Building An Ad

The opinion consumers have of your company's products or services is important. What you may not realize is that they start forming this opinion even before they buy anything, when they first see your ad. You want your ad to make customers think: "hey, maybe I should buy my next hair dryer for Sally's beauty salon" not: "no way am I giving those business owners my money." To keep your company image in the former category, here are some questions you should ask yourself when you're thinking of designing an advertising campaign.

What kind of image do I want to create for this product?

Advertising is all about forming customers' opinions for them, so the first thing you need to do is decide what you want them to think. "townhouse for sale" is too broad a statement. You need to keep it simple, so focus on one particular element that gives the customer some sort of reference point. Like "Luxury two story townhome in a great neighbourhood" paints a much better picture.

Who is my target demographic?

The tone and message of your ad will be different depending on who you're trying to reach. To sell a downtown townhouse you want your ad to appeal to mature people with high annual incomes. Therefore, before you decide on the content decide who your product is for. Children? College students? Retirees? Low-income single mothers? Whoever it is, write the content in a way that will appeal primarily to that group of people.

How Can I Make This Original?

Originality will go a long way toward making your ad stick in people's minds. Common techniques like testimonials and simple presentations of the product are just that: common. People will forget ads like this while they're still looking at them. To hold their attention, come up with a unique yet appropriate spin or campaign. Bonus points for making people laugh, so don't take yourself too seriously.

Where will I run this ad?

Use your common sense. You wouldn't advertise your job search engine on the crafting website, because they are completely unrelated. This is sort of an extension of the target demographic question, because obviously ads aimed at different age or interest groups will be more effective in different media. For instance, tech-savvy teenagers are more likely to respond to internet ads while literary minded older people are more likely to read ads in the newspaper. Try to affix your ad to a website, program, or publication that is in some way related to your product or service in order to reach the maximum number of people who may need it. For more information on grabbing consumers attention you can visit our article titled "Internet Video".