by Qed media Group

 As a business owner I am sure you are always looking for new ways to get the word out about your business, products or services. You are probably also looking to do it in such a way where you can increase sales, yet decrease the cost of advertising. You are not alone.

Every business owner, us included, are always looking for new and creative ways to get what you are offering in front of or in the ears of potential customers. It goes without saying that the less you spend on advertising and at the same time you increase sales, your profit margin will also increase.

Common sense right? Absolutely! So how can we accomplish this? The answer is simple, homework, homework, homework. Now you are probably sitting there wondering what the heck is Bruce talking about. Homework? What does that mean? Well let me tell you.

When I say homework, what I mean is you need to do your homework. In other words spend as much time before you put your advertising campaign together, preparing for who exactly you are advertising for.

You are probably still scratching your head, not sure what I am talking about and that is fine. By the time this article is done, a light bulb will go off in your head, and you will say "ah ha", I know what he means.

We have all gone through school at some point in our lives, and if you haven`t, wow you must be incredibly intelligent to navigate the Internet without any prior instruction. What I am trying to say is, in school the teacher loaded you up on homework. They weren`t doing it to punish you or your classmates, what they were doing is preparing you.

Lets take for instance, math. You are learning your addition and subtraction, multiplication and division. Did your teacher throw you directly into a test after a day of teaching it? No of course not. That would be ludicrous and ridiculous. What they did was give you homework each night on the topic with some problems to figure out on your own. Each night you received new problems, until finally you were so good at it, you took a test and of course passed.

The same concept can be used in advertising. In order to cut your advertising costs, you need to do your homework. So many times I have seen businesses run newspaper ads just because people buy newspapers. However, do the customers you are trying to reach, read the section of the newspaper you just put your ad in? This is where your homework comes in.

A friend of mine runs a business where he does nothing but repair rental properties. Would it make any sense for him to pass out flyers in a neighborhood of million dollar homes? Maybe, since many millionaires own rentals, however its not practical. He needed to go to where the rentals are and do his homework. He researched properties that he knew were rentals, obtained the owner information and then sent them a postcard, flyer etc., letting them know about his business. In other words he did his homework.

As you can see 100% of his advertising is getting in front of people he knew could be customers. He wasn`t blindly shooting in the dark, so to speak. You need to do the same. Find out who is perfect for the products or services you offer and then do the necessary homework so that every penny on advertising you spend, gets in front of potential customers.

Remember it is not about getting in front of the most people. It is about getting in front of the most people that are right for your business, products or services, to maximize your advertising dollars.