The benefits derived from advertising are manifold. It is one of the most important components of the marketing process.
This is beneficial to manufacturers, traders, consumers and society as a whole. Advertising offers the following advantages.
The major advantages of advertising are:
Advertising plays a significant role in the introduction of a new product in the market. It stimulates people to purchase the product.
It enables the manufacturer to expand his market. It helps in exploring new markets for the product and retaining the existing markets. It plays a sheet anchor role in widening the marketing for the manufacturer’s products even by conveying to the customers living in far-flung and remote areas.
Advertisement facilitates mass production of goods and increases the volume of sales. In other words, sales can be increased with additional expenditure on advertising with every increase in sales, selling expenses will decrease.
Advertising is greatly helpful in meeting the forces of competition prevalent in the market. Continuous advertising is very essential in order to save the product from the clutches of competitors.
Advertising is instrumental in increasing the goodwill of the concern. It introduces the manufacturer and his product to the people. Repeated advertising and better quality of products bring more reputation for the manufacturer and enhance goodwill for the concern.
Advertising is educational and dynamic in nature. It familiarises the customers with the new products and their diverse uses and also educates them about the new uses of existing products.
It aims at establishing a direct link between the manufacturer and the consumer, thereby eliminating the marketing intermediaries. This increases the profits of the manufacturer and the consumer gets the products at lower prices.
Different goods are advertised under different brand names. A branded product assures a standard quality to the consumers. The manufacturer provides quality goods to the consumers and tries to win their confidence in his product.
Advertising greatly facilitates the work of a salesman. The customers are already familiar with the product which the salesman sells. The selling efforts of a salesman are greatly supplemented by advertising. It has been rightly pointed out that “selling and advertising are cup and saucer, hook and eye, or key and lock wards.”
Advertising provides and creates more employment opportunities for many talented people like painters, photographers, singers, cartoonists, musicians, models and people working in different advertising agencies.
Advertising is immensely helpful in reducing the cost of newspapers and magazines etc. The cost of bringing out a newspaper is largely met by the advertisements published therein.
The experience of the advanced nations shows that advertising is greatly responsible for raising the living standards of the people. In the words of Winston Churchill “advertising nourishes the consuming power of men and creates wants for a better standard of living.” By bringing to the knowledge of the consumers different variety and better quality products, it has helped a lot in increasing the standard of living in a developing economy like India.
The slogans and characters from famous advertising campaigns become staples of the pop-cultural lexicon and landscape. As part of an overall marketing effort, your own advertising efforts can achieve benefits for your company that help you move past competitors to the “top of mind” level of customer awareness. You may not have the big-dollar budgets for national TV spots or magazine ads, but you can give your business a sales boost through carefully chosen media and messages.
Whether you conduct your advertising campaign through social media involvement, pay-per-click online advertising, newspapers and other print resources, broadcast placements or in-store retail promotions, you help raise the visibility of your company’s brand or the products you sell. Some of these advertising opportunities come through ongoing involvement in communities, whether they’re digital and virtual or real and local. Engaging with people who gravitate toward your brand enhances your opportunities for sales and referrals. You may find social media help you grow your abilities to build a real audience for your business, not just to make a few sales.
Introducing a new product without giving its debut a chance to attract attention simulates the age-old cliche about a telephone ringing in an empty house. If no one answers the “bell” of your market launch, your sales don’t increase and your product doesn’t thrive in the marketplace. Choosing how to publicize a new offering requires an in-depth study of the demographics of your target market and a well-chosen selection of media that can place your ads in front of those customers. How you position your ads also depends on the type of product you sell.
General advertising attempts to engage with customers and prospects to convince them your products or services outdo the value of what your competitors have to offer and they therefore should choose your company first and foremost. This kind of advertising can require more ads over a longer time period to establish your authority as a resource or your value as a merchant. Depending on whether what you sell appeals predominantly to customers in your local market or you can engage successfully with prospects through your website, you may find direct mail campaigns, local broadcast ads or online advertising productive in building your clientele.
Any advertising campaign requires thoughtful consideration of its cost-benefit ratio. If the money you spend to reach your customers exceeds the value those customers bring in, you may be wasting your investment unless you simply want to achieve greater awareness for your brand. Whether you choose and negotiate the cost of media placements yourself or use a professional media buyer, validate the likely results of your campaign as much as you can before you take the plunge and review its results thoroughly after the fact so you can refine the choices you make for your next campaign.
Professionals like advertising operations managers and marketing directors make comprehensive marketing plans for organizations. Their duties run the gamut from developing new to promoting, advertising and selling them. Initial marketing research guides the entire process by indicating what types of products customers would be willing to buy, at what price and how often they can be expected to make a purchase.
Product planning, advertising and sales are based on marketing research. To develop a product that will sell, identify your target markets demographics like age, income, family structure and outside interests. Professional marketing research specialists use primary research techniques like interviews, surveys and focus groups along with secondary research to find out the answers to questions that will determine the product line.
Planning to put a new product on the market takes strategic planning. Some companies hire specialists to help define the product, develop a brand promise and conduct an assessment. By using SWOT analysis, the company can identify the strengths of the new product compared to the competition, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Proper product planning will allow a company to position the product in the marketplace and produce sales. That means the product may provide more value, a better price, more innovation, convenience or other benefits compared to competing products.
Advertising gets the word out to the public about the product. A comprehensive advertising plan can include traditional methods like direct mail postcards and brochures along with Internet advertising and creating excitement through social network sites. Special events and promotions can lure customers and introduce them to new products. Innovative electronic methods like QR barcodes can link printed material to a company website with product information with a smartphone application.
Using strong sales techniques can go a long way toward increasing profits for a company. The sales staff can be trained to form relationships with the buyer based on trust. Once a rapport is established, the saleswoman can use open-ended questions like “What are the main challenges you are faced with?” to identify problems. The saleswoman then responds by recommending the correct product to solve the problem. This is called consultative selling, with the saleswoman providing added value to the consumer by acting as a consultant and providing information. Companies benefit from repeat business.
Advertising on TV offers a number of benefits to businesses by incorporating sound, images and movement to make the whole package interesting for consumers. Ads that capture the attention of the audience can start consumers talking, effectively reaffirming the advertising message. In addition, cable advertising allows businesses to target very specific geographic areas at a lower cost than major network advertising.
One of the benefits of TV advertising is its ability to communicate with a very large audience. Considered a form of mass media, TV ads work well to attract attention, generate awareness and establish a preference for products and services, says Lin Grensing-Pophal, author of “Marketing With the End in Mind.” Because of the broad audience, they target–particularly through major TV networks–TV ads tend to provide general, rather than very specific, messages.
Despite the large audience reach of television, it’s important to note that the ability to target market segments has grown significantly over the years, says Grensing-Pophal. Even network TV offers a wide range of programming options where ads are most likely to be viewed by specific target audience segments. With cable television advertising, advertisers can narrowly target specific market segments not only by placing their ads in specific programs but also choose specific zip-code areas for broadcasting the ads.
TV has always been able to appeal to multiple senses through its combination of text, images, sound and motion. While the development of effective TV spots requires significant planning and the use of experienced, and often expensive, production experts, the value can be significant as well. It is its multi-sensory appeal that allows TV advertising to remain a viable option for many advertisers.