Do Offline Ads Work?

Published Jul 14, 2023, 11:00 AM

In episode #2509, we’re exploring the effectiveness of offline ads. We investigate why B2B companies invest in airport ads and examine the factors affecting the success of offline ads. You’ll learn how to creatively engage your target audience and differentiate yourself in a saturated marketing landscape. Tune in for insights on leveraging offline ads for maximum impact!

TIME-STAMPED SHOW NOTES:

  • [00:00] Today’s topic: Do offline ads work?
  • [00:13] The effectiveness of offline ads, including billboards and airport ads.
  • [01:48] How offline ads are evolving to merge with digital platforms.
  • [02:20] Factors affecting the success of offline ads.
  • [04:38] Why IT marketers should focus on creativity rather than technical details.
  • [05:12] The importance of evoking emotion to drive customer interest.
  • [05:36] Why unique campaigns make effective campaigns.
  • [06:16] That’s it for today! Don’t forget to rate, review, and subscribe!


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All right, so we're going to talk about if offline ads actually work. So, Neil, I came up with this this topic because I was looking at a tweet and this tweet here says I'm going to share it on my screen. Actually, so it says why B to B companies by airport ads? So vast majority of IT buyers travel, and according to Nielsen, eighty percent notice airport ads, forty two percent take action after seeing an airport AD, thirty six percent visit a website associated with an airport AD. And so then it also says nine hundred million flyers will board a plane via an HSBC branded gate this year.

Have you seen the HSBC branding gates a lot of times when you boarded? Terminal? Says HSBC. I've seen that for so many years. It's great branding. Yep.

But do you use HSBC?

Actually I do, but I use them before that. I back in the day we were banking with the banking acquired that bank got a by another bank, and that bank eventually got acquired by HSBC. So that's how I ended up there, not because I signed up with HSBC. It was more so a bank count that I had when I was like eight years old with my dad.

Yeah, I mean, look, I remember when the crypto stuff was really hot. It was a bull market, right, and all the Miami Airport ads were like block fly. It was like this exchange, that exchange. Actually, when I went to Turkey recently, Neil, there's a crypto exchange that has all the gates branded literally like it's like inscribed into the gate and like they took over everything, right, So yeah, I think it's just what I say. I did start looking actually I did good at their website afterwards and I started looking them up, so I actually took an action there.

So yeah, they're effective, you know, just because offline advertising isn't digital anymore, some of it's starting to merge into digital and they're adjusting it, such as making these offline you know, billboards all digital and you can buy them through the web. But the thing is is people wouldn't be doing them if it didn't work. So the question is is how can you end up leveraging ads, whether the offline or their digital or online whatever you want up calling it. The real question is is does it convert in which channels? And just like normal online ads that you guys are buying the offline ones. We see some work, we see some don't. You can't just go buy offline ads and expect them all to work extremely well. You've got to think about where are your target customers and audience, and how do you get in front of them, and more importantly, what's the creative that you use to grab their attention so that they're willing to take action. So there's a lot of variables that can make a ad work or not work. It's more so if it's not about if it's online or offline. It's more so can you do all the other elements well? And can you get it at a reasonable price, because if you're overpaying for it, it's going to make it that much harder. Refer to work.

Yeah, marketing one on one at the end of the day is just finding where the attention is, where your audience is hanging out. And so for example, Microsoft Clarity Dream host a sponsor this podcast, and we're very grateful for them. Shopify too, and well they want to reach Clarity for example, it's it's heat mapping product, right and it helps you increase conversion rates, So marketers probably want to use it, and so it would make sense to target a marketing school podcast. Now let's say I'm at Let's say I am like an entertainment brand, and maybe I want to target a bunch of music festival goers. Maybe I might run one of those drone ads.

Right, you have the.

Drones kind of like moving around and stuff at a music festival. So it just depends, right, It's it's you can't like, why is it when you're driving on the freeway you see a lot of these personal injury lawyers and like all this different stuff orre like go buy weed from this store over here. It's like because people are stuck in traffic, and then you're getting a lot of that that real estate.

So it just depends.

And to Neil's point, it is important to look at where you can not only find where your target where your target audience is hanging out, but where the attention is underpriced.

Yes, do you remember that story the company that sold to eBay. The guy who was an ex EBA CEO was a meg Whitman that was one of the whole x And what they would do is they had billboard ads targeting her drive to work and home, and they kept showing their company and they ended up getting acquired. I think it was like one of the ticket companies. I forgot exactly which one. It was really affect a strategy. They got purchased by eBay. So it can work. You just got to get creative with it. And I think that's a problem that most people struggle, not just with offline ads but also their online is how do you get super creative and do something unique so that way not just stands out, but it grabs people's attention.

The IT marketers are they typically aren't that creative. And so you go to airport, he's like the best servers or whatever, so you.

Like see like these whatever, like who You're so right, they're like best servers ninety nine point nine percent reliability. Like it's just like okay, they're not getting creative at all with them. And just because because your buyers are IT buyers doesn't mean that they don't want to be entertained. Yes, they're in it, but they're humans just like you and I, So try to be a little bit more creative with your advertising.

Yeah, you got to evoke emotion, right, So I believe with AWS what they do is like build on aws, and what they do is there's kind of a storybind. It's like this big company, Airbnb, builds on AWS right, and I don't know if they actually do, but that's an example, like, oh well Airbnb does it. Maybe we should take a look at AWS right. That evokes emotion and that's what good marketing is.

Yeah, And the funny part is is right now everyone's like AI this and AI that and how it's going to really change everything. But the thing about AI is if you are doing the same thing as everyone else, it's going to create more me too campaigns. And when we say me too, we're not talking about gender or that women's movement of harassment. We're talking about me too. Like where's Waldo? Right with where's Waldo? Everyone's in that. You have to find Waldo where he's in that white and red striped shirt. And now everyone's looking like where's Waldo? In which you know, everything's blending in because everyone's using the same tools to create the same type of campaigns.

Man, that's a complicated analogy, but it works, all right.

That is it for today.

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