Advertising is an important way to help promote your business and create brand awareness. The aim of advertising is to influence potential customers and generate leads by creating an impactful advertising campaign. These campaigns should be memorable if you want your business to stand out and win over customers.
Advertising takes form in different formats and has changed over the years as a result of the rise in technology, giving way to new advertising methods. Traditional forms of advertising include print, radio, TV, direct mail, and billboards. Modern forms of advertising include using social media, email, paid search, and native advertising. Whilst modern advertising formats are continuing to grow in popularity due to more people using the internet, it’s important to note that you shouldn’t forget about traditional methods as they are still just as effective when promoting your business. Take for example billboard advertising- there will always be cars driving on the road, meaning it is inevitable that they will look at billboards when making a journey and could be influenced to research your business.
Here are 7 types of advertising you could use to promote your business:
This form of advertising is becoming more and more popular due to an increasing number of people using different social media platforms. With social media advertising it’s easier to reach out to your key target market so it could be easier to generate leads. Across social media platforms you can use different methods of advertising- Tik Tok can be used for creating short videos and targeting a much younger audience, Instagram for showing visuals of your product and Facebook is good to use if you’re a small business because of its low costs when advertising and its wider range of demographics using the platform. Spotify are well known for advertising on social media with their Spotify #wrapped. Since 2017, Spotify has been sharing data with their users at the end of the year, which compiles a list of their most listened to songs, albums, and artists in a personalised ‘Spotify Wrapped’ summary.
This form of advertising is where advertisers pay a fee each time their ad is clicked, usually through a search engine. It is commonly used when advertisers have set a daily budget for campaign.
This is advertising where ads are only served on mobile devices and include: mobile display ads, mobile search ads, mobile videos, mobile app ads and social media ads. Mobile advertising is important as more people are using smart devices as opposed to a desktop computer when browsing online. At the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, the food chain Chipotle collaborated with Zoom to host a virtual hangout called “Chipotle Together” as people weren’t able to physically be together.
This method refers to ‘traditional’ forms of advertising and used to be the primary way of advertising before the technology boom. Print advertising is not as popular and if you’re a smaller business you might find the advertising costs are higher and it’s difficult to measure the success of an advertising campaign. This method is effective if you’re trying to target an older demographic who may not be as tech-savvy. Despite digital advertising growing in popularity, print advertising is still important. Transport for London launched its biggest campaign since the 2012 Olympics to encourage people to return to using the Tube and bus network as levels plummeted as a result of Covid-19. The “Welcome back London” campaign shows what people have missed out on over the past 18 months and has been published in local newspapers and the Time Out magazine.
This form of advertising includes mass-market media like radio and TV. The costs of broadcast advertising varies as it depends on the TV channel, the time you want to advertise, the frequency the ad is played, and the length of the ad. You also need to take into consideration the cost of producing the ad. The Super Bowl is one of the most expensive times to advertise, with the price of a 30-second commercial being $5,500,000 in 2021. John Lewis is known for its impressive Christmas advertising campaigns and is seen as a signal that the countdown to Christmas has begun. It features well known covers and a storyline to engage people of all ages.
This is advertising that reaches people when they are not at home and includes billboards digital signage, and transit ads. With digital advertising, people can use ad blockers, preventing them from seeing ads, but with out-of-home advertising, this isn’t the case as it’s difficult to avoid them, especially if you’re waiting at a bus stop. For this form of advertising to be successful, campaigns should be impactful and creative to keep people engaged. McDonalds launched a weather reactive McCafe campaign. Weather data was used to advertise seasonal drinks- if the temperature rose above 22 degrees it showed their frozen drinks, strawberry lemonade and millionaires frappe as this temperature was more likely to make a cold drink tempting to passersby and encourage people to go to McDonalds.
This involves ads that are delivered to a person’s home through the post and includes brochures, catalogues, sales letters, and newsletters. This isn’t a particularly popular method of advertising as people don’t like to receive advertising leaflets through their door as it might be considered junk mail. For it to be successful, the advertising has to be creative and visually appealing for consumers. To promote the Kit Kat Chunky, Nestle placed a Royal Mail style ‘We’re sorry we couldn’t deliver your parcel’ card through doors because ‘it was too chunky to fit through the letterbox.’ This campaign allowed the consumer to go and collect a free Kit Kat Chunky from a newsagent.
Now that you understand the different methods of advertising, take some time to consider what method would work best for your business- remember you don’t have to use every method!
