Small businesses are quickly finding out that online advertising is not only the most economical way to reach a huge audience, but it is often a necessity for survival. Paper advertising is fast taking a back seat to every form of online advertising. Simply on price comparison alone, it is easy to see that online advertising offers an attractive deal.
How Online Compares With Other Forms of Advertising
There are a number of benefits of online advertising over other forms of advertising. Most businesses find that newspaper and telephone directory advertising are generally the most effective forms outside of the internet world. If you have looked into newspaper or directory advertisements, you quickly find out that they can be cost prohibitive for small businesses. Pricing is dependant upon the area that you are in and the ads can get very pricey in the metropolitan areas. The price comparison is one of the key factors leading in the direction of online advertising.
Now, on to the audience that is reached for a set length of time – how does that compare? Newspaper ads are usually only for a period of a few days a week, for a limited number of weeks. Of course, the more it appears in the paper, the more it costs and you will only reach its limited readership in a particular local area.
The same is true for directory ads. Although people do keep phone books around for longer times and reference them, it is still costly and limited to a small area. While this may be acceptable for businesses that only function in that small area, you may want to attract customers from a broader area, operate online or even ship globally.
Online Advertising Benefits
This leads us to the clear benefits of online advertising for small businesses. Most small businesses are small because they don’t have an unlimited operating budget. This means that they have to be very careful where they spend their money and they must make their advertising spend count. Since today’s society spends much of its time surfing the web, online advertising seems to be a no-brainer. It offers a variety of benefits.
* Cost effective – Online advertising generally costs less than off line forms of advertising.
* Greater reach – More people can be reached in a shorter period of time online than with other forms of advertisement.
* Ability to edit – While printed ads cannot be changed once they are published, online forms can be edited quickly and easily and with little or no cost.
* Long lasting – Online advertising generally runs for long periods of time and can easily and, fairly economically, be renewed for even longer periods of time. Be aware that some forms of online advertising, such as online classifieds, do expire on short terms.
While there may be a small niche of customers that you will not be able to reach online, the fact is that today most people actually spend more time reading online than any other form of print. For a small business to become bigger, or even just to survive, online advertising can be a very smart option.
Professional Website Tips for Small Businesses
If you are a novice that has decided to take on the task of designing your own website you may wonder what a professional would do differently. One of the keys to success is starting with the right perspective – and it’s not your own!
Online Marketing for Small Businesses
Small businesses have to be careful where they spend their marketing budget – every pound counts! There are so many options available it is difficult to decide what the most effective form of marketing is. While there is a variety of off line marketing opportunities offered, to economically reach the largest number of people quickly, online marketing is often the hands down winner.
How to Keep your Website from Becoming Stale
Does it really matter if you have the same website for 365 days a year? The answer is a simple, “Yes!”
