Joint Publicity Schemes for Effective Advertising

As a small business, it's hard to get noticed. Even if you pour a high proportion of your profits into publicity, you'll never be able to compete with the big corporations whose marketing budgets dwarf your annual turnover - at least, not on your own. So why not get together with other local businesses to make your advertising efforts more effective? By combining your skills and resources in joint promotional campaigns, you can really start making an impression.

Joint Publicity Objectives

When you combine your advertising efforts with those of other businesses, there are several ways in which you can go about setting your joint goals. For instance, you can promote the local area as a great place to shop or to do business of a certain type; or you can promote a package of goods and services which you and your business enterprise partners can provide; or you can simply share space and list what you do individually.

Think carefully about your particular circumstances to decide on the best strategy for you. Remember that, if you intend to advertise repeatedly over a long period of time, it helps to be consistent. This is particularly important if you are using your advertising to create a brand image.

Pooling your Skills

You can slash the cost of a publicity campaign by doing some of the work yourself, rather than hiring agencies, but this is only practical if you have the appropriate skills. If you can put together a business enterprise team which includes someone with previous marketing experience, you can make a good start. Other relevant skills may include writing, page setting, printing, design and photography, law and communication with the press. Try to develop your campaign in such a way as to take best advantage of the talent you have available. It's usually possible to negotiate with agencies for help in specific areas, rather than the package deals they offer as standard, and you can always find freelancers to fill in when you need extra assistance.

By working together, your group of businesses will also have access to combined experience of your target market, making it easier to establish whom your campaign is aimed at and to design it accordingly. The best way to do this is usually to get together and discuss it all in person. Set time limits on your discussions with a vote at the end so you can be sure of reaching real decisions, not just carrying over debate from one session to another. If you have a large group, nominate different people to oversee specific aspects of the campaign.

Pooling Funding to Get Results

Of course, the main thing you need for effective advertising is money. By putting your money together you can move out of the small ad sections where hardly anyone will see you to large, prominent newspaper adverts and maybe even billboards. Remember that for every new medium in which your advertising appears you'll need a slightly different set of words and images.

Advertising like this, on a major scale, brings complications of its own. If you're advertising in newspapers or magazines, for instance, you may want to exercise some control over what stories your adverts appear next to, though this will cost you extra. If you try billboard advertising, think carefully about where it's positioned and who will see it - finding the best deal can be tricky and will depend on the type of customers you want.

Large scale advertising is about saturating the cultural environment with your message, so a short-lived but intense campaign can often be more effective than a series of smaller ones. Try to get people talking about your adverts to keep up their awareness of your business.

Joint publicity campaigns can put you up there in the spotlight with the big boys, giving you an amazing opportunity to move forward with your business. Just make sure you're ready to follow it up with good customer service and good work, to make the most of your advantage.