Marketing and Advertising in the Modern Age

With new marketing and advertising mediums seeming to appear on a daily basis, it can be extremely difficult for any business to keep up. The challenge becomes even more daunting when it comes to a small or niche business and their limited budget. Never the less, modern age communication options have put us all on alert and scrambling to decipher what needs to be done to build our businesses.

On the one hand, we have the tried and true mediums of getting our message in front of the target audience such as newspaper/magazine ads and billboards that work to some extent. While on the other, we have the inundation of website banner ads, video signs at the grocery store and mobile marketing capabilities. When you read the various articles that the media produces by the minute, and at times tend to also contradict each other, it makes our decisions that much more difficult. Every business has the exact same goal and that is to bring their product or service to market. What tends to be missed in this struggle for balance is exactly that…there must be a cohesive message that will imprint the consumer using traditional and electronic communication methods, while at the same time having their brand or product showing up in the least expected places in order to grow their business by having their brand remembered.

In the heart of Times Square there is a new interactive video billboard. Now everyone knows that Times Square has become a tourist destination for its advertising, but what made this billboard stand out was that the consumer provided the message at little cost …paying only a standard text messaging rate “When our Director of Sales pointed the billboard out to me, the first thing I thought was that the cost per impression to brand a business or product would be hundredths of a penny (depending on the size of the current crowd)” says Michael D Harris Jr, President of Ardynn Media. “What does this mean for consulting firms if the average person is shown where and how to advertise?”

Even though the purpose of the billboard was to act as an interactive form of entertainment and keep the audience there long enough to view the rotating promotion for the Spot Light Live Restaurant. The fact that thousands of tourists were taking pictures of the messages appearing on the billboard, which becomes a piece of take-away branding, is proof that this fresh and unique marketing medium works. But what we need to remember is that attempts like this should only be part of an overall marketing strategy and no matter how great a response a company gets from a particular medium, they still need to be well rounded and utilize multiple avenues of getting their message out there.

With the explosion of new methods to convey a company‘s message, how does a business owner sift through the bewildering options and information in order to find the best mix that will propel their business to the next level? One way is through designating a team member to becoming a marketing expert whose sole job is to keep up with the advances we see on a daily basis. Another, and probably more realistic way to accomplish this, is to hire an outside source to handle all aspects of your marketing and advertising. Not only are you getting expert knowledge and education, but they work for you and have your business’ best interest at heart. The latter has become more common as we continue to see outsourcing during this estranged economy.

No matter where your company stands on their marketing today, tomorrow will bring new challenges that must be faced. If you are not situated to face that change and adapt your current strategy on very short notice then you are hindering your company’s ability to fulfill its growth potential.