Online Or Print Local Marketing The Difference


Everyone has a purchasing progression they go through. It may take as short a time as several hours to go through it all. It may take a year or more to go through the buying process. But here is the process.

This method is the way most people buy;

1) The buyers are aware of a need, or want.

2) The buyers gather knowledge about the product, service, or solution to their problem.

3) The buyers ask contacts, gathering social proof.

This is another way of gathering more knowledge to make a decision. Reading customer review, reading articles on the subject, watching videos, twittering friends, e-mailing friends, reading Consumer Report, or calling an expert on the subject are all simply ways to gather more knowledge.

Eventually, enough knowledge is gathered to make the buyer comfortable in making a decision.

Again, the time required can vary radically for the individual

buyer.

Nearly 95% of the "Buying Process", the buyer is gathering knowledge. Only about 5% of the time is the buyer actually looking to buy right then.

With offline marketing, you will likely produce the most profit by concentrating on the buyers that are at the end of the buying process. Why? Because offline marketing to provide knowledge ignores the people ready to buy now.

Virtually never does a newspaper reader search for ads to buy from. They are looking for news or opinion. The radio listener is listening for music, news, or a talk show..they are not waiting to hear your ad.

In offline marketing, you are surprising the buyer by going to them. They are not looking for you. And the buyer hearing your radio ad, does not write down your phone number to phone until they are ready to buy. The newspaper reader does not clip out your advertisement until the prospects are ready to purchase.

So marketing offline to people at the beginning of the buying process is a waste of money.

Pretty much every marketer that has tested marketing results, will agree with that assessment.

Currently, with local online marketing, it's completely different. Why?

For the reason that people are going online to get knowledge. After entertainment, the biggest reason people go online is to learn something. Buying something is a distant second place reason to go online.

And with knowledge, I call it "Content Marketing", you can become the source of the knowledge the local prospect is looking for.

With content marketing, you can appeal to customers at every point of the buying process. You can become the favored source for opinions, reviews, videos, articles, buying guides, product comparisons, and more. You can be the "Go To Guy" for that prospect.

How? By creating all of these things yourself or having someone do it for you. Online search engines are loaded with online directory listings, and websites. Do any local search, for any product category, and you'll see what I mean. Every listing in a Google search will be online directory listings or website listings.

But do you know what search engines like Google love? Substance. High quality, applicable, factual content.

So they list articles, reviews, and especially video higher in the local search results.

Those listings can almost all be yours.