New Media Rules

Your competition’s pouring money into digital marketing. Should you? Start by looking at your business and your customers. Then do the math

By Colleen Biondi
Illustrations by Raymond Biesinger

It didn’t take divine intervention for the Christian and Missionary Alliance to include the Internet as part of its new advertising campaign. It made sense, says John Twaddle, general manager of Calgary ad agency Metrographics, to upgrade the client’s existing website with a more dynamic look. Along with newspaper ads, a direct-mail postcard campaign and newsworthy stories for the print media, this blended approach was geared to attract more people to the church in the Alliance’s western Canadian district.

“We are bombarded with messages every day,” says Twaddle. Adds fellow Metrographics partner Doug Driediger, “You need to break through that clutter. You cannot be boring.” Repetition, repetition, repetition is critical; people need to see an ad seven or eight times before it becomes top of mind. And if they see it in different situations via different media – say, driving their cars and scrolling through their text messages – so much the better.

For small to medium-sized businesses with limited budgets this presents a particular challenge and one that is being increasingly met with Internet-based advertising tools. According to the American Advertising Federation (AAF), 20% of media budgets were spent online in 2006 and that number is expected to reach 32% by 2010. But the statistics mask a digital divide: while some small businesses are pouring money and resources into so-called “new media” – not always with a clear understanding of the return on their investment – others continue to shy away from Web-based, e-mail and wireless marketing.

“Not everyone is doing it,” confirms Roger Jewett, president of Rare Method, a Calgary-based interactive marketing firm which has just signed up a 6-billion-euro company with zero budget currently allocated for online advertising. “And I don’t blindly recommend it.” But advertising online can be a critical component of a plan which includes traditional options like print, broadcast and outdoor ads and direct marketing.

Before he designs an advertising plan for a new customer, Jewett asks the question, “What do you want to accomplish?” For example, do you want more traffic on your website? Do you want more of your widgets purchased? Do you want more people to know about your company, Widgets Inc.? Online options will be thrown into the mix for consideration.

Here is a sampling of Internet marketing tools gaining favour in the industry:

•Pay-per-click advertising. This involves an auction-type setup where companies bid for ads on search engines.

•Banner advertising. This involves creating a static or interactive ad which you place on related websites and for which you pay according to the action (number of hits) on the website.

•Corporate blogging. This involves a regularly changing Web log which is intended to promote a perspective, drive people repeatedly to the website and allow for two-way communication. It is estimated that 100 million bloggers are communicating on the Internet today.

•Search engine optimization (SEO). This involves designing your website with key factors that will rank you high on search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN. These factors, says Rohadi Barry Nagassar, CEO of Calgary-based DistinctSEO.com, include onpage (quality and uniqueness of content, key words, clean and efficient webcode, which will help you to “organically” rank high with a search engine) and offpage (promotion and weblinks, which will “non-organically” position you well) aspects.

Nagassar’s relationship with a customer begins with an analysis of its website, looking at content, design, the webcode and frequently conducting SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and strengths) involving competitors. Key industry or product words are not, as he puts it, the “holy grail;” rather, he may do a “long-tail analysis” which will look at less competitive and more targeted key words, so that customers who do access the site will represent the best market for the product.
SEO can be basic (Nagassar offers a two-hour training for customers who want to do SEO work themselves) or in-depth. And, like Jewett, Nagassar says the Internet is not necessary for every small to mid-sized business. Mom-and-pop outfits may not need SEO. If their customers are from the neighbourhood, traditional media hitting a local trade area are likely the best option.

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