Look around your house, your desk at the office, your mailbox, and brochure holders in business locations and the answer is abundantly clear -
“NO” . There are mailers and flyers and handouts everywhere. Why? Because good brochures are effective ways of getting your message in the hands and minds of potential customers and clients. Even if you only visually scan a piece, it’s primary message has been delivered – and if it’s a subject of interest you’ll likely read the whole story then or set it down somewhere to keep to read later. It then has shelf life.

Who can benefit from distributing brochures? Almost every independent business person – sales, services – and nearly every entity and professional practice. “Isn’t the internet where people go to find out about us?” Yes. People search the internet for everything – agents, products, services. However, if their search parameters don’t bring you up, they don’t find out about you. But if they have your professionally created personal or company brochure in hand, they can know about you or your company plus be invited to visit your website – perhaps even using a QR code for the millions of smart phone users out there.

Interested in talking about a brochure – firstinadvertising.com

“14th ANNUAL KAPPA SIGMA (of Colorado University) Golf Weekend
50 Years after these Brothers were in college together Lifetime Friendships – One of the Lasting Benefits of Fraternities on Campuses”

An appropriate article would accompany this photo to a paper, magazine, blog, email. Fraternity brothers gathering annually nearly 50 years after graduation is news for a certain audience! A great ad for the Kappa Sigma Fraternity and the Greek system.

What are your employees or your company doing that is newsworthy?

Sales up year over year? New service or product?
Just landed a new client? Attended a benefit? Won an award?

Something’s certainly happening to shed a favorable light on your company?
Charitable contributions, Community Service, Employee Promotions…

Want to talk about PR – The Advertising Company

Facebook and Twitter were specifically pointed out as tools to make businesses and internal business communications more effective. IBM is expanding development efforts in the areas of The Cloud and Mobile Devices. If your business hasn’t plunged into the social media wave, which is building to a tsunami, the time is now.

If you are only marginally in and paddling on the back of the wave, a toe to test the water, it’s time for the plunge and for putting someone in your organization in charge of setting up and managing your social media presence. This person/group can initially seek outside assistance to get on the front of the wave. Then work with an outside agent plus utilize skills learned by in-house personnel.

Using social media effectively requires planning, scheduling, creating your campaigns, and performing on-time. It involves building a following, getting feedback from your following about your social media output. It involves a commitment by management. Is “social media” instead of what you’re doing now to get the word out about your business – products, service, image, brand? No. It’s a vital addition to your current e-marketing and print media campaigns.

Want to find out more – firstinadvertising.com

IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced a new initiative to help organizations become social businesses with the broadest support for smart phones and cloud delivery models. With today’s news, IBM is introducing new software, services and programs that will help organizations integrate social networking concepts into business processes to accelerate collaboration, deepen customer relationships, generate new ideas faster, and enable a more effective workforce. A shift is occurring in the enterprise.

The adoption of social software is rapidly becoming a vital business tool, enabling organizations to transform virtually every part of their business operations from marketing, customer service and sales, to product development and human resources. Social business offers the world of possibility that occurs when all of the energy and opportunities that have been generated around consumer models, such as Facebook and Twitter, are focused, and brought to bear on business challenges.

According to IBM’s 2010 CEO Study, 57 percent of companies who have invested in social business tools have outperformed their peers citing collaboration as having a direct impact on their organization’s growth (1). In fact, social business software is rapidly gaining momentum in the enterprise. The market for worldwide social platforms is expected to increase by 33 percent in 2011 to $630 million, and triple to $1.863 billion by 2014.(2) Complete press release at http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/33513.wss –>> Need help with your social media?

The ADVERTISING Company – firstinadvertising.com

Bigger is not necessarily Better in Advertising.

But bigger is one way to reach a certain segment of your market. How do you reach your market?

• FACE-TO-FACE – Personal Calls and Appearances (Seminars, Speeches), membership in organizations

• PRINT MEDIA – newspapers, magazines, flyers, company brochures, product/service brochures, direct mail to targeted markets, public relations articles

• VIDEO – Television, YouTube

• INTERNET – Websites, Social Networks (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn), effective Blogging – consistent and relevant articles

What contributes to success in advertising?

Planning • Branding • Quality Ads, content and appeal • Consistent, ongoing Programs • Continual Reviews of Effectiveness • Altering direction as needed

Continual reviews of the results of advertising are the best way to know if your advertising dollars are being well invested. How do you know what’s producing results. Ask clients and customers how they found you. Ask customers what they think of your advertising. Test your advertising on a control group beforehand to get its appeal. Study your traffic according to search engine statistics. Meet with your advertising professionals frequently.

Method of Advertising vs Customer Profile

For example, what age group is best targeted for your products or services? The important place to begin is planning your advertising strategy. Statistics are showing that a substantial percentage of target customers in the 18 to 40′s age group are looking hard at things through mobile devices – iPad, smart phones. Many of those prospects will likely never see your printed newspaper ad because they also get their news online. Online advertising is likely where your target customer will find you – complete with the “Follow me on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube” clicks as a part of it. Electronic presence, easily available, is a window to much of today’s 18-55 age group with the 55+ groups growing stronger.

Information provided on psfk.com

The point being that a study of your target market is essential. Nearly 80% of the internet viewers report searching electronically for health matters, with a similar percentage doing product research, and 70+% getting news on line. Other activities are summarized by ZDNet Research. The results of your research might point to the use of printed media (high impact magazine that targets an affluent market) or video to make your pitch almost live. Sources indicate that internet users are starving for more quality information now and video is an excellent way to feed this need.

However, don’t ignore that effective print advertising not only produces direct results but can also drive traffic to your websites for additional benefits.

This blog post does not advocate the exclusive dependency on electronic advertising. A mix of printed and electronic advertising normally reaches the largest target market.

There is a magic wand in advertising.

It works when you point it in the proper direction.

What’s your market and what gets the best results for you?

Want help evaluating your current advertising with a look to the future? Call on The Advertising Company and it’s 20+ years record of success for it’s clients.

Photo-synthesis - Dancer backed by Hubble Telescope photo - click image to enlarge

Creating Memorable Advertising and Promotions

Over the last couple of decades, the camera hasn’t needed to click the exact image to create the desired image. Photoshop and other photo editing systems give creators of synthesized photographs a great deal of flexibility in combining and editing. Unless one is a purist who believes that a photo must stand on its own, “photo-synthesis” creates excellent images that may be difficult or impossible to photograph – such as the above combination of the dancer in front of a galaxy a few thousand light years away.

click image to enlarge

Cameras Have Limitations – Imaginations don’t. Parts of a composite image may be impossible to get together as a single actual photo. For example, she’s in the city, the rest of the image needed is elsewhere. They can join perfectly in the studio.

We can correct for limitations of camera lenses. Quite often wide angle isn’t nearly wide enough but a professionally joined combination of photos can get the job done beautifully. Below, contrast the single wide-angle photo (right) with combining three vertical wide-angle photos to present a total view of a voluminous room.

CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE

How does “Photo-synthesis” Benefit your Advertising

Imagination and creativity are powerful forces in advertising. Strong images combined with powerful messages and creative design have always produced the best results from advertising.

Chuck Fetterhoff, The Advertising Company

Have an advertising need? The Advertising Company can help you -

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When was the last time you got a thank you by snail mail OR email from your auto mechanic, dentist, bookseller, grocer, lawyer, or accountant. They all have our contact information and solicit business from us, but how many of us as business people take the time to send a handwritten (or at least hand signed) appreciation card to a customer or client – or a friendly email that asks for nothing – just says “Thanks”.

Did you know that statistics indicate it takes 6 or 7 times the expense to get a new customer or client than it does to retain an existing one. Customers need to know we appreciate their business and they are important to us. Simple concept? Yes. A few extra minutes per customer per year is a wise investment.

Are we living in an e-World? Yes, and that’s a good thing. So is that good old fashioned personal touch.

Chuck Fetterhoff, The Advertising Company

Have an advertising need? The Advertising Company can help you -

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