Category Archives: Costs to advertise

Why You Need to Keep On Advertising

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business couple at computer In a recession, or when things are tough (as they most definitely now are), business owners and marketers tend to put a lid on their advertising spend as a means of capping their expenses. And yet, whilst understandable, it’s often a mistake to do so.

The reason that advertising is often the first expense to face the chop is that it’s the easiest thing to cut. It’s far easier to send out an instruction to your ad agency and media agency to cut, by way of an example,  TV advertising or radio advertising from a media schedule than it is to, for example, retrench staff.

History has shown that advertisers who stop advertising in recessionary periods have some catching up to do when the economy turns for the better. This stands to reason, as the advertiser who continues to advertise in a downturn will be better positioned to capitalise in an upturn as his or her advertising would have remained uppermind over time.  The advertiser who has stopped advertising will have lost ground in the minds of his or her target market. (A matter of out of sight, out of mind..)

One of the most prevalent reasons given by marketers looking to cut, or stop, advertising is: there’s no money out there, so what’s the point? Fact is, that whilst some South Africans have no money (OK, many South Africans have no money), many do..something that was brought home recently when my wife and I tried to find a week’s timeshare on the coast.  After days of searching, it became clear that there was none to be had.

How could this be, if people don’t have money? The cynic would say that they don’t have money because they spent on things like timeshare, but this rings hollow.

South Africans are spending WEEKS on holiday. And as a family who was fortunate enough to have eventually found somewhere to stay and as a result, went away for ten days, we can vouch for how much an extended holiday would cost. Eating out every day and keeping the kids entertained costs plenty. And yet, restaurants are pumping and queues at the movies or fun parks never seem to end.

Another thing that struck us is how many people have second homes on the coast: homes that cost millions. And boats, that sit idly moored to those homes..

People short of money? Certainly not all of them…

It is clear that there are many people in this country (admittedly in the upper LSMs) who have money to burn. And these are people who continue to eat, continue to drink, continue to entertain, continue to drive, continue to bank, continue to invest and continue to holiday.

Quite simply, they need to be advertised to – regardless of the state of the economy.

The bottom line is that if you’re not advertising to them, you’re not in the picture. Simple as that.

But what about the middle class? Or the lower income-earners in our country? Here a different picture emerges because they’re more under pressure, financially-speaking. That said, they still need to eat and drink, still need to buy household goods, still need to put food on the table. So they also need to be advertised to.

What marketers need to do when things are tough is box clever.

If your product is not moving, you need to think of ways to GET it moving. Discount the price, offer a “buy one, get two” offer, start a loyalty program…think out the box and get creative.

The worst thing is to put a stop to your advertising efforts. But if you have absolutely no choice other than to cut back, do it strategically. Cut back on media that you consider to be “nice-to-haves” – this might be in the form of TV advertising, radio advertising, cinema advertising, outdoor advertising, newspaper or magazine advertising – and continue with advertising that brings you response. (Digital advertising more than likely).

With people googling practically everything these days, make sure that your website is professionally optimised for search engines. You need to come up on the first page of Google when people search for the type of product or service you offer. This is imperative. It’s said that the best place to hide a dead body is on the second page of Google. Why? Because no one ever searches there. Quite simply, if you’re not on the first page of Google, you’re dead in the water.

Google Adwords are also good. If you’re running Adword campaigns, continue running them. And if they’re not delivering the type of response you expect, find someone professional to manage them.

Google Display? Also good. Keep it going.

Blogs? They work well. Blog more than you have in the past.

If your business is struggling, cut your advertising spend if you must – but at the very least – maintain a presence online. You’ll regret it if you don’t because , despite what you may believe, there ARE  people with money out there. And amongst them will be people looking for what you offer.

My name is Gerard Kavonic of This country’s smallest ad agency, Kavonic Hone and I can be reached on [email protected] and 083 444 9888. You can see what I’m about on www.kavonichone.co.za

I’d be happy to advise you.

Billboard Advertising and Outdoor Advertising. One and the same?

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advertising billboardWhilst those within the advertising industry would know the difference between “billboard advertising” and “outdoor advertising”, some marketers may not – judging from the volume of enquiries I receive for eg billboards when what they are looking for are street pole posters, or maxi posters.

So, a quick explanation:

Billboards are generally the free-standing boards you see on the sides of freeways or on main roads in suburban areas. They come in all shapes and sizes, and in portrait or landscape-formats. Of all the outdoor media-types, these type of billboards are normally the most expensive (together with building wraps) and can range from around R20 000 per month to around R70 000 a month – depending on their geographical location, and how many people would see, or pass by, the billboard in question in any month. In addition, there would a reproduction cost for printing the artwork, which would be a once-off cost, ranging from about R15 000 and upwards.

Billboards could be in the form of static billboards and digital billboards; the difference between them being that on a static board, only one advertising message could be shown at a time, whereas on a digital billboard, a number of ads could be shown one after the other. Digital billboards are becoming more and more popular as they are generally cheaper to flight, the messages can be changed quickly and the creative can be “walked” around a pre-determined area, so as to reach more people in different locales.

Outdoor advertising is a more encompassing term than billboard advertising and includes all outdoor advertising types – ranging from billboards, maxi posters, mini posters and street pole posters to building wraps, signage at taxi ranks, dustbin advertising, trailer advertising and bus shelter advertising.

Of these, the most expensive are building wraps where a side of an entire building can be branded if need be. Not only can this be impactful, it can be incredibly costly and can generally only be afforded by large marketers with expansive ad budgets. (Typically, companies in the banking, insurance, telecommunications and liquor industries).

Maxi-posters are also popular and are to be found between the north-bound and south-bound lanes of major freeways. These are extremely effective, so long as the creative messaging is kept simple and eye-catching. The rule of thumb here is to communicate the USP (Unique Selling Proposition). There’s no point in having a poster with a long headline that a motorist travelling at speed would have no chance of absorbing.

But this is true of all outdoor. You have to keep things simple, and understandable. Eye-catching is also good.

Take street pole posters. Generally put up in series of three or four, if the message is complicated, you’ll lose most motorists and your advertising money will be money down the drain. Street pole posters are cost-effective and hence popular with advertisers with limited advertising budgets. Anyone with R15 000 to R20 000 available could probably afford a series of street pole posters (depending of course on what an ad agency or design studio might for charge for the creative concept and design) although that said, one would normally get a better result by having more than one row of street pole posters.

Then there are mini-posters. Like street pole posters, they can work well. But their success is largely dependent on the creative.

In general, outdoor advertising is incredibly popular with marketers and probably always will be.

Many marketers will look at billboards in conjunction with radio advertising and as a strategy, this makes a lot of sense in a country like South Africa.

As with all advertising, however, billboard or outdoor advertising needs to be approached strategically and professionally and the process typically commences with identifying your target markets and researching their media consumption habits. There are ad agencies and media agencies specialising in outdoor advertising who can crunch the numbers. More than this, they could give you current outdoor availability in a specific area, provide reproduction and rental costings and recommend and purchase space on your behalf. Simplifying the outdoor or billboard advertising process as a result.

Whichever the outdoor advertising type, there will always be three costs:

The cost that an advertising agency will charge you to conceptualise the advertising message and supply artwork

The cost that the media owner will charge you to print the artwork

The cost that the media owner will charge you to flight your advertising per month 

If you ever need help in this area, I’d be happy to point you in the right direction.

What Can An Advertiser Do on a Small Advertising Budget?

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As a small advertising agency, many of my recent enquiries are coming from small or medium sized-companies with small advertising budgets. Probably not surprising, due to tough trading conditions, in which budgets are under pressure, and my positioning in the market as This country’s smallest advertising agency (in which I’m often – erroneously – perceived as This country’s cheapest ad agency). And it’s not that I mind receiving these enquiries.

Rather, it makes me question whether a limited marketing budget of, say R30 000 per month, is actually sufficient in this day and age.

Prior to the advent of social media and the effectiveness of online marketing, a budget of this size would have been problematic – for the simple reason that conventional advertising media would have required a significantly more substantial investment to make them work.

One has only to look at the costs of TV advertising, radio advertising, print advertising or outdoor advertising these days. They’re not for the faint-hearted.

Unless a marketer has a budget of at least R1 million to spend on TV advertising, it’s probably not a medium worth considering (unless the marketer has a cheap TV commercial in mind – one that could be produced in studio – and intends only a short burst of airing the commercial).

Radio advertising? Expensive if one intends advertising on morning or afternoon drive time, but less so if not. One could probably get away with an advertising spend of R100 000-R150 000 dependent on station choice and duration of a radio campaign.

Advertising in newspapers or magazines? Also expensive, unless you have a small black and white ad in mind, or you’re looking to advertise in a Caxton paper or a trade journal.

Outdoor advertising can also be costly, especially if you’d like to advertise on a freeway or at an airport. Building wraps are also extremely costly. Whereas street pole posters and other forms of outdoor advertising are less so.

Limited advertising budgets are often difficult to work with, but for my money, I would in nearly all cases recommend an online marketing approach, in which one’s target market(s) are driven to a website through:

Google Adwords
Blogging
Remarketing
Social Media

That said, the effectiveness and success of an online marketing campaign is often dependent on the website itself. Today, one’s website needs to talk to one’s target audience. It needs to, at a glance, tell people what you’re about. First impressions count. Your website needs to stand out, be liked, be easily navigable, be built correctly and be professionally optimised for search engines.

(With “professionally” being the key word here: too many so-called online marketers today think they know about optimisation but ending up doing an average job. Far rather, get someone who understands optimisation and specialises in the field).

Once your website has been professionally optimised for search engines and has had the aforementioned boxes ticked, a Google Adwords campaign should be looked at. (Unless you know what you’re doing, get a professional in to set it up and manage it for you).

Regular blogging is also important. As is remarketing. As is social media (if done correctly). But these will be dealt with in upcoming blog posts.

The most important thing with online marketing is get someone who knows what they’re doing in to do it for you. Unless you’re really clue-d up in this area, it’s best to seek outside help. Done correctly, an online marketing campaign can do wonders for the bottom-line and a business with a limited advertising budget should look at one as a first port-of-call.

I work with some of the best online marketers in the industry. I could put you onto them if need be.

Nando’s Directional Sign – Street Pole Posters Successful Pointers

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Nando’s advertising is well-respected and well-known. Normally for stirring controversy. But between its TV ads, which invariably succeed in getting the brand on the front pages of newspapers, and its radio commercials and newspaper ads are street pole posters which drive traffic to its outlets.

In a discussion I had recently with someone who works on the Nandos advertising account, the street pole posters seem to be working well. Not at all clever or controversial (unusual for this often off-the-wall marketer), they are achieving their objective which is to point motorists to the nearest outlet and to get them to purchase.

From a marketing point of view, they also point to how a brand that is witty and irreverent can have TV, radio and print as its flagship mediums raising laughs and street pole posters doing the business of driving traffic to its stores.

At the end of the day, Nandos is in the business of making money and clearly not in it for the controversy it stirs in the marketplace, or the smiles and sniggers it puts on people’s faces. There is only one place it can make money and that is by getting people into its stores, of which there are now hundreds around South Africa in practically every shopping centre and on every second street corner.

Because they are seen by motorists everywhere, street pole posters are a perfect fit for this marketing-led company. More so because it’s an advertising medium that lends itself to creativity, it’s also one that’s cost-effective. Marketers wanting to get their brand “out there” and who don’t have marketing budgets that make television advertising, radio advertising or magazine possible find that advertising on street pole posters fits the bill in more ways than one.

(Depending on the geographical location, one could advertise on a street pole poster for around R1 200 per month. So a series of three or four posters, run consecutively, would set you back less than R5 000 excluding VAT which is a pittance in advertising terms. (Note that this a rental cost only. You would still need to budget to have the posters conceptualised and designed). Nando’s have street pole posters all over the place however so the costs can start to run away with you if you’re advertising on a national basis.

Just out of interest: a visit to the company’s new website www.nandos.co.za shows an impressive number of countries in which it is now represented, giving proof to the effectiveness of its marketing campaigns. Readers may be surprised to learn that Nandos now has outlets in Australia, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Botswana, Canada, Cyprus, Fiji, India, Ireland, Kuwait, Lebanon, Lesotho, Malawi, Malaysia, Namibia, New Zealand, Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Swaziland, UAE, UK, USA and Zimbabwe… making it a truly global brand.

As an advertising agency, I’m often asked to produce “nandos-type advertising”. Clearly, it’s the sort of advertising that resonates with a lot of people. So hats off to its marketing department and ad agency Black River FC who has really set the benchmark for this genre of advertising.

Clearly, humorous and topical advertising has its place – and I’m all for it (where appropriate of course). In the meantime, here’s an idea for a street pole poster campaign that Nandos (or indeed one of its competitors) may like to consider.

“You’re warm. You’re warmer. You’re hot. Now you’re hot, hot, hot” with the first poster furthest from a Nandos outlet and the last poster closest to it.

Just an idea, but maybe one worth considering the closer one gets to winter?

Where Best To Find Them 2013 Advertising Rates

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Unless you’re an established marketer and have a full  service advertising agency working on your advertising account, obtaining advertising rates (and making sense of them) can be a time-consuming, frustrating, daunting and often difficult process.

As someone who runs a small advertising agency in Johannesburg, I sense this on a daily basis as I’m often fielding calls or receiving emails from businesses requesting rates to advertise on television, radio, billboards, newspapers and magazines.

Unfortunately, many of these requests for rates are not easy to see to, for the simple reason that there are so many variables at play. With combination rates on offer and discounted advertising packages for first time advertisers, it’s no simple matter providing the information required in a way that would be understood by someone new to, or unfamiliar with, marketing.

Generalist requests for “the cost to advertise on television” or “the cost to advertise on radio for a six month period” are akin to asking “the price of a car”. What type of car? A new car? A second hand car? What model? Clearly the price of a 2013 Mercedes Benz would be different to that of a 2007 Toyota Corolla.

And so it is with advertising. There are just so many variables at play and so many considerations to take into account.

Take TV or radio advertising, where a fifteen second commercial on Soweto TV would cost far less to flight at six in the morning than a thirty second commercial would cost to flight on MNet during evening prime time, and a radio spot aired during morning or afternoon drive time on Highveld will be more expensive than one aired mid-morning or mid-afternoon on Kaya FM.

In newspaper or magazine advertising, a quarter page black and white advertisement hidden on page 23 in a Caxton newspaper will be much cheaper to flight than a full page full colour ad with a product sachet affixed to it in a glossy magazine like FHM.

And in outdoor advertising, where a small billboard in the back of beyond would cost a fraction of the price of a large billboard occupying pride of place on Johannesburg’s M1 motorway.

I’m stating the obvious of course but the point is that advertising rates vary enormously and that potential advertisers should be cognisant of this. What’s also important is to be as clear as possible in one’s request for information. A request for “Rates to advertise during etv’s 19h00 news bulletin on a Tuesday or Thursday evening” would be much easier to provide than “rates to advertise on TV”.

But who should you approach for advertising rates? Whilst there is nothing wrong with approaching a media owner directly (be it SABC, MNet, DSTV, etv, Soweto TV, Primedia, You or Huisgenoot magazines, Clear Channel, Highveld, 702, 5FM, Jacaranda, Metro FM or Kaya FM as examples) you will likely only be sent a rate card or a number of rate cards for you to make sense of. And unless you’re a seasoned marketer, you may find it difficult deciding which advertising package, radio station or TV time slot will be best to take advantage of so as to deliver the most bang for your buck.

Also, the media owner wants your advertising business so any notion of objectivity goes out the window. My advice to anyone interested in advertising a product or service would be to ask your marketing consultant (if you have one) to put you in touch with an experienced media buying and planning agency.

Because these agencies are independent and work with pretty much every media owner in the country, they’re objective and besides providing you with rates to advertise, can advise as to which advertising mediums will work best for you within the parameters of your marketing budget.

And because they earn their commissions irrespective of the advertising media booked, they will do their best for your brand regardless of whether TV advertising, radio advertising, outdoor advertising, cinema advertising, print advertising, online advertising – or any other form of advertising is put to you on a media schedule.

Best of all is that so long as they get to place your advertising, their services and expertise typically come to you at no cost.

The Costs Of Not Advertising.

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Having written before on the costs of advertising, here’s a write-up on the costs of not advertising – although these are self-explanatory and should be obvious to most. In no particular order, the costs of not advertising one’s business are:

* stagnating sales
* the potential downsizing of your business
* laying off of personnel
* paying of retrenchment packagesd
* the possible closing of your doors

There are others, but suffice to say that they make gloomy reading. The reality is that in a recession (or economic slowdown as it’s often called) all businesses need to be advertising in some form or another. Unless you can survive by way of monthly cash injections by some kind benefactor, assistance from outside investors, help from understanding bankers or people spreading awareness of your company through word of mouth, advertising your products and services has become as important as paying your monthly rental or electricity bills.

With tough economic conditions prevailing and with no real end in sight, small businesses are battling. (Medium sized and large businesses too but they likely have more ability to survive).

The sad reality is that smaller businesses are caught between a rock and a hard place : Advertise, and put even more pressure on already-strained cashflows – or don’t advertise, and face a long and uphill battle ahead. It’s a difficult one but I honestly don’t believe business owners have a choice.

Whilst advertising is expensive, it’s imperative. One just has to work within one’s means and cut out the frills. Mandatory is a website. (It never ceases to amaze me how many companies out there still don’t have a web presence and justify this with the assertion that, in their particular industry, people don’t look at websites…..what also amazes me is the number of sub-standard websites out there).

Having a decent and correctly-built  website is critically important, this is just the beginning however. It then needs to be optimised for search engines and marketed online with the objective of attracting traffic. An unvisited site is about as useful as no site at all. Driving traffic to one’s website is achieved through the likes of  Google Adwords, blogging and social media and these tools are invaluable in this day and age. Social media in particular has become hugely important. It’s no longer a nice-to-have and a case of setting up Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter profiles. There needs to be an on-line strategy in place and there are some very good people out there who can help you in this regard.

Of course, before embarking on-line, a corporate identity must be developed – but this can be kept to the basics if money is tight. A decent logo, business card, email signature, letterhead and perhaps a corporate profile and you’re done.

Advertising on street pole posters and billboards, advertising on radio, cinema advertising, TV advertising and advertising in newspapers and magazines can be pencilled in as a “phase 2” and wait  until business has either stabilised or grown to a point where they become affordable.

Advertising is costly and as much as you’d like to have your target market exposed to your brand at every turn, the struggling business needs to work within its means. A professionally-optimised website marketed correctly on-line and through social media, and all else can follow.