When evaluating the different advertising formats that are available to you, it’s important to define the best approach to reach your target audience. Agency representatives are quick to brag about “reach” and “impressions,” but their demographics can be misleading when taking your objectives and budget into consideration.

Direct marketing guru, Karen Deis, feels that it is critically important to maximize your promotional dollars in an effort to have qualified customers call you first.

For example, if you’re targeting consumers who are considering a home purchase, then it makes more sense to utilize your local, freely distributed home-shopper magazine than your local newspaper, even if it costs more. The 100,000 people reading the newspaper are looking for news, and may not be looking for Real Estate at all. On the other hand, the 1,000 people reading the home-shopper magazine are specifically looking for homes. [Read more…]