This is part 2 of a 3 PART EDUCATIONAL SERIES. This installment is titled “Understanding How (Routine/Repeated) Use of Paid TV, Radio & Print Media Short Changes YOU ”. (Click here to read Part 1). If you run a business in Africa, the ideas offered in this series can help you. Any 21st century African business that depends more on paid traditional TV, Radio and print media for business promotion, is wasting money. Indeed, if you’re not using the ideas on offer here to find new clients and customers, YOU ARE LOSING PROFITS. I elaborate below…

Invite Me To Speak: If you’re reading this after 31st March 2013, I would have begun travelling slowly across West Africa as a Location Independent Entrepreneur. If you’re in West Africa click here to invite me to speak to your members or group on this topic.

In this 2nd part, I use a real life example or analogy to illustrate how the typical traditional media organization asks business owners to pay to share their expertise. This is an arrangement that benefits the media house, but rarely helps the small/medium businesses.

A Real-World Relevant Analogy

Consider this. A typical newspaper outfit. They come to you and tell you: Oh Look, We’re doing this special thing. We’re going to feature your company in our newspaper. We give you half a page,  one page and you get to give us a little speech or talk about something you do, or share your expertise in our medium, and potentially you have the opportunity of getting read by millions of our wonderful readers all over.

And so you ask them: Right, if I do this, what’s in it for me?

And they say: Oh, you’re going to get read by so many people and they’re going to call you. And all of that.

You ask them: And I’m going be the one that supplies the content?

And they say: Yes of course, you put in your content, basically anything you want. If you want an editorial, we’ll let you do that. And so on.

Then you say: Well, that’s nice. That sounds good. When do we get started then?

And they say: Oh, there’s one thing: you’ve got to pay.

That stops you dead in your tracks.

You ask: Oh, I thought I was going to share my ideas and expertise. And I thought that would be in exchange for exposure through your medium?

They quickly reply: Well you see, everybody else pays to use our medium. This is the way it works. We’ve got to charge you because that’s really the marketing space or slot we have.

So you ask: Okay exactly how much are we talking about here?

They reply: From N200,000 (i.e. $1,500).

You say: What? That much – even though I’m offering my expertise?

But your friend – maybe he is more familiar with these things – tells you: Oh yes, that’s the way it’s done really. You see it’s a national newspaper, and you’re going to get a lot of exposure.

So, You Agree. And You Pay.

And they put this beautiful write-up you’ve done in the Monday edition (Monday being the day that maybe a lot of people like to look at real estate, and you are a real estate expert. So they tell you it’s going to get by a lot of people who are passionate about real estate).

Problem number 1:

On Monday, the paper comes out, and it’s about 150 pages thick. And your write-up? Yeah it’s in the real estate section alright. The challenge is that the average reader on a Monday is busy, and probably won’t have enough time to flip long enough to find that page – except he knew about it ahead of time, and was looking forward to it.

Problem number 2:

By the end of that day – I would say 10pm, some would say 12 midnight. The point is, by the next morning, the Tuesday edition is out: Your N200,000 would be gone!

The truth is more often than not, you’ll probably get a handful of phone calls or emails – if at all you get any responses to your ads that is.

It doesn’t make any sense!

What I’ve found out is that apart from a few leads which mostly fizzle out eventually, all you end up with are bragging rights that you had the means to place an ad in that kind of medium. But your target audience more often than not could not care less, if it does not add value to them!

If you’re a big company, there’s a budget for it, and you do have the cash flow to cope with it – probably because of your size, you get a lot of customers. And so, maybe it won’t matter much, you won’t feel the pinch and the returns would be tangible.

But if you’re a small, medium or micro business owner, the last thing you want to do is give that kind of money to advertising or marketing in a medium that has a shelf life of 24 hours! That’s just too volatile.

I say this from years of personal experience struggling and falling flat on my face for years, actively exploring cost-effective ways to get high impact long term marketing exposure, to the right people that are interested in my products and services.

Instead, You Need To Think Smart!

$1,500 can do a lot of things for you for a much longer period of time, and you’d be able to measure the returns. And those returns more often than not would pay for the money you spend in marketing in that way.

I have just done this analysis to help you put in perspective, the way you spend your money on traditional advertising or marketing media in your local market.

You want to give yourself an opportunity to reach out to as many people as possible, so as to find those who would be willing to pay the kind of money you want for your quality products and services.

I’m placing deliberate emphasis on quality because I’m assuming that the person reading this now is the kind of person that is not involved in selling anything that is substandard…or low quality…or cheap.

In order to benefit from the ideas I offer here, you’ve got to be somebody that has, on offer, products and services that command respect, and that appeal to people who are discerning in their tastes, and in their preferences.

If you’re not someone like that, you’ll not be able to use the ideas I offer here. But if you are someone like that that, then what I’m saying I’m sure will make sense to you. For every naira you spend, you must seek to extract at least an equivalent return in terms of marketing reach and impact – marketing mileage you achieve.

There is a Better Way to Do It

The channels of radio, TV, newspapers, flyers, bulk SMS and all that, can work in conjunction with, and can be complemented, by this other method that I’m talking about.

I cal it the use of a Web Marketing System. I will explain it in detail in my next article. This article you’ve just read was written to demonstrate, in practical terms, how the current and more familiar marketing and advertising media cannot really help you to cost-effectively achieve the kind of reach and impact you need in an economy where money is not as available as it used to be.

People are getting more reluctant to spend and need more reasons to do so, therefore making it more difficult for the man who wants to sell products and services to find customers. Therefore, everyone needs to be smarter.  The WMS enables you to be smarter in spending your money, and smarter in getting returns, tangible returns, that add to your ability to make sales. That’s what a WMS does for you.

=========

What you have just read is part 2 of a 3 part series titled “Why You Need A Web Marketing System (WMS)”.

Part 3 follows tomorrow (I’ve decided to dispense with the plan to publish according to the weekly schedule, so readers can find all 3 parts close together).

Part 1 of 3: Why You Need To Change The Way You Find Buyers for Your Products/Services

Part 2 of 3: Understanding How (Routine/Repeated) Use of Paid TV, Radio & Print Media Short Changes YOU

Part 3 of 3: Why You Need a Web Marketing System (WMS) – Part 3 of 3

GET HELP TO SET UP YOUR WMS

There is a lot more you need to know. This series is available as a keynote speech, a half-day or full-day workshop – or request for audio/video version. You can also contact me if you would like me to send you a report that breaks down what a WMS comprises, and how to get started with yours within the next 24 hours. E-mail tayo at tksola dot com with “Re: Why You Need A Web Marketing System” as the subject.