WHEN SHOULD YOU SHIFT FROM TRADITIONAL TO DIGITAL ADVERTISING?

In general, businesses that advertise through traditional methods (TV, radio, print, etc.) do so for a number of reasons - they have a very broad audience, it’s what the prior generations of business owners have done, they haven’t had time to learn/understand digital advertising, they're skeptical of digital advertising, etc.

Regardless of the reason, it’s important to know just how to evaluate where you are and what method(s) of advertising are going to be right for you. The purpose of this blog is to help you get started in evaluating whether it’s truly optimal for you to continue with traditional advertising methods, or if you should look to make a shift to digital.

EVALUATING YOUR AUDIENCE
We often encounter business owners who truly believe that “everyone” needs their product. The truth is, there is always an alternative to your product, even if that alternative is simply going without your product. Begin the process of analyzing your ideal audience by identifying the specific characteristics that can be attributed to your audience. If your most worthwhile customers have a net worth of over $100,000, that drastically shrinks potential audience. Sometimes you should be targeting families with children in elementary school. Again, we’ve shrunk your potential audience. Doing this over and over will help you to build what’s called your “buyer persona,” which is the person you need your marketing to reach most effectively. Throw assumptions out the window, because they may cause you to miss out on opportunities – for example, YouTube currently reaches more 18-49-year-olds than any cable network in the US on its mobile app alone, with an average viewing session of over 40 minutes… if you thought that running ads on ESPN would give you the best reach to those ages, you clearly shortchanged yourself and limited your reach.

RECOMMENDATION: Digital Advertising is excellent for reaching an audience that’s well-defined. If your audience is active online, or if people seek your service on-demand (like a lawyer, a tow truck, or something else you Google), there’s no more budget friendly and ROI-optimized option than digital.

YOU DON’T HAVE TIME TO LEARN
It’s easy to understand why your business is still advertising like it’s 1999. Ultimately, you do what you are familiar with, and if you’ve always advertised on the radio, it can be really easy to just keep going with that. Sometimes, you’re just doing what you do because it’s how your parents or grandparents advertised when they were running the show, and you just don’t have time to figure out what else you could do with your marketing budget.

First off, you need to account for all of your current marketing efforts. You can’t improve anything until you’ve effectively figured out what you’re actually doing. Once you have a full accounting of your current efforts, it’s time to actually take the time to learn. There’s no way to hack this – to improve your marketing, you need to invest some of your attention. It could be helpful to ask some of your peers what they do and why. Make sure you’re seeking advice from those people who clearly are with the times and have dabbled in modern advertising techniques (you don’t take money advice from people who are broke, so don’t take marketing advice from people who don’t know what’s out there today). There are numerous audiobooks that are full of wisdom that will help you get a better understanding about what you can do to grow your business today, and self-educating yourself will help you astronomically.

RECOMMENDATION: A little shameless self-promotion here… We’re from a background of not only marketing, but business development consulting. We love to teach, and we clearly know a lot about online marketing. We also stay abreast of all the developments that are always happening in this field, so we are always current and have a good feel for what’s in store for the future. The FASTEST and EASIEST way for you to learn about digital advertising is by talking to us. Let us answer your questions and help you figure out what, if any, new methods of advertising could be wise for you to explore and utilize.

YOU’RE SKEPTICAL
A lot of people look at digital marketing as voodoo magic. You’ve maybe been burned in the past by snake oil salesmen making empty promises, or perhaps it makes so little sense that you can’t place any confidence in it. The thing is, YOU’RE RIGHT. Yes, there are oodles of so-called “experts” out there that are really as smart as a box of rocks, and they just happen to be good salesmen that have no idea how to actually deliver results for you. We’ve seen enough horror stories to know that not all digital marketers are created equally. And yes, if digital marketing doesn’t make sense, you certainly can never be confident in investing in it. The best way to overcome your skepticism is by learning. As detailed earlier, there are tons of ways you can gain a more in-depth knowledge of social media, digital video advertising, PPC/SEM, SEO, etc. The more you educate yourself, the better you’ll be able to evaluate potential marketing opportunities in the future.

RECOMMENDATION: A huge difference between us and other digital marketers is that we employ no sleight of hand and strive to ensure you know what we’re doing. We want you to understand what we’re doing, so we teach you and answer every question to make sure you truly get it. We also are transparent in our efforts. You don’t have to rely on anecdotal evidence to know if things are working – we show you the data and show you everything we are doing. In a sense, we’re terrible poker players because you ALWAYS see the cards. You don’t even have to pay a dollar to know if we will work out for you – we will dig into the data before doing anything to see if and where opportunity exists, then explain what we’d do and what would be the likely result of our efforts. You can talk to our current and past clients to see what their experiences were like, and surely they’ll be raving fans too, because we go out of our way to ensure that every concern is addressed and every effort is optimized. We’re disrupting the field of digital marketing by telling our clients what we’re doing, why we’re doing it, and what will come of it, from the very first moment we connect with them. No recommendation could be as strong as this: talk to us, and soon you’ll know more than you ever have and you’ll trust us so much that you’ll go out of your way to refer all of your acquaintances to us.


​About us: Level 11 Online Marketing is a fast growing digital advertising agency that is becoming known for disrupting the status quo.  We specialize in digital advertising, video production, SEO, SEM, advanced analytics, custom web solutions via website design & implementation, social media strategies and conversion optimization.  Headquartered in Utah, you will find Level 11 team members in Utah, Washington, California, Idaho, and Colorado. We have the best creative minds in the industry backed up by the most talented software developers and video production teams which leads to powerful, efficient advertising campaigns.

If you have questions, comment here or email us at info@level11.io today!