Maximize The Impact Of Your Television Advertisements

The reason why television channels exist is because of the revenue advertisements get them. The ads paid by business folks like you, are to reach people and maximize the impact that it has on your business. Television Ads to a large does impact the way your product is publicized, but then a simple tweak in the way your advertisement is shown on screen can further increase the impact it has on viewers.

On examining most Advertisements show on the television, I noticed that the way an Advertisement was structured.

1. A Problem – The Advertisement highlighted the problem that is faced by the viewer. A problem does not always mean a tedious or painful situation; for example a headache or a toothache. It could also be as simple as enhancing your lifestyle and comfort from a stage at which it already is; for ex: - A car with much better comfort features than an existing luxury car.

2. Tackling the Problem – The Advertisement further talks about what can be done to solve the problem. Using the above example, the solution could be to use an analgesic or toothpaste or own a car which is much roomier and has better seats.

3. The Product solving the problem – This is the stage in which the advertised product solves the problem to near perfection and emphasis the reason why the ad viewer should buy the product.

4. The Brand Logo – This is the final stage of the Advertisement, where the Brand Logo of your business is displayed.

The ad in spite of being really good, would in time fade out of your viewers mind. Your business would make tons of products advertise and sell it. What is permanent is your business and to the world it’s your Brand Image portrayed as the Brand Logo.

You spend less than a second in a ten second advertisement to show your Logo. Do you see the problem here? The solution to the problem is simple. Have the Brand Logo of your business be present during the entire duration of the advertisement. Place the Logo as an opaque watermark at one of the corners of the screen. Just as a television channel has its logo constantly in the screen. This would definitely imprint your brand logo in your viewer’s memory far better, than a fraction of a second flash of the logo.

One Indian company has seemed to do it and it’s worked really well for them. The company that I am talking about is Reliance. Below are a couple of links to a TV ad of Reliance Mobile. Notice that the Logo is always present during the entire duration of the Ad.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qhJdqMz7-M
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OqGr8Gwxm4

Feel welcome to post your thoughts, views and questions in the comments.

For more entrepreneurial talk and ideas visit the Home Page of my blog

Copyright © Dennis D Maliekal

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Understanding The Importance of Competition

Every entrepreneur out there is trying to start his own business and has tons of ideas why his venture is the best with numerous reasons, why it would never fail. A small bunch of aspiring entrepreneurs have the mindset where they believe, “They would succeed in flying colors since they face, or have no competition”.

The truth is “A business is not worth venturing into if you do not have competition”. Competition is the only way to evaluate the existence of the market that you are trying to sell to. There are 6 billion people on this planet. Assuming that no one else has seen potential in the business that you are trying to establish is quite dumb.

Summarizing what Guy Kawasaki says in the ‘Art of the Start', The best venture is where you have evaluated your competition and worked out smarter ways to leap frog them. It’s smarter to have someone else make the mistake and you learn from it. This would give you the advantage to zip past them successfully. Look at the mobile phone industry, Motorola was the first company to launch the mobile phone, not Nokia or Apple. Compare the market that Motorola has captured and that of Nokia and Apple.

The lessons learn't here, for any want to be entrepreneur are

1. Know your market well
2. Understand your Competition better
3. Innovate by learning from the flaws of your competition.

For more entrepreneurial talk and ideas visit the Home Page of my blog

Copyright © Dennis D Maliekal

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Marketing– Economic Recession and Economic Boom

The marketing team of any company is the sole group that makes sure that the company survives, expands and grows. No matter what the economic situation is, the last in the line of fire is this team. The dissolution of this team directly implies that the shutters are down for the organization.

Why is marketing the best profession to be in? To answer this, let’s look at the 2 different economic situations.

1. The economy is booming – This is the stage when an organization is looking to expand and bloom into something larger. The expansion is direct result of increased business which of course is because the marketing team stepped in and did their job well.

2. The economy is in a recession – Sales are down, customers seem apprehensive to do business, people think 10 times before opening up their wallets. This is the stage when every organization is trying to survive and make sure they never hit an iceberg. The only way to sail through and weather the storm is by having customers do business. This can happen if and only if the marketing team can make it happen. The marketing team is the last hope for an organization to have sustained business. This implies that the jobs of the members of this team are the safest. They are the saviors.

The irony here is the marketing team does not really have to exist, if the product that you sell to your customer carries value. The best marketing that you can get is a happy satisfied customer talking positively about your product.

For more entrepreneurial talk and ideas visit the Home Page of my blog

Copyright © Dennis D Maliekal 2009

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Building and Maintaining Your Client Base

All organizations have clients. The reason that they have customers is because of the great marketing & sales team that the organization has. These are the heroes who got out there to the deep ocean and fish out customers who indirectly but definitely write our pay cheques.

No matter who the client is, be it a large organization with 10000+ employees or a small business of say 50 people, the ‘Client’ is finally a human. The reason why this was stated is to understand the way people think and work when it comes to buying a product or a solution.

Let’s deep dive at the 3 stages that are involved from the “Marketing & Sales Sell” to the “Final product delivery”

Stage 1: The Emotional Bond
A human being has to reach a height of emotional bonding and desire to buy something big. For example If you had to buy a car, you did for some point of time reach the peak of liking and desire for that particular car, to have actually bought it.

This is the same rule that applies to your clients. Your marketing and sales team has performed the role of getting your client to a level of desire and want for your product or solution, which resulted in a guaranteed sell.

Stage 2: The Buyers Regret
Once a product\solution is bought, it’s only a matter of time (i.e. anywhere from a day to two weeks) when your client enters the phase of ‘The Buyers Regret’. This is the phase where your client would start thinking that he could have got a better deal or a better product and start regretting the current purchase.

This is also the phase where your marketing and sales teams have moved out of the picture and it’s the client coordinator who is in charge to deliver what was promised. Imagine the scenario where your coordinator is not perfectly in sync with what has been promised and sold by the marketing team. This basically results in the recipe for disaster. The client being in the regret phase is further anguished and the regret seems more justified to him.

The Moral here is, always keep the stakeholders in the entire cycle in sync. The Client coordinator has to have a perfect knowledge transfer with the marketing team to understand what was exactly sold.

Stage 3: The Product Shipment
If things went perfectly fine in stage 2, then stage 3 is where you could potentially fall. If the marketing team promises the moon and the stars and what the development team can create is only water and soil, we both know what will the result will be.

The Moral here is, it’s better off to have a smaller satisfied customer base and grow steadily than to have a large one who is continuously breathing down your neck and threatening to break the deal. Your marketing team should know what is the potential of the development team is. They should only sell and promise what can be achieved by the development team by a realistic stretch.

For more entrepreneurial talk and ideas visit the Home Page of my blog

Copyright © Dennis D Maliekal 2009

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