Like a lot of business owners, you’ve probably got by on the assumption that you understand marketing completely, and that there isn’t anything else to learn about it. This may be true if you’ve been a major CMO for the past couple of decades, but in all likelihood, that isn’t the case!
One common misconception among business owners is that marketing should be 100% digital in this day and age. Wrong again! Spending the right resources in the right marketing strategies can drive the success of your business.
Your business can benefit from the use of both digital and traditional marketing activities. Business blogs, social media mentions, Infographics, YouTube videos and AdWords are a lot more popular with businesses today.
But tangible traditional items like business cards, print ads in newspapers or magazines, posters, commercials on TV and radio, billboards and brochures can still attract target audience to your product or service.
Promotional products
You may think that promotional products are something that’s reserved for the biggest multi-national giants. This kind of attitude could be screwing you out of a lot of great leads! Promotional products are a hugely effective and affordable method of getting your name out there.
Not only do they inject an air of professionalism into your brand, they also give you a huge amount of outreach and brand recognition for a low, one-off cost. Let’s say you made a large order of promotional pens with your company name and phone number on them.
There’s no telling where these will end up. After all, everyone needs pens, and they change hands all the time! You could potentially get leads through these pens years after you put the money down. For more on promotional products, see this great guide from Dynamic Gift.
Business cards
Similar to promotional products, these will offer you a massive amount of outreach for a low initial investment. Unfortunately though, a lot of modern business owners manage to overlook business cards completely, and neglect the massive potential they have.
Some more old-school professionals, who could end up as seriously valuable partners, consider business cards to be a necessity. If you were to bump into one of these people at a networking event, they asked for your card, and you didn’t have anything to give them, then it’s going to be a staggering blow to your professional reputation.
While you should order some business cards as soon as you can, it’s a big mistake to rush through the design process. The lack of a clean, unique design is a hugely damaging mistake when it comes to business cards. You can find out more at the Design Inspiration.
Direct mail
There was a time when junk mail was the bane of everyone’s existence. This title is now held by spam email! In a time where your customers are constantly being bombarded by flashy ads before their YouTube videos, or in the banners of their web browsers, using direct mail marketing is a way to break through all that fuzz, and create a more personal connection with your customers.
Various studies have shown that a piece of direct mail marketing is far more likely to be opened than any spam email. I’m sure you’ve received at least one letter in the past week which you knew wasn’t going to make you buy anything. However, the high-quality envelope and graphics made you just curious enough to open it and check, right?