Is free advertising effective?

[otto101]

Advertising for free could takes some time.Does anybody do offline marketing besides using free online marketing?
Business cards can be effective to use for offline marketing.
Does anybody use biz cards for a marketing tool?Your input appreciated.

[webcosmo]

I am up for any marketing thats free and brings results.
Business cards is a proven way of off line marketing. I use it.

[swapw]

Originally Posted by otto101

Advertising for free could takes some time.Does anybody do offline marketing besides using free online marketing?
Business cards can be effective to use for offline marketing.
Does anybody use biz cards for a marketing tool?Your input appreciated.

Depends on what type of niche, let's say you're selling electronics and you are planning to meet up with a potential client that's huge, chances are that a face to face conversation is always proven to be more effective then online based communications.

-Swapw

[unlmtdrw]

Absolutely! free off-line marketing works and CAN be very effective. But the key to making it effective is taking the time to tailor your materials to target the specific customer you are trying to attract. Generic scattergun approaches have lower chances of achieving the results you have in mind... and are even worse if you've paid for them.

Think very carefully about the type of customer you want to attract to your business. What do they want? How do you meet that need? What problem do you solve for them? Why do you do it better than someone else? Write your materials to highlight the benefits you bring to their life.

Business cards are great off-line advertising, but get them into the hands of the people that "matter" to your business. The same thing applies to any other off-line method of advertising - word of mouth, local newspapers, targeted/personalized sales letters, direct mail, etc. etc. Consider working with/joining forces with other businesses that offer complementary products/services to your own, work a joint venture.

[nks]

The best way of advertising is through the way of organic links from search engine. It's free and literally cost nothing.

[shahab6]

I doubt off- line advertisement is that effective.
As when people read something, usually they won't go on their computer to enter that website.

[Steven_D]

I do all the advertising for my site offline because online your just competing with dribble.

There is no offline advertising that is free and effective, if there was people wouldnt advertise in the news papers and on TV.

you can make drips and drabs with no money but your best bet is to get a job and spend your pay on newspaper advertising, otherwise you will be wasting to much time.

[Chatmaster]

Something that I would like to emphasize is that marketing consist out of different strategies. The type of marketing you are in are the core indicator of how you should apply your marketing strategies. Free marketing strategies imo doesn't exist, because they take time to practice and time in my case is money.

As I said the type of business you are in will pretty much determine your priorities within your marketing strategies. But here are a few pointers.

SEO
SEO is very much consistent out of On-page and off-page factors. So initially you need to ensure that your basic site design is done correctly and that SE's will figure out what your website is all about. So on-page factors are a priority within your marketing strategy. The next step will be to ensure a flow of backlinks into your site and fresh content. Therefore you will need to dedicate at least 1-2 hours a day on off-page factors for SEO. Remember that each marketing techniques has it's own benefits and SEO has primarily the benefit of good conversions, targeted traffic and higher visitor loyalty. It does however take a little bit more time to get generis SEO to flow, but once it gets flowing it is worth it.

Online Advertising
Search Engine advertising, gives good quality visitors whilst you are waiting for your SEO to become effective. Banner ads on targetted sites can also leave you with a very good Cost per Acquisition ratio and is very good for building your brand and corporate identity.

Viral Marketing
Without jokes, this is one of the most powerful and longest lasting marketing strategies you can apply. Once again deciding your core objective influences the success that you can have with it, but I would look at sending out at least one campaign at least once a month.

Traditional marketing
Generally, traditional marketing has a very poor growth atm. There are simply to much choice for the consumer. There are hundreds of TV channels, thousands of magazines and newspapers and it is expensive. Not to mention that Internet ad revenue is on the up and conventional advertising is on the decline, this is in places like the US and Australia, there has been alot of research on this topic and a Google search should give you further information on this. HOWEVER, the basics needs to be done e.g. business cards and office administration should sent users to your website. The reason is simple, the web is a much easier place to convert and retain visitors as well as obtaining valuable info about them, something conventional marketing simply cannot do. Conventional marketing can be very effective still if your product is localised but your ROI target is normally increased and needs to be monitored frequently.

Editorial Marketing
Publishing of articles and Press releases needs at least 4 hours a week dedicated to it, and can be very effective if choose topics that are related to current events. It also helps with building of backlinks if you update content on your own website in conjunction. Special note, Email marketing is still very effective, if the database consist out of people that are interested in your product and did subscribe willingly to receive it.

Social Media Marketing
This is something you need to dedicate at least and hour or 2 on each day. It is extremely effective if done right.

Community marketing
The benefit with joining forums related to your product is that you stay current with trends and also get a chance to get popularity through your insight and knowledge within a certain product or service. However if not utilized correctly it can also hurt you, a mature personality is a requirement.

Referrals
Get a way of initiating a tell-a-friend campaign. People rather take notice if a friend suggested your service, if you somehow control what is being said about you, even better. Apply a bit of SMO to your site, you will never be sorry!

Finally, just take note that marketing any business take time. Newspaper reps will tell you that you need to advertise frequently for campaigns to be effective with them and that one time adverts often are unsuccessful. Marketing is not a quick thing, plan your strategies and stick to them, the ice always break for those that are patient.

[Hafsoh]

any offline marketing including biz card could be effective if you follow the right way in doing it, following the neccesary marketing strategies and trageting the right customer.Though it may take your time but it will really be effective.

[Steven_D]

Originally Posted by Chatmaster

SEO


Online Advertising

Viral Marketing

Traditional marketing

Editorial Marketing

Social Media Marketing

Community marketing

Referrals

Nice post.

Traditional marketing and referrals are most effective.

I like the idea of viral marketing, eg hotmail and myspace etc but there are millions of people their whacky ideas that try and utilise this form of marketing and the chance of success is super slim, like super super, skinnier than a super model on crack, chance of success.

SEO, just be patient and market using other methods.

Again, nice post, love reading intelligent information.

[otto101]

Thanks folk for the input.

[RewardsKingdom]

It depends what off-line marketing you do, flyers, TV ads, radio ads, etc.

[AmySueN]

Originally Posted by Chatmaster

Something that I would like to emphasize is that marketing consist out of different strategies. The type of marketing you are in are the core indicator of how you should apply your marketing strategies. Free marketing strategies imo doesn't exist, because they take time to practice and time in my case is money.

Fantastic post!

Something I'd like to add is to make sure you have a year-round marketing plan, not just something you do sporadically when you feel like it or need the sales. If you plan across a whole year you can also make sure you're not using the same technique all the time.

[otto101]

I found that offline marketing is effective when I ask for some refferals.
I guess is because of the business cards.

People are impress when you show them your business cards.

[wayzee]

yea free advertising like online advertising is really effective it grabs attention of many peoples at no cost to you so its always useful but it require your efforts & hard work.

[darkAngel]

I've been using free advertising method (because my boss is stingy when it come to budget :p) If we know the right channel/site, the result is pretty impressive. But free advertising result isn't the same as the paid one, people tend to trust the paid advertising better.

[otto101]

You're right free advertising is less effective.Paid advertising is more effective because it gives you credibility.

[guinanie]

Thanks for the list Chatmaster and help us determine the marketing strategies that is effective to your business. But for me SEO is very much consistent out of On-page and off-page factors and Viral and traditional marketing is much effective but need more effort to convince the clients about the products.

[otto101]

I'll try using those link thanks.

[Futo]

I think it can work although results will vary depending upon the nature of the business and how much effort is put into the campaign.