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Key Questions Target customers
Consider what is probably the most important factor when creating an ad strategy--your target customers. Who are your target customer? It's very helpful to know what kinds of people are now buying your products or services and who you'd like to target. Adults? Teenagers? Male? Female? High income? Low income? Years ago, as a young salesperson, this author was making recommendations to a discount liquor store that their ads needed a lot of cleaning up. After suggesting I run it by an artist to give it a nicer look, I was told in no uncertain terms not to change the ad. As it turns out, it was purposely designed to look downscale, since they were trying to convey the message that they were a "no-frills" warehouse discount store. They wanted people who were interested in saving money, so the design, as it should, had emerged from that goal. They knew their customer. Why should these people come to you? This is one of the most important questions you can ask yourself. We recommend making a list of reasons, from your strongest ("we've been in business 50 years) to your weakest ("free estimates") and keep this in front of you when creating your strategy. Why do they choose one place rather than another to buy? In other words, what does your target customer care about most when choosing one place rather than another to buy the products or services you sell? Many businesses who attend our ad strategy seminars get this confused with the question above, since they sound so similar. It's an important distinction, though. This question isn't asking what you're good at, but what your target customers care about most when choosing one place rather than another. So you might not be as good as your competitors regarding selection, but your target customers, perhaps busy with only a couple of hours to make a decision, might rule out anyone without a large selection. Keep this list in front of you as well when creating your strategy. What do you do with this information? While this article was about what information you need to develop your strategy and design an ad, some of the other articles on this web site, in the Design Your Ad and the Build Your Ad sections, and certainly in our live and online course, can help you transform this raw information into a winning ad.
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