For decades, brands have relied on traditional marketing methods such as advertisements on TV, radio, and billboards. But, many brands are now turning to more innovative promotional methods, such as social media advertising and experiential marketing. As brands start to shift more of their marketing dollars to these non-traditional methods, many industry experts are wondering if traditional marketing has finally reached the end of the road. It’s too early to declare traditional marketing dead, but there’s no denying that it is definitely struggling to keep up. Here are some of the many reasons why traditional marketing is losing its appeal:
Slow Turnaround
It can take weeks or even months to film a TV commercial or design the layout of a print campaign. Even after the commercial or advertisement is complete, getting the campaign up and running will take even longer. This slow turnaround time is one of the reasons why marketers are pulling away from traditional marketing methods. Marketers want to be able to immediately launch new campaigns to respond to what’s going on in the world, which they cannot do with traditional marketing. However, marketers can quickly launch campaigns with new marketing methods, especially pay-per-click or social media ads.
Mid-Campaign Adjustments
Marketers are able to monitor their social media or pay-per-click campaigns to see how well they are performing in real time. If something isn’t performing as expected, marketers can make adjustments to ensure they are spending their marketing dollars wisely. For example, marketers can adjust the keywords they are targeting or broaden their target audience if they are not seeing good results. Unfortunately, they are not able to make adjustments in the middle of a traditional marketing campaign. Marketers cannot change a billboard design or tweak the wording used in a print campaign without investing a great deal of money and time. The flexibility of non-traditional marketing methods has convinced many marketers to start allocating more of their marketing budget to these new tactics.
Two-Way Engagement
Customers want to be able to engage with the brands that they love, but this is not possible when brands use traditional forms of marketing. There’s no way for a customer to engage with a commercial that he sees on TV or a billboard that he passes on the road. However, he can easily engage with other forms of marketing. For example, he can click on pay-per-click ads, comment on social media ads, or speak with brand ambassadors at an experiential marketing event. This gives him the opportunity to give feedback on products or services, learn more about the company, and form an authentic relationship with the brand. Consumers love having two-way conversations with brands, so this is a much more effective way to connect with your audience.
Analytics
At the end of a campaign, marketers want to know how it performed so they know what they should do differently in the future. But, it can be incredibly challenging to calculate a return on investment for traditional marketing methods. There is no way for you to know exactly how many people were reached by a billboard, for example. Even if you were somehow able to figure out how many cars drove by the billboard, there’s no way of knowing how many people actually looked up and paid attention to the ad. This leaves marketers in the dark. How do they know if the ad was effective? Should they make any adjustments to the design of the billboard if they want to run the same campaign again? These questions may never be answered—unless marketers turn to non-traditional forms of marketing. Marketers have access to a lot of information about social media or pay-per-click ads, for instance. This allows them to calculate the return on investment and determine if it was a good decision to run the campaign.
Small Budgets
Small businesses do not have large marketing budgets, which means they cannot afford to film commercials or pay the fees associated with other types of traditional marketing methods. However, businesses of all size can use non-traditional marketing methods such as experiential marketing, social media, and pay-per-click ads. You can spend as much or as little as you want on these marketing tactics, so there’s no pressure to break the bank in order to promote your business. In fact, a social media campaign can be launched with as little as just a few dollars, which means it’s affordable for all businesses.
But, that’s not the only benefit of being able to launch a campaign with a small budget. Because businesses do not have to invest a lot of money in order to launch a campaign, there is little risk involved with trying a non-traditional marketing method. Businesses don’t have to worry about making a bad decision and losing a lot of money since there isn’t much to lose.
Distractions
Do consumers even pay attention to traditional marketing methods? This question has been on the mind of marketers everywhere. Consumers may fast forward through commercials or pull out their cell phones to scroll through social media to pass the time. A consumer that is flipping through a magazine may get distracted by something she sees on another page, so she may not even notice your ad. But, non-traditional marketing campaigns are often able to cut through the clutter in order to grab the consumer’s attention.
It’s not hard to see why non-traditional marketing methods such as social media, pay-per-click ads, and experiential marketing are getting more attention. For more information on the latest trends in the marketing industry, get in touch with the team of experts at Factory 360. We can help your brand plan and execute an experiential marketing event to grow your business!