketball player can wear a pair of Nike basketball shoes to
support the quality of Nike basketball shoes.
5. “Demonstration” Strategy. This type of ad strategy focuses solely on ways to
explicitly show the product benefit via a “demonstration.
6. “Competitive” or “Comparison”
Strategy. Use this strategy to make either an
overt or subtle reference to any differences between your product and a
competitor’s product. The classic example is the Mac vs PC commercial where Apple directly compared Mac’s features against PC’s
to explicitly show the superiority of Mac computers.
7. “Negative to Positive” Strategy. Use this strategy to turn a boring or negative perception
about a product, brand, or market into a positive one by adding an extra or
clever argument. For example, VW’s famous “Think Small” ad turned the common
American belief that bigger is better, by showing positive reasons for owning a
small car, such as smaller bills and parking spaces.
Examples of Marketing Strategies Used to Sell a
Product
Marketing, often confused with
advertising, promotions and public relations, is the function that guides the development
and sales of products and services. Depending on your product or service,
competition, budget and customer type, your small business can use one or more
marketing strategy to grow your company.
Guerilla
Marketing
If you don't have a budget large
enough to purchase advertising, give away T-shirts or market your business at
promotional events through low-cost trades. For example, if you have employees,
you can ask them to donate their time to a local telethon, answering phones for
on-air mentions of your company. They can act as ushers, parking attendants or
concession workers at events. If you are a florist, you can lend decorative
plants to a function attended by your target market in exchange for signage. If
you own a restaurant, you could set up a concession stand at high school sports
events, donating the profits to the school in exchange for product sampling. If
you are a car dealer, you can lend cars for parade use.
Positioning
One way to market your product
without spending money is to create a brand, image or position in the
marketplace. This might be as simple as pricing a product on the high end to
create an air of quality, or pricing it on the low end to make it seem a good
value. If you limit your product to one gender, such as selling only women's
shoes, you send a message to that gender that your product or service was made
especially for them. Selling golf clubs in pro shops only, instead of big box
stores, tells the public that your clubs are for serious golfers.
Cause
Marketing
One way to develop brand loyalty is
to sponsor a charity. Pay the fees or supply the uniforms for local sports
teams. Sponsor a tennis tournament or marathon that raises money for a charity.
Offer churches and schools discount days or nights, donating a portion of what
their members spend to the church or school. In exchange for a local charity,
such as an animal shelter, hospital or school, promoting your business, donate
a percentage of your sales to the organization. This is an effective way to
introduce new products or services into the marketplace.
Sports
Marketing
People who are loyal to a sports
team may appreciate your supporting their team as well, helping you create an
affinity between those fans and your product or service. Sponsoring a sporting
event offers many opportunities. You can get signage at the event, have
athletes or officials wear your logo on their uniforms, set up a booth at the
event, have the event named after your company or specific product, and be
mentioned in pre- and post-event marketing materials.
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