Monday 17 September 2012

Looking at the bigger picture when it comes to advertising

When setting up an online store, while the products themselves are going to be what ultimately makes a customer's mind up as whether they make a purchase or not, you can help nudge them in the right direction by having the right promotional material.

If your ecommerce store is running a special offer or has recently added new products to it's inventory, you may look to create some promotional material to help drive traffic to your site. This material will generally come in the form of banner advertisements. These banner advertisements can be placed on your ecommerce store to not only make it look more inviting, but also help develop your overall brand image. 

While placing these banners on your store's home page is a must, you should also look to place them in a number of different places, such as all of your social media platforms and any forums that are related to what your business sells. However, you will generally find that to place a banner on a forum, you must have some form of sponsorship with the site. Although this generally isn't too expensive, it's up to you to decide whether it is right for your business. 

Although, some people may be able to create their own banners, others may just not have the time or the capabilities to develop one to the standard that your business requires. If you are someone in the latter, you can look to pay an ecommerce or design business to create a banner solely for your business. While you may think that creating a banner is a cost you can't afford to make when your business is just starting out, it is a great way to help generate traffic and sales for your site, allowing people to access your site who may not have become aware of your business through other methods. 

Looking at the bigger picture


It isn't the cost you should look at, it's the potential return on your investment that the banner will bring. For example, if you have a banner created for £100 and you sell products from your store for £25, the banner only needs to bring in 4 sales for you to get back the money you paid for the banner. In the bigger picture that isn't much and when you factor in the added sales the banners could bring in through social and mobile commerce, it's definitely an avenue that any business should be looking to explore in order to develop their brand image and sales. Like all aspects of online selling, the key is to look at the biggest picture as look at what the investment will return rather than focussing on how much it will cost. As the old saying goes: "You have to spend money to make money."

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