How To Produce Effective Ad Campaigns and Grow Your Business
Advertising and business have gone hand in hand since the beginning. Whether it’s to promote new products, cross-sell goods while showcasing your biggest sellers, or you’re simply looking to generate more brand awareness for your company, the best move you can make is to create your own ad campaigns. Think of big brands like Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Apple, and BMW, for example. We see advertising from these companies every day, and it’s not like people need to see them buy their products, but they spend millions on marketing each year.
If you’re a small business looking to grow or a startup trying to get your first customers, running ad campaigns and putting time into your marketing efforts is a proven method of generating revenue. To do this effectively, though, you’ll need to devise proper strategies, know when and where to place your ads, and who it is that you’re hoping to appeal to. This is especially true for startups since knowing your demographic is essential.
Wondering where to begin with your ad campaigns or how you can improve them? Read on for some useful tips.
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Know Your Purpose
It might sound obvious, but you need to know exactly what it is you’re looking to advertise. Campaigns can often be ineffective when the message is too broad, or the wrong product or service is communicated. Think of what your goals are: perhaps you want to boost engagement, promote a new offering, or generate revenue in areas that seem to be the least popular with customers.
Effective ad creatives are made by first recognizing your campaigns’ purpose, and if this is simply something more general like creating brand awareness, what your biggest selling points are to achieve your aims.
Choose Your Platforms
There are many ways to put your campaigns out there. Though advertising through less modern methods, like listing in newspapers, might not be all that cost-effective, you can reach a much wider audience and for less money by using social media, for example. Plus, the ease of communication means nurturing leads into loyal, paying customers is much more accessible.
Email is a format you should consider, also. It’s actually the most successful method, and it’s why approximately 90% of businesses use it as their main source of marketing. Plus, it’s free, and you’re able to speak directly to the people you’re trying to sell to.
Who Are You Appealing To?
Truly knowing your audience is an essential part of business success, not just for your ad campaigns. You shouldn’t just assume that you’ll be able to grab the attention of just about anyone – we all have different needs, wants, and hobbies, after all. If you sell handmade fishing tackle, you know that you’ll want to target people who enjoy fishing and anyone who wants to take up the hobby but hasn’t gotten around to it.
Once you’ve established who you’re appealing to, you can start to devise a campaign that speaks directly to your demographic. And with that, you should be getting ideas about the type of messaging that’ll get through to your audience. Let’s be honest; someone who sells knitting needles and yarn probably won’t see the best advertising results that include facetious humor.
Measuring Success 
Once you’ve released an ad campaign, how do you intend to track results? In other words, what metrics will you use to gauge whether or not it’s working the way you intended? For example, you might see a boost in your social media followings as a marker of success; an increase in sales and social mentions also shows that your campaign is being noticed.
If you’re promoting across multiple platforms – like email, social media, and local radio – you should consider how to measure effectiveness through these platforms and how much of your campaign success can be attributed to your presence on each one. This is easier to manage with social media and direct mailing, however.
Turn To The Experts
While some businesses have in-house teams to support their campaigns, many turn to the outside help available with marketing agencies. This is especially useful if you’re struggling to advertise successfully or you’re new to it. By collaborating with an agency instead of going it alone, you’ll first need to share the ins and outs of your operation; explain what your strengths are; give insight into your top-selling products, and explain what you aim to achieve with your campaign.
One big benefit of working with agencies is that they’ll create several mockups for you to choose from. What’s more, the turnaround time from conception to implementation will be much quicker than putting campaigns together in-house.
