There’s No Such Thing as Low-Cost Marketing

Author: Jean McIntyre (Marketing Angels)

That’s bad news for all our readers who are looking for the secret to marketing without spending any money.

It’s true, there are some ways that you can get effective results without spending a lot of money but there’s a huge, hidden cost that creeps up on business owners that’s often forgotten – ‘Opportunity Cost’.

‘Opportunity Cost’ (as defined by www.answers.com (viewed 15 Sept 08)) is: “The benefits you could have received by taking an alternative action.”

From a marketing perspective it’s about all the other things you could be doing to earn money while you are using your time to do “low-cost marketing”.

What sorts of things am I talking about when I say low-cost marketing?  Well, there are lots of things businesses can do but the five key activities I see business people focusing on most are: speaking engagements, newsletters, publicity, database marketing and word-of-mouth.

Let’s examine the opportunity cost each one separately.

Presenting seminars: On the surface – giving talks to groups of people seems like a pretty low-cost strategy but when you add together the time taken to give your talk, and travel time to and from the venue that can be several hours.  Also, if it’s an opportunity to impress prospective clients, then you want to put together a great presentation that delivers your key messages clearly.  You’ll also want to create some good handouts for people to take away to remember you.  This all takes time to do well.  Of course if you prepare a good seminar you can deliver it more than once – but keep in mind that the more times you present the same talk – the more likely in a small place like Canberra that you’ll have the same audience.

Newsletters:  There’s nothing cheaper than sending out 1,000 electronic newsletters to your list of subscribers.  But to be able to do that you have to source information, write several articles, put together a compelling offer, manage your list, send it out and measure the response rate.  Again, the newsletter needs to be interesting and informative enough for readers to want to take the time to read it and that takes considerable time and effort to prepare.

Publicity: The Kinks had a song with the Lyric “I’m a lover not a fighter”.  Perhaps in this case it’s more appropriate to say “I’m a plumber not a writer”.  I’ve seen business owners spend huge amounts of time writing a media release, preparing fact sheets, planning and executing media conferences only to find that there’s very little response to what should be a good news story.  If they don’t have the skill to pull it off – it’s really a waste of time and effort.

Database marketing: It’s a wise business person that pays keen attention to who’s in their database and proactively and regularly identifies opportunities to contact good prospects within their existing contact list.  It takes time however to segment the database, prepare communications and most importantly to make contact and follow up.  To be done well it’s an expensive use of time.

Word of Mouth:  If I had a dollar for every time a Canberra busines person told me that they rely solely on word of mouth marketing for business growth…..  But I find that most of our business people don’t put nearly enough effort into it.  A good WOM campaign involves carefully crafting and communicating your key messages, taking time to develop strong relationships and build loyalty, planning a contact strategy and preparing attractive referral reward programs.  If you don’t do these things then what you are doing is relying on the whim of your customers, who aren’t experts in selling your business to decide to recommend you and hoping that they do it in a way that builds the right expectations for your prospects.

What I’m saying here is that none of these activities are low-cost marketing.  The opportunity cost can be very expensive.

First, they take valuable time away from you doing what what you need to do to make your business work. 
Second, if you aren’t an expert in writing, presenting, and relationship building then it could well be an expensive waste of time.

This is doubly sad when there are experts out there who can probably achieve a better quality result for you in half the time, for a modest investment that leaves you the time to do what you do best.

I’d be interested to hear your comments and experiences on the opportunity cost of relying on ‘low-cost marketing’ options.

Jean Mc