Pittsburgh Companies Demand Proven Results for Every Dollar Spent in this Bad Economy
By bryan | November 17, 2008
Tough times have hit Pittsburgh and the surrounding areas. This is especially true for smaller local businesses. Here’s a few case studies we’ve noted in the past few months:
- A small mattress store with negative revenues forced to lay off most of their work force.
- A car transportation company destroyed because car sales are so low there are no cars to deliver.
- Mortgage companies reaching out for alternative funding sources because the regular sources are no longer viable.
- Trade schools not being able to pull in students that live more then 30 minutes away because they can not afford the gas to go to school
So what are these companies doing to make it through difficult times and adjust to this new market?
They are working over their budgets. And more specifically they are monitoring their marketing funds very closely. They are only spending on proven marketing with known results. Everything else is on the chopping block, or they are looking for measures to track how their money is spent to ensure effectiveness.
We recommend finding ways to track all your marketing both online and off. This will require coordination between all of your marketing avenues as well as affordable tools and creative methods of marketing. In the long run the time and attention will yield big returns for your company. We often hear from business owners that they speculate 25% of their marketing is truly effective, but those same business owners can not tell exactly what 25% of the marketing is working or whether they had a good return on investment.
When you track your marketing dollars you can better identify those marketing avenues that work. In addition to identifying good avenues to use you can weed out the bad. This could free up funds to better exploit those marketing areas online or off that are working effectively.
Many of our clients biggest cut backs have been with phone book advertising, radio, trade shows, and print (direct mail). There has also been a cry of frustration from companies that try internet advertising in conjunction with any of the phone book advertising companies. Most have had horrible, costly, results, due to poor setup and planning.
We understand exactly how frustrating this is because we’ve tried the same methods and gotten the same terrible results. We’ve all read about how online marketing is the most cost effective strategy for marketing, but the results just haven’t been justified. What’s worse is that we know online marketing works, because everyday small businesses are losing contracts or jobs from people shopping them online.
Higher Images offers an extensive set of affordable tools that help you track many stages and types of marketing. Plus we have an extensive knowledge on how to market online. Gives us a call and let us show you how to better leverage your marketing funds today!
Topics: Industry Secrets | No Comments »
How to Market Online During Economic Crisis
By mike | October 9, 2008
There is clearly a economic burden from the sub-prime lending melt-down. Many companies have cut back their spending online. This is due to the belief that their online markets will dry up. That statement can’t be further from the truth. Internet marketing reaches more people for less dollars than any other form of marketing. The thought that people won’t spend money online anymore fetched. The internet poses the best chance of any marketing media to grow during the Eco-crisis.
Penny pinching will be the name of the game and prepare to haggle. Many companies will find that cutting prices and lowering the bottom-line will help them survive. Turning a blind eye to marketing will create no business. So, convincing advertisers to maintain there current spending but, stay involved in the market analysis and conversion, will be a challenge.
Internet marketing has 2 major ROI’s. The first is obvious, sales, the second takes some explaining. Information is the #1 ROI you can take from your online efforts. There is no better way to peer into the minds of your consumers than where and what they search to find your business. Knowing what your competitors are doing and how you and your business is postured to learn from their (your competition) mistakes. Market analysis lets you know if you have a chance to generte income online or if you should reconsider your business model.
There are going to be alot of hype floating around about what to do in the economic state we are in, but in the end we will return to our monetary utopia and continue to spend money on goods and services. We have survived much worse with much less, it is the American way to adapt and overcome. Will your business be able to overcome or will it be overcome?
Topics: Industry Secrets | 4 Comments »
Local Internet Marketing in Pittsburgh
By mike | September 8, 2008
Another summer has come and gone. The summer of 2008 seemed to over-shadowed by the current state of the economy. With civic leaders preaching conserve and change, and business owners following suit, many small to mid-sized businesses where hesitant to explore the web. The Pittsburgh local internet marketing scene looks and sounds like a broken record, with many if not all SEM agency’s pitching the same businesses with the same spiel, “We can make you #1″.
The business owners have to be as versed in the pitch ,as the salesmen. They must think that all of “us people” sell the same thing. Well, this is the furtherest from truth. I think it’s safe to say, we are all different. Apples to oranges compare that!
In the up-coming weeks I will outline the who’s and what’s of the local internet advertising game. This should help clarify the specifics of the offering of each agency. To help business owners separate the different types of internet marketing, will will discuss Pay-Per-Click (PPC), Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Local Business Directory listings. For the sake of our competitor’s we will not name names.
To round things out, we will advice without bias the Pro’s and Con’s of each type of marketing, and how it can best benefit you and your company.
Topics: Industry Secrets | 2 Comments »
