How much of my budget should I devote to advertising my business? This is a question I am asked quite often and the answer can vary depending on the business and what their goals are for their marketing and advertising efforts. However, most of my clients who have been successful in business have stuck with the 20%+ rule. They have devoted faithfully 20% and sometimes more of their budget to advertising which has kept their name out in front of their competitors and allowed them to strengthen their brand and sales.
There is a temptation to pull back and stop investing in advertising in slow economic times, but to attain and maintain customers you need to be in front of them. This means that in addition to investing at least 1/5th of your budget to smart advertising campaigns, you also need to get out of your office and connect face to face with potential clients at networking events and on-line social networking sites to reach potential clients. How much time should you be investing for this? Well, some businesses will need more time since they may have introduced new products or have a new business which needs more exposure, but most successful businesses will regularly use at least 20% of their time to attend business networking groups, connect on-line regularly with their connections and connect with their client base one on one to increase sales. The key is to always be working your business like you just opened your doors. When you cut back on your advertising and you stop attending events or connecting with businesses on-line, the sales pipeline gets smaller and the climb back to where you once were in business is twice as hard.
If you want to increase sales it requires investing in your business and that starts with smart marketing and advertising campaigns!
All my best to your success!
~Charlene
