Advertising vs. Publicity – Which Medium Is More Effective For A Startup?

For a budding bizMAVERICK (Rebel Entrepreneur), generating buzz amongst consumers for a brand new product or service is often the most difficult task for a start-up company. These newcomers to the small business world do not have the necessary resources to create a million dollar marketing campaign that will guarantee success for their venture. So what is a small business owner to do?

First, let me tell you what NOT to do…

DO NOT ADVERTISE!!!

You might as well dig a six-foot hole for your venture, because it will die a violent death if you go about generating buzz via advertising. Let me tell you why…

Reason #1 – Typically, advertising is effective only when maintaining brand awareness and implementing “call to action” strategies. Your product has never seen the light of day and therefore has no business existing within any advertising section during this stage of your company’s development.

Reason #2 – Advertising costs an insane amount of money that you do not have as a small business owner. In order for an advertisement to leave an impression on a potential customer, that person has to have seen it roughly 8 times! Those 8 exposures to your advertisement still doesn’t guarantee that they will turn into a buying customer. Imagine the amount of advertising you would have to buy in order to get into the head of just one individual! You would have to make an incredible amount of sales to gain a profitable return on your advertising investment. Even if you do have a sufficient amount of capital available, you still should not use it for advertising because…

Reason #3 – Advertising can be annoying, and will often be ignored by the audience, when delivered by unheard-of entities. This promotion vehicle should only be used by brands that have a following that is entertained by their presence, or have an offer that cannot be denied. During your start-up phase, a casual consumer is not likely to respond to your advertisement because they have never heard of you. If you want the attention of today’s consumer, you are going to have to work for it! Our generation is bombarded with various communications within a single day and cannot be bothered with advertising messages, from unheard of companies, that do not promise an immediate benefit.

So if you can’t advertise your company, what are you left to do? Well… I’ll get to that in a moment. First, let me explain what you need to concentrate on during the development of your venture. This is highly important, so listen up…

While you are piecing the nuts and bolts of your operation together, you need to be consciously figuring out what separates your product from the competition within your industry. What elements of your business are unique and exciting? What about your product is going to create frenzy amongst your consumers? Think BIG! How is your venture going to impact the lives of those who utilize your services? These are all highly important questions you must be asking yourself as you create your business empire! If you cannot find the answers to these questions, you might want to seriously reconsider what you are getting yourself into with this venture of yours. Products without qualities that differentiate themselves from its competition have a very short shelf life.

Now that you have recognized all of the compelling elements of your product that create its uniqueness, it’s time to inform the rest of the world of these exciting features and benefits. How do you go about accomplishing this without advertising…?

You create buzz for your company via publicity! Publicity is the obvious choice for a small business owner who wants to carry out an effective product launch because it is free (or inexpensive), and it works!

Publicity is typically initiated through the media and delivered to people of influence who then spread the news about your business via word of mouth promotion. Intriguing publicity has the ability to seep into common conversation amongst common folk. If these people care enough about your business to discuss it casually with friends, they are going to be more apt to make a purchase. The power of publicity, when carried out effectively, has legitimate potential to bring you and your product overnight success. Can the medium of advertising make that claim…? No.

While the magic of publicity may seem effortless, as evidenced by the quick success it can bring you, it’s anything but a simple task. You have to fire up the marketing wrinkle in your brain and unleash some serious creativity.

What vehicle are you going to use to grab the attention of the media? Press releases? Media tours? Internet newswires? Emails to bloggers? What’s it gonna be?

What story are you going to deliver to the media to convince them that you are worthy enough to utilize their influence? I’ll tell you this… Your story better be impressive.

It is the media’s job to entertain their audience with news stories that are on the cutting edge of what’s buzzworthy. They don’t bother featuring stories about just anything. Now is the time where you unleash your hidden marketing guru. It’s time to create some breaking news, so you can have your opportunity to break the bank!

There are two leagues of entrepreneur who approach the media for publicity. There is the group that has a product that is obviously innovative and publicity ready; then there is the class that has a quality product that is knee deep in competition, and has a dire need for a differentiating quality about itself to separate it from the rest of the pack.

The group that has a product with clearly unique and newsworthy qualities will have an easier time grabbing the media’s attention. The class that has a product that simply reinvents the wheel of an existing industry will need to strategize a bit more to win the attention of the press.

Do not fret if you are a member of the second group. You now have an opportunity to outshine group one if you can merely recognize the direction you must take your business. It is time to launch your product beyond its potential and to a level that it did not realize exists. This innovation of the product’s personality, that I am going to educate you on, has a highly probable chance to make the media your best friend.

To illustrate the mindset you must develop in order to take your product to the next level, I’m going to share with you a brief story of what Chevron Gas did that propelled its brand to the top of the industry.

Most of the general public purchases gas based upon whichever station has the lowest prices. Gas is gas right? Well Chevron Gas created a publicity plan that showcased that their gas was much more than just gas. Chevron promoted the idea to the public that their gas had an ingredient called “Techron” within it. Techron was a detergent additive formulated to prevent engine deposits and to reduce vehicle emissions. Their slogan was… “Chevron Has Techron.” So here I am, Joe Blow customer, and I hear that the word on the street is that “Chevron Has Techron.” So I’m thinking… “Wow, Techron sounds like something I need to have in my gas! I have no clue what Techron is exactly (They never promoted the actual benefits of the additive), but it sure does sound like an important ingredient for gas to have!” It turns out that the rest of the marketplace had the same thoughts about this “Techron” stuff. No one knew what this element of gas was exactly, but people began buying Chevron Gas even when their prices were higher than those of the competition. Customers felt that their “Techron” was worth paying a premium for.

So the lesson that must be learned from this story is this… It does not matter if you have a creation that competes with hundreds of other identical products. As long as you can find, or create, a differentiating quality about your product, you can still win the attention of the media who will give you the best publicity imaginable. (And please note, it’s not cool to lie about your product to make it seem better than the rest of the pack… You need to strategically brand it through truthful positioning of your product’s features and benefits. Chevron was not lying about the existence of their “Techron” ingredient… They simply, and brilliantly, took an element of their product (That other gas companies also used) and gave it an intriguing name to make the Chevron version more appealing.)

publicity, Publicity, PUBLICITY!!! It’s affordable and highly effective. Publicity is where it’s at when you are an up and coming business mogul who needs to shed a bit of light on their genius creations. You can utilize the advertising medium later on in the life of your product when its brand ranks up there with Coke and Disney. In the meantime, do whatever it takes to turn a profit, as soon as possible, so you can afford to keep your entrepreneurial dream alive!

Wishing you continued success…

bizMAVERICK – Brad Williamson

Join me on the bizMAVERICKS MySpace profile!