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. Below are seven questions to ask yourself before 
writing out that check.

1. Do you need to generate customers/traffic/leads/etc. 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 e-zine list? If so, then you might be better off sending 
an e-mail (assuming you have customers' e-mails). Although 
technically e-mail 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 Web site 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 Web site 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 Web site. Advertising 
is good for speeding things along.

Frequency is king when it comes to marketing -- if you're out of 
your customers' sight, you're probably out of their mind when it 
comes to buying time. Advertising is a good way to beef up or 
speed up what you're already doing.

4. Are other marketing methods not appropriate in this situation?
Let's say you want to have a sale. But your customer database is 
small (or nonexistent). Your Web site has minimal traffic. And 
you aren't going to get any bites from the media since having a 
sale isn't news. What do you do? Run some ads.


5. Would you rather save time than money? Let's face it. Running 
an ad is easy. Other marketing methods are more time-consuming. 
If you want your marketing to be easy, then advertising is about 
as easy as it's going to get. (Now there is a caveat to this 
one, because you can hire people to do some of those marketing 
tasks, such as updating Web sites, running PR campaigns, etc. 
However, not everything can be hired out so you still might be 
stuck spending time you don't have.)


6. Are you planning to test a new campaign or a new 
product/target market? Running small, inexpensive ads can be a 
good way to test certain marketing aspects before launching big, 
expensive, time-consuming campaigns. If you want to penetrate 
a new market or if you have a new product to launch or a new 
marketing message to try, buy some ads and see what the response 
rate is. Another strength of advertising is control -- you have 
total control over your test.


7. Do other marketing approaches never quite measure up? It 
happens. Advertising in one or two specific media outlets seem 
to generate more sales and more leads then anything else you've 
tried. If that's the case, then don't mess with it. As the old 
saying goes, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.


Creativity Exercise -- Advertising and your business

Is advertising right for your business? Try this exercise and 
see.

1. What's your biggest marketing challenge right now? Write it 
down.


2. Go through the above list of questions and ask yourself each 
one. Does it apply to your situation? If it does, write that 
down too.


3. Do some brainstorming. In what ways can you use advertising 
to solve your marketing challenges? What media would work best? 
Online? Print? Radio? Television? Direct mail? Something else? 
Make up an ad for a variety of media. 

Now do the exact opposite. Think of ways advertising WON'T work 
for your business. Brainstorm at least 25 reasons why advertising
won't work for your specific situation. Be silly. It's a good way
to loosen you up.


4. Go back and reread both your pro and con lists. Now read your 
ads. Do you like what you came up with? Do any of them resonate 
with you, even now after coming up with your list of objections?

You may have just come up with your next advertising campaign. 

Copyright © 2005 Michele Pariza Wacek

Michele Pariza Wacek is the author of "Got Ideas? Unleash 
Your Creativity and Make More Money." She offers two free 
e-zines that help subscribers combine their creativity with 
hard-hitting marketing and copywriting principles to become 
more successful at attracting new clients, selling products 
and services and boosting business. She can be reached at:
http://www.TheArtistSoul.com.