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Curious to know if you guys are spending less on advertising / marketing these days?
Are you cutting down on your advertising/marketing spending?
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Re: Are you cutting down on your spending?
no, not really. We dont do any ads in the papers and what not. We just put up a new banner and we are working on a new sidewalk sign. I found we do better without the advertsing in papers. We may as well take a match to our money......it gets us the same number of people.
Now is when you want to push yourself....get out there and seen. Everyone else is tightening up the purse strings. Make sure you get seen....and it can certainly be done on the cheap!! When everyone rides out the storm, they will remember you!
no, not really. We dont do any ads in the papers and what not. We just put up a new banner and we are working on a new sidewalk sign. I found we do better without the advertsing in papers. We may as well take a match to our money......it gets us the same number of people.
Now is when you want to push yourself....get out there and seen. Everyone else is tightening up the purse strings. Make sure you get seen....and it can certainly be done on the cheap!! When everyone rides out the storm, they will remember you!
Re: Are you cutting down on your spending?
Geez, I could go on and on about this one.
I agree with Robin, don't waste your time and money on any print ads. They do not work in this industry, at least they do not work for us, and I have learned the same from many other printers and businesses in our industry. We placed a phone book ad consisting of line entries in 5 categories, a business card size ad on a couple pages and listing on their website, at a decent price, to run for a year, and we have not received one hit from it in 9 months and will not renew it. Other printed ads have done absolutely nothing for us.
The best marketing is online, walk ins for local businesses, chambers of commerce gatherings, etc. Of course as always word of mouth too...
Keep online marketing up, and spend money on it!!!
This is the time that you want to increase your spending on marketing!!! Let me repeat with emphasis, THIS IS THE TIME TO INCREASE YOUR SPENDING ON MARKETING!
The first quarter of every year is the slowest, and January is rapidly approaching. Start your marketing now in preparation for that.
Also market heavily through what looks like it's an honest to goodness recession coming our way. This seems like the time that you would want to be pinching marketing pennies but it is not. Pinch in other areas, but spend spend spend on marketing. Why? You want to drive in business NOW, you want to drive it in and bring it in when fewer people may be looking for you and more people are wary about spending money. There are industries and customers out there who will weather the recession and will have money to spend through it. Find them and go after them.
In addition to that, if you can survive the recession, when it is over, your really going to boom. There are many reasons for this. You may have local or nationwide competitors who may not survive. We may see many shops close their doors. What happens to you if you've marketed your way through a recession, kept your head above water, and 5 other print shops in a 5 mile radius around you (we're in a super competitive area, and there are 3 times that number around us) have shut down? Well, during and after the recession, some or much of that business is likely to be yours.
Capitalize on this, read a lot, learn what other successful companies in any industry have done in times like these. This is obviously a time where people are worried about the economy. Stay confident in yourself and your business and market with the mind that you will be better and bigger and stronger if you weather the storm!
Best of luck to all of us!
Geez, I could go on and on about this one.
I agree with Robin, don't waste your time and money on any print ads. They do not work in this industry, at least they do not work for us, and I have learned the same from many other printers and businesses in our industry. We placed a phone book ad consisting of line entries in 5 categories, a business card size ad on a couple pages and listing on their website, at a decent price, to run for a year, and we have not received one hit from it in 9 months and will not renew it. Other printed ads have done absolutely nothing for us.
The best marketing is online, walk ins for local businesses, chambers of commerce gatherings, etc. Of course as always word of mouth too...
Keep online marketing up, and spend money on it!!!
This is the time that you want to increase your spending on marketing!!! Let me repeat with emphasis, THIS IS THE TIME TO INCREASE YOUR SPENDING ON MARKETING!
The first quarter of every year is the slowest, and January is rapidly approaching. Start your marketing now in preparation for that.
Also market heavily through what looks like it's an honest to goodness recession coming our way. This seems like the time that you would want to be pinching marketing pennies but it is not. Pinch in other areas, but spend spend spend on marketing. Why? You want to drive in business NOW, you want to drive it in and bring it in when fewer people may be looking for you and more people are wary about spending money. There are industries and customers out there who will weather the recession and will have money to spend through it. Find them and go after them.
In addition to that, if you can survive the recession, when it is over, your really going to boom. There are many reasons for this. You may have local or nationwide competitors who may not survive. We may see many shops close their doors. What happens to you if you've marketed your way through a recession, kept your head above water, and 5 other print shops in a 5 mile radius around you (we're in a super competitive area, and there are 3 times that number around us) have shut down? Well, during and after the recession, some or much of that business is likely to be yours.
Capitalize on this, read a lot, learn what other successful companies in any industry have done in times like these. This is obviously a time where people are worried about the economy. Stay confident in yourself and your business and market with the mind that you will be better and bigger and stronger if you weather the storm!
Best of luck to all of us!
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Re: Are you cutting down on your spending?
Dan thanks for the great post.
I agree with both you and Robin that print ads just don't seem to work (at least not for me)
I placed ads a few times and never got one call. (now the guy stops every week, can't get rd of him. you would think me saying no everytime he would give up
)
Dan thanks for the great post.
I agree with both you and Robin that print ads just don't seem to work (at least not for me)
I placed ads a few times and never got one call. (now the guy stops every week, can't get rd of him. you would think me saying no everytime he would give up
)
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455 Posts
Re: Are you cutting down on your spending?
Spending less??? I've never spent any All I've ever done is put a vinyl sign on the back window of our Jeep and got a free online yellow page ad. Can't say we've seen any signs of a recession, I just ordered another embroidery machine to handle the load. And that doesn't include the upswing for the holidays that are just starting to flow in. Guess we are one of the lucky ones. The only other marketing we do is to make a cap, t-shirt, cup, etc. with a companies logo on it and send it to them, and we don't need to do that very often.
Spending less??? I've never spent any
All I've ever done is put a vinyl sign on the back window of our Jeep and got a free online yellow page ad. Can't say we've seen any signs of a recession, I just ordered another embroidery machine to handle the load. And that doesn't include the upswing for the holidays that are just starting to flow in. Guess we are one of the lucky ones. The only other marketing we do is to make a cap, t-shirt, cup, etc. with a companies logo on it and send it to them, and we don't need to do that very often.Re: Are you cutting down on your spending?
on the other hand, something needs to be done in order to expose a product, be it word of mouth, radio ads, web or whatever works. No one will know about your product if you dont market/advertise it.
Of course all businesses are different and what may work for one may not work for another...for obvious reasons.
But, I for one do believe that marketing/advertising when done right does work and it is a necessary element of any business operation.
...jut my onion.
:
I guess spending less on marketing/advertising would only apply if such promotions do not work. In this case, it would be better to stop or improve the ads or look elsewhere to promote.
on the other hand, something needs to be done in order to expose a product, be it word of mouth, radio ads, web or whatever works. No one will know about your product if you dont market/advertise it.
Of course all businesses are different and what may work for one may not work for another...for obvious reasons.
But, I for one do believe that marketing/advertising when done right does work and it is a necessary element of any business operation.
...jut my onion.
:
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121 Posts
We always cut down in January and February. Only because that is the slow season for us.
Thanks Rodney...
Funny, because I bumped into the Yellow Pages salesperson whom I canceled that ad with at a gas station after lunch today. A couple of months ago he called to ask if I would renew it, and I said no thanks, and he said he'd come by the next day for me to sign cancellation papers. He showed up with his supervisor who seemed determined not to let the sale go and had a new contract all drawn up, but no cancellation papers. I tried to keep cool (I was, am, very busy and don't have much time for heavy sales people) but I'm sure I appeared maybe a little frustrated, but I made it clear we would not be renewing and asked for the other paperwork to cancel. I felt bad because I never want to be a jerk, but I may have been a little short with him or his tactics at least.
Anyway, the guy who was not the boss sounds like he's going to order some shirts from us. He's printed before and already has a small line. He was impressed with the samples he saw in our office that day and will be by tomorrow to talk about an order...
So did that yellow pages ad work after all? Was I not as much of a jerk I thought I was? Do our samples outweigh a short response to his boss? Who knows, but it's always good to keep your cool, never get too short, because you never know who your next customer could be!
Funny, because I bumped into the Yellow Pages salesperson whom I canceled that ad with at a gas station after lunch today. A couple of months ago he called to ask if I would renew it, and I said no thanks, and he said he'd come by the next day for me to sign cancellation papers. He showed up with his supervisor who seemed determined not to let the sale go and had a new contract all drawn up, but no cancellation papers. I tried to keep cool (I was, am, very busy and don't have much time for heavy sales people) but I'm sure I appeared maybe a little frustrated, but I made it clear we would not be renewing and asked for the other paperwork to cancel. I felt bad because I never want to be a jerk, but I may have been a little short with him or his tactics at least.
Anyway, the guy who was not the boss sounds like he's going to order some shirts from us. He's printed before and already has a small line. He was impressed with the samples he saw in our office that day and will be by tomorrow to talk about an order...
So did that yellow pages ad work after all? Was I not as much of a jerk I thought I was? Do our samples outweigh a short response to his boss? Who knows, but it's always good to keep your cool, never get too short, because you never know who your next customer could be!
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We Dropped the yellow pages adds a couple years ago for our screen printing business. I think its old and out of date most people use google to find us. They even gave us a tracking number to see how much business we got from it and we where right not much. Pluss it cut down on the one shirt phone calls a little since we do have a minimum of 12. Still have adds on cable tv and radio so i have to tell about 20 people a day that we dont not have nascar shirts and dont print just one lol but its all part of the game i guess.
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Simply put: EARLY TO BED - EARLY TO RISE - WORK LIKE H--L AND ADVERTISE!
In some cases it's not how much you make, it's how much people think you make that drives them to want to do business with you. I agree with keeping your productive lines of advertising rolling and people will view your company as solid in a weak economy.
Rick
In some cases it's not how much you make, it's how much people think you make that drives them to want to do business with you. I agree with keeping your productive lines of advertising rolling and people will view your company as solid in a weak economy.
Rick
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Exactly, keep advertising. We don't advertise traditionally. Our advertising dollars are $0 but strong.
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That's so awesome so many of have spent nothing on advertising. My husband and I were having this debate.. will PPC ads increase in average cost per click or go down. I suspect ads will increase.. what do you think?
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hello
i do not have personal experience with pay per click but a friend of mine does in a big way. I would not think it will go up because the competition is getting more agressive. this friends shop does 10 million dollars a year. he is a offset printing house with alot of large corporate accounts. this summer when I stopped in to see him, they were making instruction books for gerber infant seat. Millions of them in every language where they are sold. he started in 1986 with one manual press. he only turns his ppc on when they are slow and says that the 1 or 2 days a week it is active they generate big business. he says he bids on ppc with the highest bidder getting on. With advertising budgets getting more conservative these days it may even start going down considerably. it really works for them.
Rick
i do not have personal experience with pay per click but a friend of mine does in a big way. I would not think it will go up because the competition is getting more agressive. this friends shop does 10 million dollars a year. he is a offset printing house with alot of large corporate accounts. this summer when I stopped in to see him, they were making instruction books for gerber infant seat. Millions of them in every language where they are sold. he started in 1986 with one manual press. he only turns his ppc on when they are slow and says that the 1 or 2 days a week it is active they generate big business. he says he bids on ppc with the highest bidder getting on. With advertising budgets getting more conservative these days it may even start going down considerably. it really works for them.
Rick
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This has been one of the best threads I've read in a while. It's pretty much exactly the advice I needed to hear at the moment. Just when I was thinking I would have to scale back my marketing budget, I now see the advantages in being persistent. Particularly the idea that even if customers can't buy much now, they'll remember you later if you advertise consistently through this. That was something I was wondering about. Thanks, everyone!
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The mistake a lot of companies make, even huge ones, is that they cut back advertising during economic crunches. We do a lot of work with advertising agencies (unrelated to shirts) who are currently frustrated due to the slashed budgets they are getting for the next quarter of advertising. I guess one good thing is those who persist with their advertising during times like these may be taking advantage of a chance to elevate their business to the next level, even if it means cutting margins a little for the time being.
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Its time to advertise and self-promote within reason. Even more so, time to get creative. For my company the blogging community and podcasts have been a great resource. They are always looking for content and promotions to post about. I can't tell you how amazed I've been just asking for "help" and the responses I've received.
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