Friday, March 18, 2011

Marketing - Traditional Advertising

Currently reading - Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan

What most traditional marketing gurus consider traditional advertising includes magazine/newspaper ads, TV spots, or radio commercials.  I'll make this short and sweet once again--save your money.

This type of advertising is incredibly expensive.  Unfortunately, what makes it work is repetition.  If you don't believe me, watch Saturday morning cartoons with your kids (or your neighbor's kids, nieces, nephews, etc.)  Watch how many times during the course of four hours over four weeks the same spot airs.  Now calculate that by a $10,000.

A lot of money, huh?

And the other types of traditional advertising aren't much cheaper.

If you're Stephen King, the publisher has no problems throwing millions of advertising dollars around because they've calculated a potential return on investment ("ROI").  Publishers DON'T spend that kind of money on anyone but their A-listers.  If you're mid-list, you're on your own.

And that very mentality is one of the reasons, I'm looking at independent publishing.  And there's lots of cheaper alternatives that work.  And work much better.

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