Where to Start: Advertising 101 Part 2

Once you have made the decision to advertise and either hire help, or do it yourself, you need to start thinking about the kinds of advertising media which are accessible to you given your budget.

* Internet advertising is a popular form of advertising and generally less expensive than other forms of mass media.  It can get into more niches than newspapers, radio or magazines.

It usually takes the form of banners, but there is also sponsorship, links,  and webmalls.

Internet advertising also uses auto responders, email marketing/advertising, though you do have the choice not to use these.  Auto responders will automatically forward a response or information from an incoming email or a set subscription.

Then there is straight email marketing, in which you mail to a list, or you take out an ad with a popular ezine.

There are also blogging and article submission options.

Article submission is simply writing and submitting articles to directories. It is usually for free, though it does take time and effort.

With a blog, you can submit this to a directory as well, and again, it does not usually cost anything unless you want to have your own blog site, but it does cost in terms of time and effort.

Affiliate marketing is also available.  Affiliate marketing will also connect you to many other companies, and you will generate an additional income by using affiliate marketing which can help offset the overall cost of advertising.

Affiliate marketing does not cost you money–in fact they pay YOU for every  sale.  But it does take time and effort, and you will usually need to have an efficient way to contact your prospective buyers, such as email.

For a robust email program with autoresponders, you might want to consider Aweber

Make sure every link and campaign is trackable with its own unique code, so you can determine the success of each and do more of the most successful campaigns to get more bang for your buck, as well as your time and effort.

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Author: jm

Joan Mullally has been doing business online for more than 20 years and is a pioneer in the fields of online publishing, marketing, and ecommerce. She is the author of more than 200 guides and courses designed to help beginner and intermediate marketers make the most of the opportunities the Internet offers for running a successful business. A student and later teacher trainee of Frank McCourt’s, she has always appreciated the power of the word, and has used her knowledge for successful SEO and PPC campaigns, and powerful marketing copy. One computer science class at NYU was enough to spark her fascination with all things digital. In her spare time, she works with adult literacy, animal fostering and rescue, and teaching computer skills to women.