The Most Effective Advertising Strategies By The Numbers
By Jane Dawson
Online retailers need to get their message out to a much larger universe of potential customers than brick and mortar stores. The old methods of advertising do not necessarily have a good deal of relevance in the Internet environment.
For a number of years now, Internet entrepreneurs have been experimenting with various ways of getting the message out to their audiences of potential buyers. Practical Ecommerce recently conducted a study to determine which advertising methods online entrepreneurs rate as the most effective.
The April 2009 survey asked readers of the Practical Ecommerce website to rate the following advertising strategies for effectiveness, which they defined as increasing web traffic or online sales:
- PPC ads
- banner advertising
- online rich media
- online video
- podcasts
- print advertising
- radio ads
- television ads
- catalogs
- direct mail
The respondents overwhelmingly selected pay per click advertising as the hands down best way to advertise on the Internet, with seventy-nine percent labeling pay per click advertising as effective or very effective.
Respondents did not just pay lip service today per click advertising either. An overwhelming eighty-five percent said that they purchased pay per click advertising as part of their marketing strategy.
Second most important to online retailers is the use of email. This growing phenomenon is used by fifty-five percent of respondents. A lesser number, forty-four percent used banner advertising and about a third used videos to sell.
Most surprisingly, about half of all respondents still used print advertising as part of their strategy. This seems quite unusual for an online seller population, especially in these days when print advertising media is in a substantial decline, e.g., many newspapers around the world are simply closing their doors due to lack of advertising revenue.
So, what is the take home message from these experienced online retailers? We think there are several important messages to think about.
If you do not have a pay per click strategy, it is time to get involved. When almost one in ten online sellers say it works, that is a strategy that cannot be ignored.
If you do have a pay per click strategy in place, take the time now to review it and be sure you are getting the best possible value from your efforts. There is an art and a science to placing advertising, writing the ads and crafting the landing pages. Be sure you are using this tool as optimally as you can.
Remember that even though pay per click was resoundingly the most popular advertising form, online sellers also spread their advertising dollars around to a variety of other techniques.
These savvy entrepreneurs are not placing all of their eggs in one basket. They are out there, blanketing with a variety of techniques, watching and learning what is best for their marketplace. Your strategy should be similarly broad, if it makes sense.
However, do not simply race out and buy banner ads. Take the time to learn what works in your target market and create an array of techniques that gives you the best balance between financial outlay and results.
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