Getting Started With Print Advertising

By Chris Barr

Why Is is Print Advertising Important?

Marketing is one of the most important factors facing your business each day. When you think about it, marketing has a direct impact on every factor involved with your ultimate success or failure. With this in mind, it becomes obvious that a healthy advertising strategy is vital to the health of your business.

Direct marketing offers many benefits that might not immediately seem obvious. Sure, direct marketing generates outstanding short-term results - but it also develops, strengthens, and maintains affiliations between your target groups and your brands, which are extremely important in the future.

Sales, expansion, retention, profitability, lead generation, telephone calls, competition, ROI, strategic planning...sound familiar? They should, because all of these terms (and the list could go on) are key elements to your company's success. Further, all of these terms are directly (sometimes entirely) a result of marketing.

How do I advertise? Why should I advertise? How much will this cost me?

Direct Marketing is used by almost every business in the world for a good reason. It works. Print advertising creates a lasting positive image with customers, delivers a focused message, engages your customer with graphics and photography, creates an emotional response, and defines a call to action.

A friend of mine, who is a successful small business owner in Virginia, always says the following about customers: "If you don't show it, you don't have it. If you don't tell them, they assume it isn't there. If you don't give them a reason, they won't call."

Use newspaper inserts to market your products and services to new customers, retain current customers, lend credability to your business, and increase awareness. Newspaper inserts are a cost-effective and time-tested method of generating short-term results and lasting impact.

Think about the pizza shops in your local area. Pizza shops are print advertising machines. How many pizza menus and flyers have you seen in the last month? The owners of these take-out restaurants advertise heavily because if they know that if don't advertise, you will call someone who does. It's that simple.

If you are worried about the prices, don't be. Print advertising is more cost-effective than ever. For example, you can have 10,000 full color, 2-sided, glossy flyers produced for as low as $375. Once you have the flyers printed all you have to do is distribute them through your area newspaper(s). If you can't afford the daily paper's rates, distribute your flyers through weekly newspapers. Many weekly newspapers offer newspaper inserts for $40 per thousand or less! You can't go wrong with newspaper inserts, and you will quickly realize the impact print advertising has on your business once you start your advertising campaign.

Other benefits of newspaper inserts:

*target specific zip codes

*easy to track results/ROI

*total creative control of content and design

*ability to include coupons, specials, etc

*easy to research competition and plan ahead

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Chris Barr is an experienced marketing professional and graduate of Christopher Newport University. Mr. Barr specializes in print advertising, business development, web business strategic positioning, and technical writing. For the lowest prices on printed flyers, newspaper inserts, brochures, menus, and postcards please visit http://www.printanddeliver.com

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TRUTH IN ADVERTISING