Don't Underestimate The Power Of Old School Marketing

Any good business has to keep up with technology to survive. You won’t get anywhere these days without a good website and social media presence but they aren’t the be all and end all. Too many companies are directing all of their resources toward newer, more technologically focused marketing techniques and neglecting all the old school ones. While you do need to be up to date, some of the tried and tested marketing strategies are still just as effective as they always were. They’re also usually a lot cheaper so it makes sense to use them. If you think that these marketing techniques are obsolete, think again.

Photo by Tomás Del Coro from Las Vegas, Nevada, USA (Sign Spinning 2017) [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Trade Shows

Getting out there and meeting potential customers face to face is always a bonus. It gives them the chance to get a sense of who you are as a business and people are more likely to put their trust in somebody that they’ve met personally. A trade show is a great way to get thousands of potential customers in one place and show off your products. There’s going to be a hell of a lot of competition out there so you need to make sure that you’ve got great trade show displays that will catch people’s attention. There’s no way that people can visit every stall that’s there so you’ve got to make yours stand out. It’s also worth applying early so you can get the best position possible. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that the best place to set up camp is right next to the entrance, people like to do a round before stopping anywhere so right at the entrance is actually one of the worst places. You’ll get way more foot traffic on the end of a row or in the corner somewhere.

Promotional Gifts

Everybody loves something for free so a good promotional gift goes a long way. It gives your company value and it’s a brilliant way to give people a taster of your products. It’s also a good way of encouraging people to buy other products in order to get the promotional gift. If you don’t believe me, just think about the toys that you get in a McDonald’s happy meal or in boxes of cereal. Kids are constantly hassling their parents to buy that stuff just to get the gift. It doesn’t have to be anything expensive and if you’re getting them in bulk, it’ll be even cheaper.

Sign Spinning

When people walk past signs and billboards in the street the conversion rate is pretty small. Half the time they’ll just get ignored. Sign spinning is a pretty cheesy way of advertising but studies have shown that it does actually work. The spectacle draws people in and then they’ll read the information on the sign as they watch. It doesn’t work everywhere but if you pick a busy promenade that gets a lot of foot traffic then you’re likely to see some good returns on it with very little investment.

Always keep up to date with technology but don’t underestimate the power of old school marketing techniques.