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Method
Marketing Newsletter: Volume 2 Issue 24
April 5th, 2002
Evaluating
Those 'Great Advertising' Opportunities
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Synopsis:
Only
use advertising vehicles that reach your target. Make the
advertising company prove their effectiveness. Rating points
are relative. If you haven't advertised before, some targeted
advertising may be enough, but beware, too little is a waste
of money. Lastly, a target point is a target point is a
target point, up to a point.
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"It
is essential to start any advertising endeavor with the acknowledgement
that there is a new, ad-savvy and marketing-Tefloned consumer
out there who is ready to act as a tough interlocutor."
Marc
Gobé 'Emotional Branding'
"The truth well told."
The
ad agency, McCann Erickson's motto
"Advertising is the rattling of a stick inside a swill bucket."*
George
Orwell
Your
guests define 'value' by the totality of the experience:
the service, the décor, the food and its flavors
and aromas and the cost: all details that create a memory.
The most memorable experiences come from an organized,
well-rehearsed and communicated performance. Great 'word
of mouth' is built note by note, scene by scene, act by
act, so that by the end of the visit your guest walks
away 'wowed'. Or bored. Or, worse of all, disgusted. It's
your choice. |
We
are assaulted by at least 3000 advertising messages a day. Three
Thousand. On television alone, the average viewer now sees
almost double the commercials they did in 1985. And it is not
only because time in front of the tube has increased. There
are more commercials per hour than ever. There are several ways
to combat this: improve the content of your advertising, improve
the creative execution or improve the placement. This issue
focuses on placement.
George Orwell may well have been referring to the content of
the swill as much as the noise in the bucket. Still, there is
no doubt he would be driven deaf by the cacophony of banging
in today's world of mass communication. Marc Gobé
hits the point right on. Many of today's consumers, inundated
with commercial messages from birth, have a sensitive 'hype'
meter. They know when you're lying, sometimes before you do.
They laugh at your attempts to 'sell'. They tell their friends,
who laugh as well. This is a tough audience. But before you
can enter the 'performance ring' and put your life on the line,
you have to get to the audience. Many restaurant and hospitality
professionals do not even cross this threshold, because they
have not chosen their advertising vehicles wisely.
How many operators are inundated by requests to place ads in
newspapers, on radio, on cable, in journals or in penny savers?
Sponsor softball? Donate to the church? Support literacy? Love
kids, Mom and apple pie? Yes, of course, but at what price?
Let's consider the decision-making process. Rule Number One:
target your audience. With whom do you wish to share the experience
you have created? Your research should make that an easy step.
Rule Number Two: align your communication vehicle with
your concept. We operate in a visual, sensory world. Choose
advertising vehicles that are visually stimulating. Where does
that leave print advertising? Probably in the dust. Unless you
have a deal (and let's hope that is a rare thing), I believe
print is a waste of money. Rule Number Three: focus your
resources to reach your target as often as you can. Remember
the number of commercials we all see every day? There is a conventional
wisdom that states unless your guest sees/hears your advertisement
a minimum of 4-5 times per flight, they won't even 'see' it
at all. I heard a media consultant suggest that it takes 10
repetitions to get them to act and that number goes up as we
get exposed to more advertising. So, of the two components of
advertising measurement, reach and frequency, frequency probably
is more important. This is particularly true, the less money
you have to spend.
When someone comes offering an unbelievable advertising deal,
don't believe it. Bulk spots do not mean effective advertising.
Make every advertiser show you how their program meets your
communication goals to 'share the experience'. Force them to
demonstrate how they will achieve your reach (to your exact
target audience) and frequency goals. Make them justify the
costs by translating their program into rating points, a measurement
system that allows you to compare one station with another.
Most of us are still in primary school when it comes to media.
That's ok. I think we have had some Presidents with less education.
If we can get ourselves educated about Target Rating Points,
then we will be in a much better place to judge the efficacy
of one vehicle versus another. My attitude is that 'a point
is a point is a point' - - at least at this point in our understanding.
As we learn more, it gets more complicated. Oh, joy!
The next issue offers hints on
how to write your concept story. -->GO
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