By Duane Sprague
You
have no doubt heard of the 4 C's of selecting a diamond
(Cut, Clarity, Color, and Carrot).
Well, I have created the 12 C's of advertising. And when
these 12 elements are used together, you will have effective
and efficient advertising that works every time!
Cut: First
and foremost, you need to cut through the competitive clutter
and get noticed and remembered in a positive way. Your copy, offer
and creative execution must be enticing, exciting, moving, and
believable. You need to stand out, and offer something stunning
that people want. Like exceptionally friendly and personable service,
super convenient location, huge variety and product selection,
value-added services, etc.
Clarity: Your
message, offer, and Unique Selling Proposition (USP) must be clear,
concise and easy to understand quickly. Keep it simple, powerful
and clean, both in design execution and message.
Color: Use
only full color ads. Color increases credibility, enhances communication,
and cuts through a sea of non-color ads. Use colors in your logo
and color schemes that fit your image and message. Use them consistently.
Use color pictures, graphics, charts, or any imagery that will
enhance and communicate your message and offer. In a two color
ad, the most powerful attention grabbing color combinations are
red copy on a solid yellow background (Kodak logo), yellow copy
on a red background (McDonald's logo), or black copy on a yellow
background.
Carrot: You
need a hook, a carrot or an offer that is going to motivate the
viewer to act now. You need a call to action, like "come
in today and receive a free_______". Or a self-liquidator,
which is a popular item that you can buy in bulk at a huge discount,
and sell them for what you paid, just to get people into your
dealership. Self-liquidators work great as traffic builders, as
long as what you are offering is clearly in demand, you can sell
it for less than what the retail market price is, and you advertise
it so that people know about it.
Communication:
You need to establish a dialog with your prospects, which requires
a response device (phone, self addressed and stamped reply card,
e-mail, etc.), a database of responders, and a timely follow-up
system.
Commitment:
You must stay committed to your advertising, your schedule, your
look, and your branding message. Otherwise you lose the equity
position you created.
Consistency:
There are two conflicting theories in advertising. One is the
theory of frequency, which claims that people must see or hear
an ad at least three times before they will take notice and act
upon it. The other is recency. The recency theory makes more common
sense, because it claims that only one impression is required,
if it is made upon a person that is actually in the market to
buy. Think about it, if you are in the market to buy a DVD player,
and you see an ad with a good price on a quality name brand that
you like, with the features and specs you are looking for, at
a store convenient to you, why do you need to see that same ad
3 times before you will act on it? You don't. You see it once,
all the elements make sense, and you act.
Recency theory
then, simply states that it is far more important to cast a wide
net to reach that small percentage of people that are ready to
buy today, than to keep beating your message over the heads of
a smaller audience with frequency, because statistically, you
will be talking to fewer people who are in the market. And this
is precisely why classified newspaper advertising works so well
for dealers. Despite the fact that newspapers are losing readers
and market share every year, and the average age of the daily
subscribers is going up each year, outpacing the average age of
the population. And the fact that people spend less time reading
the paper than ever before, the fact is that the few people who
are reading the automotive classifieds are those who actually
in the market. And they only need to see your ad once before they
act.
The recency
theory hinges on the idea that is far more important to cast a
wide net using mass media, and be seen or heard by those people
who are in the market, just before they are ready to buy.
Combination: In order to capitalize on the recency theory, you
need to get in front of as many potential buyers as possible on
a regular basis. This requires a media mix, consisting of a 7x15
full color ad in the automotive classified section of the major
daily newspaper every Friday, Saturday and Sunday, a regular broadcast
TV schedule (not cable), consisting of at least 100 Gross Rating
Points per week, and a radio schedule on the top 4-5 stations,
with at least 4 spots per day, Monday through Friday, with an
equal rotation from 6AM-7PM.. As well as 2 spots per day Saturday
and Sunday, 10AM-4PM.
Cost: Your media schedule must be professionally planned and negotiated.
An expert professional approach will take into account strict
cost efficiency objectives of buying the schedule at the lowest
Cost Per Point (CPP) and Cost Per Thousand (CPM). As well as generate
more reach and more frequency than a media schedule that is placed
by a layman. More money is wasted in advertising than you can
ever imagine, simply by paying too much, buying the wrong media
outlets, the wrong schedules, and the wrong programs. There are
specific methods, strategies, and formulas to buying and negotiating
media at rates 30-70% less than you are paying currently. You
can learn them, or hire someone who has the training, and the
proven and documented ability to do so.
Caliber: Your
ad must be of a high caliber that will reflect positively on your
dealership. The only thing that the prospect knows or sees about
your company, is the image that you portray in your ads. If your
ads are a cheap, slapped together low quality production, what
does that say about your company, your image and your product?
The quality of your advertising production, like your clothes,
your house and your car, are a direct reflection on who you are,
the types of customers you attract and serve, and where you are
going in the future. Advertising is the same as courting a beautiful
lady. You absolutely must put your best foot forward in order
to win the hand of that lovely lady. Don't skimp on production
if you can at all help it. In fact, reserve about 15-20% of your
entire monthly advertising budget for print and electronic media
production.
Copy: Use
advertising copy that entices, describes the benefits in word
pictures, stirs the emotions, justifies the decision on logic,
and SELLS! Make every single word count. No fluff, no filler,
no waste. Your job is to capture their attention, peak their interest,
motivate and sell in only a few seconds. Again, the caliber of
production is critical. If you don't have a really good copy writer
who can write to sell, your sunk. Budget for quality production
and quality copy writing.
Cute: Avoid
cute kids, pets, models, jingles or jokes if they are not absolutely
critical to the selling message and motivation to buy. These are
known as "attention vampires" and they actually rob
from your advertising impact by taking the focus off of your critical
selling message and offer. There is a time and place, and a very
effective way to use them, but only when they are essential to
the very message itself. Michelin Tires does a wonderful job of
the proper usage of cute babies and animals in their ads. Simply
because their entire message is the safety and protection of your
most precious cargo. If the message were anything different, it
would not have worked for a tire company.
