Printed media still exists

Last year I was approached by Your Business Magazine to write an article about Facebook for them. I was only too happy to do this, and early this year it was published.

<< To the left is a pic of me holding up the printed article in one of the Web 2.0 seminars I delivered this year.

The article was only published in the February / March 2008 edition of the magazine, and I was quite chuffed because they have a very strong national distribution channel. What’s more is that about 2 weeks ago I secured a business lead from it in Pretoria. Just 1 lead yes, but I’m sure many people have read the article, and many people have seen my name, or my company’s name. This adds to “frequency” of your brand.

Frequency is something I speak about very often in seminars. It is the activity of communicating your brand very frequently. Not on a large scale, even in small bite sizes, but frequently. There is a particular brand in South Africa – I’m not going to mention their name because that’s not the point – that was in the media a lot a few years ago. Then they just disappeared from the “eyes and ears” of the public. The business was still running, but they weren’t doing any brand communication. Years later they started advertising again. To everyone’s surprise of course. This company – of course – does not understand about brand communication.

This brings me to my actual subject: “Printed media still exists.” Well, being such a Web 2.0 enthusiast, and being so hyper-actively involved in Social Networking, Social Media, and all this “Online Marketing” – many would think that I’m opposed to offline or “Traditional Marketing.”

To the contrary. I love offline media and offline marketing? Why? Because they still have – and always will have – audiences. Audiences? Yes, groups of people with eyes. I speak about this in my seminars – tapping into multiple audiences. This goes against the grain of “target marketing” – but I believe that in the Web 2.0 age, we have to speak to everyone. It’s about a conversation isn’t it?

Let’s think about this. Your friends. Do you talk to them only about one topic? Do you have targeted friends? Well, of course not. Previously, traditional marketing only worked to targeted audiences, but that was not really only due to the “results.” It was also due to the “means” of that marketing. The means of marketing are 2: firstly, the cost to produce the marketing (printed, tv, etc) – and secondly the cost the reach an audience. For this reason major corporations succeeded and grew. Because they had the means to expand their markets, i.e their audiences. With the advent of Web 2.0 however, everything has changed. Why? Because we have access to more markets, at lower cost, and at easier convenience. We can now market our businesses to several audiences, across several industries, and across the globe. This is of course the phenomenon of The Long Tail.

Targeted Marketing has thus changed to Conversational Marketing. There’s still room for some targeting. For example, there are certain “types” of clients that we prefer to work with, and others whom we prefer not to work with. That’s some level of targeting. But it does not dictate our marketing. Our marketing is a conversation. To everyone. With everyone.

To end this post, let me get to what brought this post about in th first place. :) I actually wanted to write about printed media because Louise Le Riche from Your Business Magazine contacted me again last week. She was writing an article on time management and wanted my tips or advice on the subject. I explained to her what I try to do in the time management department, and while she sat on the couch in my office I showed her my MacBook screen – I was working on a deadline so my email software was closed, Facebook was closed, Twitter was closed, and I was just focusing. You’ll have to wait for the printed magazine to know what other tips I shared with her though. :) If you haven’t read the Timothy Ferris book titled The 4-Hour Work Week then you simply must. It’s all about simplifying your life and enjoy life while you can. I blogged about it here, and here.

If you’re starting a new business, or trying to grow your business – especially in franchising – then it’s crucial that you pickup a copy of Your Business Magazine. Click here for their subscription rates.