Following on from yesterday's post on the power of RASCIL in print advertising, we present to you an alternative view on writing the perfect persuasive copy for your product or service, nicely wrapped up in the mnemonic 'IDEA'.
Interest Desire Enthusiasm Action
Interest In the first instance the interest of the reader must be gained before there is the possibility of making a sale. The main methods of gaining the readers interest include:
- Unique selling point: car and van MOT’s just £35 - Self-interest: sale, 20% off with this advert - Curiosity: something new, something different
Desire The next stage is to create 'desire' – this is done by imagery and giving details to explain the offer and/or information about the product/services offered.
Enthusiasm The ad should now encourage the customer to call/visit the business today, not tomorrow. This is done by the use of selling phrases.
- "Buy now whilst stocks last" - "Yours for only £..." - "Call now for details" - "Offer ends in five days"
Action Now the ad has gained the readers interest, created desire and enthusiasm to buy, the reader then needs to know how they can contact the business.
- Name and address (including map) - Opening times - Telephone number - Web/e-mail address
Whether it's RASCIL or IDEA, Friday-Ad knows its stuff when it comes to print advertising. Why not give us a call on 0844 871 6604, or e-mail our sales team.
If you are a business owner, why not share your experiences (good or bad) with print advertising? Please leave your comments on the blog, or e-mail us at businessblog@friday-ad.co.uk.
Despite the rise and rise of online advertising and it's importance for small businesses (more on this to follow in due course), there is still a place for print advertising.
Print advertising - using Friday-Ad and other newspapers, magazines etc - can be a great way of getting customers 'through the door', but only if your adverts are saying the right thing.
The costs of print advertising can be quite high, so you need to make sure you are maximising the response which in turn will help you to analyse the ROI (Return On Investment).
Adverts that contain all of the information required to make the customer decide to respond to you are valuable to you, otherwise it's a wasted opportunity (and a waste of your money).
One way to ensure that you are including the right information in your ad is to follow the rules of R.A.S.C.I.L. Here's a quick summary of what this is and how you can use it to help create the right advert for your business. Please note that some of these things may not apply directly to you, but can be adapted to suit...
Reliability Authorised products and services Safety and Protection Completeness of service Illustrations Location
Reliability People buy from people they trust, so mention how many years you have been established, size of firm, locally owned etc.
Authorised products and service These are things that give the customer confidence. Use brand names, certificates and qualifications, credit card logos and mention if you are an 'Authorised Dealer'.
Safety and Protection These help to prove to the customer that they cannot lose out - things like guarantees/insurances, licences/certificates and memberships of trade associations.
Completeness of Service State what your USP or Unique Selling Point is. List your products and services and show the process the customer can expect from beginning to end - Pre-purchase advice, personal service and after-care advice.
Illustrations Images can bring adverts to life and make products real. Use product pictures, photos of staff, buildings, vans etc, company and other logos.
Location This is all about where to find you and how to get in touch. Use maps, landmarks, directions, parking, address, phone number, email, Skype address and website URL.
To find out more about creating great print adverts that work call the Friday-Ad team on 0844 871 6604 or email us. We offer a free advert design service as well, so you give us the content from above and we'll create you an eye-catching ad.
After a long day at the office, coming home to an inbox full of irritating advertising will have you reaching for the delete key quicker than you can say 'spam'. E-mail marketing, therefore, is an exact science. A quick web search will bring up a host of marketing gurus who offer tips for successful mailout campaigns, such as Dave Chaffey; not to mention the abundance of agencies who offer to deliver your message effectively to the right people on your behalf.
That's not to say that e-mail campaigns cannot be created in-house. Done correctly, e-mail marketing is a very cost-effective tool in communicating with customers old and new. The return on investment (ROI) rate for e-mail campaigns remains consistently high, as small businesses discover the most effective techniques in content and layout to convert a humble e-mail address into a paying customer.
Mailouts require skill and intrigue to ensure that your latest campaign isn't one step away from the Deleted Items folder, as these tips demonstrate...
Familiarity breeds contempt The contempt from the recipient will be particularly venomous if you continually bombard customers with six e-mails a day. It's the old pestering problem, and if you're constantly keeping your client base updated with all sorts of trivial information, it's akin to a kid pestering a parent on the road with "are we there yet?" Bombarding your customers into submission isn't going to work, while a crisp, to-the-point e-mail every once in a while may win them over in the long run.
Creativity isn’t a crime... Most marketing e-mails are boring, and the majority of recipients will lose interest after the first few lines. Make it stand out from the crowd – a quirky approach that subtly hammers home the point might just be the tonic. Needless to say, a well-crafted subject line that avoids spam keywords such as 'free' and 'money' will go a long way to grabbing the recipient's attention.
...but stay on message Is your e-mail relevant to the recipient? Is he or she really going to care about the great work your company is doing in the community? Study trends and feedback to discover what it is your recipients want to know. One often-overlooked technique is to apply Google's Analytics tracking tool to the links within your message, as demonstrated here by Dave Chaffey; this provides a thorough report on how the e-mail was handled by the recipient, information that can be vital in planning future mailouts.
Finally, data collection Put simply, you need to find out how many people subscribe willingly to your mail list. Plenty of people might 'drop in' to enter a competition, but it is more effective to target the more pro-active user base, those who are most likely to be converted into regular customers.
Do you own an SME that has created your own e-mail campaigns? Have you used any particular software or agencies, and if so, how effective were they? As ever, the Friday-Ad Business Blog wants to hear your experiences – please leave your comments below, or e-mail us at businessblog@friday-ad.co.uk.
Today's post features the first of many articles written for this blog by a business expert from the Sussex area. First up is Robin Houghton, a marketer with over twenty years experience, based in Lewes.
Time for some networking
Business networking, love it or loathe it? If you're groaning already, I promise this won't be a thinly-veiled promotion for a membership association. But here's the thing. Businesses are having a hard time of it right now and when the going gets tough, like it or not, the tough get networking.
I have a bit of a Jekyll and Hyde thing about networking. On the one hand, I absolutely believe in the principle of it – people do business with people not other businesses, it's not who you know it's who knows you, blah blah.
But I also acknowledge there's something contrived about getting together with the sole purpose of doing business, whilst going through the polite motions of small talk. All that bonhomie with complete strangers, awkward sales pitches and 6am starts - is it quite, well, British? Even my local chamber of commerce seems to view the idea of members promoting themselves to each other as positively grubby.
For my own part, I've done the formal business breakfasts, the informal get-togethers and quite recently had a taste of speed networking. What works? It depends on many factors, not least of all your personality, the type of business you are in and the make-up of the group you attend.
When considering the more formal membership groups, the two biggest issues to square are the cost (both of joining initially and the regular meeting fees) and the time commitment (often every week, with no time off for good behaviour.) In my experience, those who are almost guaranteed to do well in these groups are in 'commodity' businesses (something that most people will always need, like stationery suppliers, accountants, solicitors). They also suit outgoing types (although if you are on the shy side it can build up your confidence about standing up and speaking to a group, for example). The focus of this kind of group is on getting sales leads for one another, so although the time commitment may seem high there is a full agenda at each meeting and no time is wasted.
However, if your business is something more unusual, or your market somewhat niche, or if you have a strong aversion to smiling brightly at 7am, speaking in public or adhering to rules, you will probably be happier with informal networking. Turn up if you feel like it, wear what you're comfortable in, talk to who you like, have a drink and if you hate the hard sell, just be sociable.
Of course, even informal business networking carries its unwritten rules. Don't talk about yourself all the time, for example – far better to turn the spotlight on the person you're talking with. American business etiquette consultant Phyllis Davis offers many useful tips.
A word of warning though: it's a bit like brushing your teeth. Once or twice a year and you may as well not bother. You may not go to every meeting, but try to get along as regularly as you can, because it's the repeated, regular contact with people over the long term that seems to really bring results.
Hello and welcome to our Advice For Small Businesses blog. Our aim is to provide small businesses with a wide range of information related to marketing, advertising and promoting your business.
The blog is run by Friday-Ad, a well-known classifieds publisher that has been helping Sussex businesses to gain customers for over thirty years, both with our publications and our website, Friday-Ad.co.uk. Our experience gives us a really good insight into how small businesses can benefit from using a variety of advertising and marketing methods in order to maximise profit.
As well as advice, we'll be posting regular news items, plus interviews with marketing and business experts from the Sussex area. And it doesn't have to be us doing all the talking - each article allows you to post your own comments, so feel free to leave your thoughts and get involved with other readers.
Make sure you bookmark this blog or use our RSS feed to check for updates.
John Wright, national chairman of the Federation of Small Businesses, spoke to the BBC on Sunday about the credit crunch and the new £12bn Europe-wide fund that will go some way to keeping the 4.5 million UK-based small businesses in operation during the current economic climate.
It's a fair bet that at some point you've opened your inbox to find an invitation to join in the fun of social networking, an Internet phenomenon that has worked its way into public consciousness largely through word of mouth and an abundance of press coverage. Whether you enjoy being poked on Facebook, love discovering new musical talent on MySpace or have revealed your deepest secrets on Twitter, it seems that the craze for social networking has taken over the world. It's no wonder the business community is looking to how it can get in on the act.
It's easy to see why aspiring businesses would be enticed by social networks. Earlier this year it was revealed that there were over 14 million users of Facebook in the UK – and considering the huge range of information that Facebook captures from their users, surely this is a simple, effective platform for nabbing new customers?
Sure enough, Facebook offers Social Ads, a comprehensive marketing service that matches companies to specific demographics through targeted advertising. Picking out niches from millions of users is a skill that Facebook have honed well, thanks to their subtle use of detailed user profile information right down to favourite television programmes or relationship status.
However, the efficiency of Facebook's advertising services has been called into question. The reality of social networking is that people log on to be social; they are not there to click on adverts. The likes of Facebook and Bebo succeeded initially by offering a simple, fun place to interact; bring a corporate presence into the equation and users tend to not be interested.
This doesn't rule out social networking as a valid business tool. Many small firms have set up 'pages' with Facebook that act as a one-stop resource for company news and latest product offers; you can attract 'friends' to your page and send them information by e-mail, but the page can be seen 'publicly' and so does not require the reader to have a Facebook membership. A good example of a company page is WeCanDo.biz's Facebook presence.
The reality of social networking though, much like that other new-fangled business tool of blogging, is the constant time and energy involved in getting off the ground, interacting with online friends, and most importantly, keeping your online presence fresh and updated. Also, some businesses suit social networking more than others; Facebook, MySpace et al are still predominantly used by younger, net-savvy audiences, although the demographic is changing as more older users give social networking a go.
Those gurus of innovation, Google, may have pushed social networking for small business forward when they launched Friend Connect back in May. By simplifying the technology into 'widget' form, Friend Connect makes it easier than ever to bring the functionality of social networking to your own web pages, in theory converting your visitors into 'friends' who are inspired to regularly return to your web site.
I'll leave the full explanation to Google, but in summary, Friend Connect has the potential to work in a local business context. Imagine collecting 'friends' who are then alerted to new products or services; in turn they can provide feedback on the product, as well as pass on the news to other 'friends'. At the time of writing, Friend Connect still hasn't been formally released for public use, but when it does surface we will hopefully follow-up will a detailed analysis.
While some may think muscling in on the social networking phenomena is a necessity, it's also important for them to remember the primary reason why people enjoy these sites – the enjoyment factor. That's where subtlety becomes important; sure, online tools are more accessible and exciting than ever, but businesses need to connect with the trends of the day without it changing the face of their own day-to-day business.
Talking to Businessweek, leading web expert Peter Delgrosso from web.com gave his tu'penny worth on the social networking debate:
"For the most part, these social networking sites should be viewed as complementary to your online presence. Think of it as a nice-to-have, not a must-have. When used properly, it is something that can gain your business some attention. However, you need to realise it shouldn't be seen as a replacement to your traditional online presence."
While most businesses have pushed ahead with plans to capture the attention of the internet generation, it seems the jury's still out for some. We will cover social networking in more detail in the coming months; in the meantime, if you have used these tools as part of your company's online presence, then please let us know your opinions by leaving us a comment below, or via e-mail – businessblog@friday-ad.co.uk.
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