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Issue 7 > Seven questions to ask before you advertise.

Seven questions to ask before you advertise.

Michele Pariza Wacek with ideas on getting it right.

Most business owners and managers keep a fairly close eye on their marketing budgets. And nothing throws a budget out-of-whack faster than advertising.

Advertising, or paying good money to get your message in front of your target market, still has a place in your marketing mix, although it's not quite as effective as it once was.

If you're going to advertise, you need to be smart about it—or you can quickly find yourself with a blown budget and not much to show for it. Here's seven questions to ask yourself before writing out that check.

1 Do you need to generate customers/traffic/leads/etcetera right away? If so, then you better pull out your wallet.

Advertising is hands down the fastest way to get your message in front of your target market. (You're paying for placement after all.)

2 Do you have another way to get the word out about your business? For instance, do you have a customer database or an ezine list?

If so, then you might be better off sending an email (assuming you have customers' emails). Although technically email announcements fall under advertising, I'm not counting it in this particular case because it's more-or-less free (or very low cost).

Perhaps you have a good news angle and a good relationship with a reporter. Or you have a high-traffic website and/or blog. Or maybe you're an active volunteer with a large organization and can use networking to get the message out.

But if none of those really apply, then you'd better take a closer look at advertising.

3 Do you need to augment your other marketing efforts? Maybe you have articles featured on a website targeted to your customer base.

Great when your article is front and center and not-so-great when your article is buried in archives. A little advertising on that site can keep you in your target market's sight all the time.

Or maybe you struck gold and got a big article written about your company in the perfect trade publication. Fantastic for that month and not-so-fantastic for the other 11 months of the year.

Or maybe it's taking you longer than you'd like to drive traffic to your website. Advertising is good for speeding things along.

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