List of innovative advertising ideas for students and small businesses : –

1. Out-of-Home Advertising 2. Wrap Advertising 3. Bus Advertising 4. Consumer-Generated Advertising 5. Non-Commercial Advertising 6. Online Advertising 7. Display Advertising 8. Product-Related Advertising 9. Institutional Advertising 10.

Public Service Advertising 11. Campaign Advertising 12. Website Advertising 13. Television Advertising 14. Mural Advertising and Few Others.

Top 19 Innovative Advertising  Ideas For Students and Small Business (with examples)

The first advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Out-of-Home-Advertising.”

Out-of-home advertising (or outdoor advertising) is made up of more than 100 different formats, totalling $6.99 billion in annual revenues in 2008 in the USA. Outdoor advertising is essentially any type of advertising that reaches the consumer while he or she is outside the home. This medium is in contrast with broadcast, print, and Internet advertising.

Out of home advertising, therefore, is focused on marketing to consumers when they are “on the go” in public places, in transit, waiting (such as in a medical office), and/or in specific commercial locations (such as in a retail venue). Outdoor advertising formats fall into four main categories: billboards, street furniture, transit, and alternative.

Billboard advertising is a traditional out of home advertising format, but there has been significant growth in digital out of home advertising (billboards and place-based networks) in recent years; for example, about 1,500 digital billboard displays have been installed in the United States alone. Traditional roadside billboards remain the predominant form of outdoor advertising in the US with 66 percent of total annual revenue.

Today, billboard revenue is 73 percent local ads, 18 percent national ads, and 9 percent public service ads. Street furniture is made up of formats such as bus shelters, newsracks, mall kiosks, and telephone booth advertising. This form of outdoor advertising is mainly seen in urban centers.

Additionally, this form of advertising provides benefits to communities, as street furniture companies are often responsible for building and maintaining the shelters people use while waiting for the bus. Transit advertising is typically advertising placed on anything which moves, such as buses, subway advertising, truckside, and taxis, but also includes fixed static and electronic advertising at train and bus stations and platforms. Airport advertising, which helps businesses address an audience while travelling, is also included in this category.

Municipalities often accept this form of advertising, as it provides revenue to city and port authorities. Finally, alternative advertising includes ads in stadiums, on gas pumps, bike racks, rest areas, and other non-traditional formats. Alternative advertising provides a way to address consumers in places they may not expect. Street furniture, transit, and alternative media formats comprise 34 percent of total outdoor revenue in the US.

Some of these formats have a higher percentage of national ads than traditional billboards. The outdoor industry includes more than 2,100 operators in 50 states representing the four major outdoor format categories. These outdoor media companies range from public, multinational media corporations to small, independent, family-owned businesses.

Digital Out-of-Home -DOOH:

Digital out-of-home refers to dynamic media distributed across placed- based networks in venues including, but not limited to: cafes, bars, restaurants, health clubs, colleges, arenas, gas stations, and public spaces. DOOH networks typically feature independently addressable screens, kiosks, jukeboxes and/ or jumbotrons. DOOH media benefits location owners and advertisers alike in being able to engage customers and/or audiences and extend the reach and effectiveness of marketing messages. It is also referred to as Digital Signage.

The overall industry grew more than 15 percent last year (2010) to $2.1 billion, according to Patrick Quinn, CEO and founder of PQ Media, a Connecticut- based research and consulting firm. Quinn said gas station television is one of the largest and fastest growing segments of that category, based in part on its verifiable audience. With digital TVs in gas stations, nearly 52 million customers are getting snippets of weather, sports highlights, celebrity gossip and commercials with their gas each month, according to Nielsen.

The weekly reach is actually larger than most of the prime-time TV shows. The largest company in the space is Gas Station TV with 27.5 million monthly viewers at more than 1,100 stations across the U.S., according to Nielsen. In addition to the large number of viewers, the audience profile of TVs at gas stations is unique. 100 percent are drivers. 76 percent are adults from age 18-49 with a median age of 40 and Median HHI $70k+. According to the Nielsen Intercept Studies, 89 percent of the consumers are engaged and watching TV at the gas station and 88 percent love watching every time they fuel because they have nothing else to do.

Non-Digital Out-Of-Home:

Non-digital out-of-home refers to other types of media distributed across physical spaces.

These are:

i. Airship advertising

ii. Bulletin

iii. Bus advertising

iv. Commuter rail display

v. ComPark advertising

vi. Lamppost banner advertising

vii. Mobile billboard

viii. Poster

ix. Premier panel

x. Premier square

xi. Street advertising

xii. Taxi advertising

xiii. Wallscape

Other types of non-digital out-of-home advertising include airport displays; transit and bus-shelter displays; headrest displays; double-sided panels; junior posters; and mall displays.

Selling Billboard Advertising Space:

If a private property owner wants to sell advertising space to one of the outdoor advertising companies (‘media sellers’) he or she directly approaches the company. A media seller may also approach the owner of an interesting property and make a bid. The media seller typically requires a long term land lease due to the expense of erecting a new billboard.

The private property owner is generally paid an annual land rent. The media seller erects a structure for displaying the ads and rents out the space to the clients. The world’s largest media sellers are CBS Outdoor, JCDecaux, Clear Channel Outdoor, and Lamar Advertising.

The second advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Wrap Advertising.”

Wrap advertising is the marketing practice of completely or partially covering (wrapping) a vehicle in an advertisement or livery. This result of this process is essentially a mobile billboard. Wrap advertising can be achieved by painting a vehicle’s outer surface, but an increasingly ubiquitous practice in the 21st century involves the use of large vinyl sheets as “decals.” The vinyl sheets can be removed with relative ease, thus they drastically reduce the costs associated with changing advertisements.

While vehicles with large, flat surfaces (such as buses and light-rail carriages) are often utilised due to ease, cars can also serve as hosts for wrap advertising, despite consisting of more curved surfaces.

Attributes:

Recent advancements in vinyl development have led to new types of vinyl, designed specifically for wrap advertising- this includes vinyl that feature bubble-preventing air channels and microscopic glass beads that prevent an adhesive from functioning until the user is prepared (the beads allow the material to be repeatedly lifted and reapplied during the wrapping process, without compromising the longevity of the wrap).

The vinyl is heated with a heat gun or torch for the purpose of molding the material around objects. Decals can be made to cover side and rear windows on 9 vehicle, but for obvious safety reasons, the front windows used by the driver are not covered. The decals on side windows are typically perforated, so that it is still possible for passengers to look outside. Wrapped advertisements must often be divided into a number of smaller pieces to appropriately cover any movable panels on the vehicle, such as the fuel tank cover, trunk (boot) openings, and other doors.

Wrapping is also sometimes used instead of paint as a less- permanent way of applying its operator’s standard livery. This has become particularly common in the United Kingdom where, since the privatization of British Rail, it has become quite frequent for trains to be transferred from one company to another and thus require many changes of livery. Wrapping can also be used for vehicle customization, and race cars opt for vehicle wraps as they are lighter than paint.

Effectiveness:

A primary issue associated with wrap advertising is the reduction in the ease of visual interpretation of the advertisement. This particular concern has been addressed by the various perforation sizes used in the manufacture of perforated vinyl film. Smaller perforation sizes increase the visibility of the advertisement, and a 70/30 pattern allows for twenty percent more picture.

Driver visibility is also a concern for vehicle wraps, and vehicle windshields and side windows should never be covered. State and county authorities have devised particular regulations in order to address safety concerns connected to wrap advertising. The vinyl may wrinkle or separate from the glass on curved windows because the polyester laminates are designed for flat windows.

Washing windows with solvent glass cleaner (e.g. with Windex) prior to application is not recommended. Windex or other similar window cleaning agents contain silicone and leave behind a residue similar to wax, preventing vinyl adhesives from sticking.

This is as solvents can negatively affect the adhesive on perforated vinyl film, causing it to not adhere properly to the glass. This can cause distortion in the image. If using window cleaners with silicone, it is highly recommended to use 99 percent isopropyl alcohol to remove these residues.

Industry:

There are a variety of businesses, large and small, that provide vehicle wraps. Some are specifically vehicle wrap companies while others are more general sign and graphics providers.

The third advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Bus Advertising.”

In bus advertising, buses and their related infrastructure is a medium commonly used by advertisers to reach the public with their message. Usually, this takes the form of promoting commercial brands, but can also be used for public campaign messages. Buses may also be used as part of a political or promotional campaign, or as a tool in a commercial enterprise.

History:

Bus advertising descends from similar methods used on streetcars in the early 20th century.

Infrastructure:

Adverts are placed in bus shelters. These can be static posters, or back illuminated displays, or rolling displays allowing many messages on one shelter. Technology has also been used to create interactive adverts. Adverts may also be installed on associated street furniture such as the backs of benches at stops.

Tickets:

Often, the paper bus ticket is used as an advertising space. The ticket rolls for the ticket machines are pre-printed on the rear with a particular company’s advert.

Bus Interiors:

A common location for adverts is inside the bus. Adverts are attached to the corners between the walls and ceiling overhead to catch the eye of passengers, in the same manner as used in rapid transit systems. Increasingly, companies are using interior television systems to advertise.

Bus Exteriors:

Panels:

Adverts are often placed as basic rectangular motifs on the side or front of a bus. These may be applied directly to the bus. Additionally, adverts may be printed on placards known as boards, which are slotted into special guide fittings attached to the side of the bus.

Partial and Full Adverts:

Occasionally, the entire surface of a bus is turned into an advertisement. This can be a whole side or rear of a bus, or a scheme applied to the entire exterior, known as an ‘all-over advert’ bus.

Technologies:

Some panel and full side and all-over adverts were traditionally painted on if the length of application warranted it. This would require a reasonable longevity and cost implication for advertisers, due to the requirement to take buses out of service to apply and remove paint schemes. Frequently changed panel adverts would use replaceable boards. With the advent of adhesive vinyl technologies, this allowed adverts to be rapidly applied and removed over the top of the buses exterior paint as decals, reducing the cost and time.

The introduction of perforated and directionally transparent vinyl sheets allowed the creation of more elaborate designs that could be applied over windows (although for safety reasons not the front window), moving away from the traditional square box design approach to adverts.

With the advent of partially transparent window coverage techniques, all over adverts have been applied as a full vehicle advertising wrap windows and all. The transition from screen printing to digital printing has seen an increase in the colour range and complexity of advert designs.

Campaign and Promotion Buses:

In addition to public transport buses, all-over advert buses are often privately hired specifically for a special promotional use, such as a political campaign or specific product promotions. These will often make use of open top buses to allow the interaction of the campaigners/promoters with the public.

The fourth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Consumer-Generated Advertising.”

Consumer Generated Advertising refers to advertising on consumer generated media. This term is generally used to refer to sponsored content on blogs, wikis, forums, social networking web sites and individual Web sites. This sponsored content is also known as sponsored posts, paid posts or sponsored reviews. The content includes links that point to the home page or specific product pages of the website of the sponsor.

Similarly, the term Communal marketing refers to a marketing practice that incorporates public involvement in the development of an advertising/ marketing campaign. Such a campaign invites consumers to share their ideas or express their articulation of what the brand means to them through their own personal stories, with the use of print media, film or audio.

The resulting consumer-generated content is then incorporated into the campaign. Finally, the result of this collaboration is showcased, often in a cross-media campaign, to invite the extended community of like-minded individuals to share in the results, thereby creating a communal bond between the “brand champions as advertisers” and other individuals who have a natural affinity with what the brand has to offer.

The result provides the brand with a way to create a deeper connection with their core market, while also opening up new pathways to extend the relationship to new customers.

Consumer-generated marketing is not the same as viral marketing or word of mouth advertising, however, the result of a it achieves a high level of publicity within high relevance communities. These communities are extremely critical to the success of a brand, and normally follow the 80/20 rule, where 20% of the brand’s customers account for 80% of its sales.

The very act of reaching out to consumers to invite them in as co-collaborators and co-creative, is a fundamental component of the marketing campaign. The construct naturally lends itself to other consumer-marketing activities, like “communal branding” and “communal research.”

Anytime a brand reaches out to its audience to invite them in to become co-collaborators in the development of an advertising campaign, they are participating in a “communal branding” effort. Whenever marketing decisions are the result of communing with the brand’s audience to help drive the development of a campaign, they are engaging in “communal research.”

The fifth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Non-Commercial Advertising.”

Non-commercial advertising is sponsored by or for a charitable institution or civic group or religious or political organization. Many noncommercial advertisements seek money and placed in the hope of raising funds. Others hope to change consumer behaviour.

So the main goals of noncommercial advertising are:

i. Stimulate inquires for information

ii. Popularize social cause

iii. Change activity habits

iv. Decrease waste of resources

v. Communicate political viewpoint

vi. Improve public attitude

vii. Remind people to give again.

So called word-of-mouth advertising is a person to person communication that is perceived as being noncommercial, concerning goods or services: it is face-to-face product related communications between and among the friends, relatives and others. Because it is noncommercial, it is usually seen as being an unbiased source of information.

The sixth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Online Advertising.”

Online advertising, also known as online advertisement, internet marketing, online marketing or e-marketing, is the marketing and promotion of products or services over the Internet. Online advertising include contextual ads on search engine results pages, banner ads, blogs, rich media ads, social network advertising, interstitial ads, online classified advertising, advertising networks, dynamic banner ads, cross-platform ads and e-mail marketing, including e- mail spam. Many of these types of ads are delivered by an ad server.

Online advertising began in 1994 when HotWired sold the first banner ads to several advertisers. Revenue in the United States grew to an estimated $7.1 billion in 2001 or about 3.1 percent of overall advertising spending. The dot-com bust destroyed or weakened many of the early online advertising industry players and reduced the demand for online advertising and related services.

The industry regained momentum by 2004 as the business model for “Web 2.0” came together. A number of businesses emerged that facilitated the buying and selling of advertising space on web pages. Entities that operated web portals settled on the traditional “free-tv” model- generate traffic by giving away the content and sell that traffic to advertisers.

Most web sites, with the exception of transaction ones such as eBay, generate the preponderance of their revenues from the sale of advertising inventory the eyeballs that view space allocated for promotions to advertisers. In the first half of 2007 alone, advertisers in the US spent more than $10 billion advertising on websites. That was about 14 percent of all advertising spending.

The portion of advertising that is done online will increase significantly over time as more devices such as mobile telephones and televisions are connected to the Internet and people spend more time on these devices. The valuations that the capital markets are placing on businesses related to online advertising are consistent with this prediction. Google has had a seven-fold increase in its market value from August 2004 when it was valued at $29 billion to $215 billion in December 2007. During 2007 several companies in the online advertising market were purchased at multiples of 10-15 times annual revenues.

The online advertising industry burst into the public eye in 2007. Google’s sky-rocketing stock price and its forays into industries such as word processing software, online payments, and mobile telephones drew significant attention. More than 500 articles on Google appeared in the New York Times, Wall St. Journal and the Financial Times during the year.

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission and the European Commission launched in-depth antitrust investigations into Google’s acquisition of DoubleClick, which provides software technology and services to online advertisers and publishers. Privacy concerns also came to the fore in 2007 as consumers, government agencies and the media started focusing on the massive amount of personal data that online advertising companies were storing and using.

Businesses began to move their advertising efforts into areas by making wide use of social media from 2009. The social media includes social networking tools such as Facebook, Twitter, Hi-5, social news tools such as Reddit, Digg Propeller, social photo & video sharing tools such as Photobucket, Flickr, YouTube and social bookmarking tools such as Del.icio.us, Simpy. One of the advantages of social media advertising is proper targeting of market through the use of the users’ demographic information provided. The disadvantage is measuring effectivity of social media advertising, whether or not the number of ‘likes’, ‘friends’ or ‘follows’ could convert to actual sales.

The seventh advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Display Advertising.”

Display advertising appears on web pages in many forms, including web banners. These banners can consist of static or animated images, as well as interactive media that may include audio and video elements. Display advertising on the Internet is widely used for branding. This is why metrics like interaction time are becoming more relevant.

This may change in the future as display advertising is becoming much more targeted to users, much like how search engine ads can be extremely relevant to users based on what they are searching for. Display advertisers use cookie and browser history to determine demographics and interests of users and target appropriate ads to those browsers.

Banner ad standards have changed over the years to larger sizes, in part due to increased resolution of standard monitors and browsers, in part to provide advertisers with more impact for their investment. The standards continue to evolve. Banner ads can be targeted to internet users in many different ways in order to reach the advertiser’s most relevant audience. Behavioural retargeting, demographic targeting, geographic targeting, and site based targeting are all common ways in which advertisers choose to target their banner ads.

The eighth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Product-Related Advertising.”

As the name implies, it is concerned with conveying information about, and selling, a product or service.

Product advertising is of three types:

(a) Pioneering Advertising:

It is concerned with developing a “primary” demand that is, with conveying information about, and selling, a product category rather than a specific brand ; the initial advertising for black-and-white television, and then colour television, is of this nature. A pioneering ad for an airline service might empha­size the speed, luxury, and romance of travelling by air.

Such ads appeal to the consumer’s emotions as well as to his rational motives. This type of advertising is used in the introductory stages in the life cycle of a product, and might be appropriate for use with several different advertising objectives.

(b) Competitive Advertising:

This seeks to stimulate “selective” demand. It is useful when the product has reached the market-growth and especially the market-maturity stage. This advertising seeks to sell a specific brand rather than a general product category.

Compe­titive advertising is of two types:

i. Direct Type-This type of advertising seeks to stimulate immediate buying action.

ii. Indirect Type- It attempts to pinpoint the virtues of the product in the expectation that the consumer’s action will be affected by it when he is ready to buy.

Much airline advertising is of the competitive variety. Air India attempts to bid for the consumer’s patronage either immediately direct action in which case, it provides prices, time tables and phone numbers on which the customer may call for reservations ; or eventually indirect action when it suggests that you mention Air India’s name when talking to your travel agent.

While the exact details of the ads will depend upon specific objectives, if the product is in the competitive stage, the nature of the campaign will be consi­derably different from what it would be if it were in the pioneering stage.

(c) Retentive Advertising:

This may be useful when the product has achieved a favourable status in the market—that is, when it has attained a maturity or a sales declining period. Here, the advertiser usually wants to keep his product’s name before the public.

A much softer selling approach is used, or only the name may be mentioned in “reminder” type advertising. Much Campa-Cola advertising is of this variety.

The ninth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Institutional Advertising.”

This sells only the name and prestige of the company. This goodwill advertising is used frequently by large companies with divisions, whose various products are well known. HMT or DCM, for example, does considerable institutional advertising of its name, emphasizing the quality and research behind its products. The extent of “sell” is usually a suggestion to look for the HMT’s or DCM’s name for an assurance of dependable quality.

Institutional advertising is used extensively during periods of product shortages in order to keep the name of the company before the public. Otherwise many advertisers question its value.

Some large companies, such as HMT, use institutional ads to sell consumers on the desirability of large companies, which may be in their long-run political interest. HMT once told the story of the small-scale indus­tries supplying it with component parts, thus indicating how it aided the development of ancillary industries.

The tenth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Public Service Advertising.”

This is directed at the social welfare of a community or a nation. The effectiveness of product service ads may be measured in terms of the goodwill they generate in favour of the sponsoring organization. Some examples of public service advertising include Nirodh’s use for family planning, IDPL’s effect on health problems.

The eleventh advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Campaign Advertising.”

In politics, campaign advertising is the use of an advertising campaign through newspapers, radio commercials, television commercials, etc.) to influence the decisions made for and by groups. These ads are designed by political consultants and the political campaign staff. Political advertising is a form of campaigning used by political candidates to reach and influence voters. It can include several different mediums and span several months over the course of a political campaign.

Unlike campaign finance, there are very few regulations governing the process, and many candidates use various techniques to influence their intended audience. Unlike the campaigns of the past, advances in media technology have streamlined the process, giving candidates more options to reach even larger groups of constituents with very little physical effort.

Political advertising has changed drastically over the last several decades. In the 1948 presidential campaign, Harry S. Truman was proud of his accomplishment of shaking approximately 500,000 hands and covering 31,000 miles of ground across the nation. But that accomplishment was soon to pale in comparison when in 1952, the next presidential election saw a major change in how candidates reached their potential audiences.

With the advent of television, war hero and presidential candidate Dwight D. Eisenhower, created forty twenty-second television spot commercials entitled, “Eisenhower Answers America” where he answered questions from “ordinary” citizens in an attempt to appear accessible to “the common man.” These questions were filmed in one day using visitors to Radio City Music Hall, who were filmed gazing up at Eisenhower as he answered questions about the Korean War, government corruption, and the state of the economy.

He didn’t have to shake a half a million hands or travel the country extensively. He won the trust of the American people with his direct approach and subsequently the Presidential election. His vice president was Richard M. Nixon.

In 1960, Vice President Nixon used a formal television address in his presidential campaign, designed to answer questions about The Cold War and government corruption, and to show Americans that he was the stronger, more experienced candidate. On the other side of the fence, Catholic born John F. Kennedy created approximately 200 commercials during his campaign, but there were two that made Nixon’s efforts futile.

The first was a thirty minute commercial created from a speech he delivered in Houston, where he called for religious tolerance in response to criticisms that Catholicism was incompatible with a run for the Oval Office. The second and more memorable was the first Kennedy-Nixon debate. In the first of four televised debates, Kennedy appeared tanned and confident in opposition to Nixon, who looked pale and uncomfortable in front of the camera.

Seventy-five million viewers watched the debates, and although Nixon was initially thought to be the natural successor to Eisenhower, the election results proved otherwise, and Kennedy was ultimately declared the winner.

In 1964, aggressive advertising paved the way for a landslide Johnson victory. One of the first negative and maybe the most controversial commercial, perhaps of all time, was an advertisement dubbed “The Daisy Girl.” The commercial showed a young girl picking the petals off a daisy. After she finishes counting, a voice off camera begins a countdown to a nuclear explosion. The ad ends with an appeal to vote Johnson, “because the stakes are too high for you to stay home.”

The commercial used fear and guilt, an effective advertising principle, to make people take action to protect the next generation. The ad ran for under a minute and only aired once, but due to the right wing, pro-war views of the Republican candidate, it resulted in a 44 to 6 state victory for Lyndon B. Johnson.

Over the next decade, America saw the rise of the televised political attack ad. Richard M. Nixon was especially proficient at this form of advertising, and his commercials proved to be very successful in his reelection campaign of 1972, where he won handily with a 49 to 1 state victory.

McGovern ran a campaign free of political attack ads until the very end of his campaign, when he tried to attack Nixon after he realized he was dipping lower in the polls. His attempt proved to be too late, but his neutral style of attack ads against Nixon, featuring white text scrolling across a black background, became what is now seen as a fairly common method used in political and product advertising.

Attack ads continued to become the norm in political advertising. Ronald Reagan used them against Jimmy Carter in 1980, and it was also the first time that a family member was also used to attack the opposing candidate. One particular advertisement showed Reagan’s wife Nancy accusing Carter of a weak foreign policy.

This campaign also saw the rise of campaign finance issues when Reagan used political action committees to solicit funds on his behalf. However, in his reelection bid in 1984, we saw the beginning of a different form of political advertising; one with a much more positive flow and a stronger, more powerful message. With the country in a relatively prosperous state, advertisements in support of Reagan evoked an emotional bond between the country and its president.

Visions of Americans going about their daily lives with relative ease were compiled to convince America that voting against Reagan was a vote against prosperity. The positive and emotionally provocative ads proved more successful than negative attack ads. He was so highly successful that he won against Walter Mondale with a 49 to 1 state victory.

In the following election, attack ads returned with a renewed vigour. In 1988, George H. Bush used campaign ads that ridiculed his opponent, making him appear soft on crime. He contrasted these negative ads, with the emotional style commercial used by Ronald Reagan, to capitalize on his connection to the former president. Again borrowing from Reagan’s campaign practices he used free publicity as often as possible, making sure he was photographed in various situations that were likely to be aired in the evening news. Although

Michael Dukakis tried to discredit the Bush campaign in many ways, he was ultimately unsuccessful, losing to the former Vice President by thirty states.

There is no other election prior to the 1992 presidential election that capitalized more on the growth of technology. The rise of cable television became a formidable marketing tool used quite successfully by former Arkansas governor, William Jefferson Clinton. Both in 1992 and in his bid for re-election in 1996, he used various media outlets to reach demographics that had seldom been targeted in prior bids for the White House.

Using brilliant campaigning techniques, he frequented daytime talk shows and popular culture media outlets such as MTV, to show he was in touch with the American public in a way that no other presidential candidate had been before.

His paid advertising was also successful, placing him right in the middle of the political spectrum, appealing to a wide and diverse audience by using clean consistent messages and modern visions for the future. With the stark contrast of attack advertising and limited charisma coming from the opposition, George H. Bush lost his seat in the Oval Office to Bill Clinton in 1992, and presidential hopeful Robert “Bob” Dole was left behind in 1996.

The 2004 election saw yet another, and possibly the biggest change yet in political advertising; the growth of the Internet. Web-based advertising was easily distributed by both campaigns, and for the first time, advertisements were tailored to target specific audiences, a process known as narrowcasting. Both campaigns hired firms who specialized in the accumulation of personal data, and they used this information to highlight their strongest and weakest areas.

Then unique advertisements, sometimes with completely different messages, would be delivered to specific demographic regions in order to generate support for their respective presidential candidate. Negative campaign advertisements were used primarily by the Bush Administration, although plenty of attack ads were generated on behalf of the Kerry campaign, produced by special interest groups protesting George Bush’s decision to enter into the War in Iraq in 2003. The race was close, but resulted in a photo finish win for the incumbent George W. Bush.

The twelfth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Website Advertising.”

Websites can be wonderful ways to advertise a product, event, idea or brand. Not only can you run your advertisements on websites with highly target traffic and likely buyers (as the ad above), but you may also create entire websites dedicated to advertising your product. Modern websites can also contain content-rich features such as multi-media presentations, seminars and virtual demonstrations.

The thirteenth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Television Advertising.”

Television commercials usually come immediately to mind when one mentions “advertisement”. While proven to be very effective at selling products and helping to create high brand awareness, television advertising is facing new challenges from digital technologies that enable the skipping or “zapping” of commercials during playback/viewing. Yesterday’s model of “mass advertising” on television is changing due to both market and media fragmentation.

No longer can companies reach most people by advertising on “the three major networks”. Mass marketing is over because there are exponentially more channels out there with cable and satellite television and consumers have fragmented into niche groups with very unique needs, desires, and wants. Television advertising these days must be highly targeted toward the specific demographic desired. Not only that, but we are all becoming “advertisement intolerant” and are more and more likely to “zone out” during commercial messages.

The fourteenth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Mural Advertising.”

Outdoor Publicity:

Outdoor or Mural Advertising is perhaps the oldest form of advertising and even today, a very popular form of advertising especially in cities and towns. Its main purpose is to attract the attention of the public to the product advertised and to supplement press advertising or other media.

The following are the more common forms of outdoor advertising:

(a) Posters or Hoardings:

Advertisements exhibited on hoardings erected on tops of buildings, bridges or other com­monly frequented areas are common methods of advertis­ing. Walls, fences, chimneys, or specially constructed stands are also used for the purpose. The selection of a proper site and the use of attractive colours and themes are essen­tials for the success of poster advertising.

(b) Electric Signs and Neon Signs:

Advertising, especially during evenings and nights can be very attractively carried on by the use of electric signs using fluorescent bulbs or tubes in various colours. Electric signs in attractive colours which change every few seconds, or switch on and off, very easily attract attention of passersby. Neon signs using narrow tubes available in different colours are also very popu­larly used in advertising. The cost of erecting the signs and the electricity consumption are factors to be consi­dered in choosing this form of outdoor advertising.

(c) Transit Advertising: 

Transit advertising consists of car-card advertising, which is located within buses, subways, railways and outside displays, which appear on the fronts, sides, and backs of buses or other public transport and at transportation terminals. Transit advertising is the lowest-cost media.

It gives geographic selectivity and seasonal selectively. It has high readership. It can reach pedestrians, and travelling public. However, non-riders are not exposed to car cards located inside the vehicle. Car cards have small size and they can carry only short copy. Transit advertising is limited in quantity by the number of public vehicles in operation

(d) Sky Writing and Sky Advertising:

The use of the atmosphere for outdoor adver­tising has also become popu­lar. Messages written on or attached to balloons which are floated in the air, banners released from aeroplanes, messages written in the sky with the use of smoke, these are all methods of creating attention of passers-by.

(e) Sandwich Boards and Sandwich Men:

Advertising is sometimes carried on by using persons who are sent out on the streets with two boards placed on each side. These are known as sandwich boards or sandwich men. The sandwich men also attract attention by word-of mouth advertising. Similar use is made of tall men on stilts to attract attention of passers-by.

As can be seen from the above-mentioned methods, the essence of outdoor advertising lies in its ability to attract attention. Outdoor advertising to be successful must be simple and attractive. A minimum of words should be used. The advertisement should make an immediate impact. This form of advertising is useful for general advertising and not for selective advertising.

Merits of Outdoor Advertising:

Outdoor advertising has a reasonably long life. The same hoarding or neon sign can be used for a long time and can attract the attention of a large number of people it is a form of advertising which is used as a reminder to prospects, thus supplementing the other media. It has a general and wide appeal. It also catches the eyes of people when they are idle or when their mind is not concentrated on any other thing, thus adding its effective impact. It also provides a scope for the advertiser to use his skill and art in advertising.

Limitations of Outdoor Advertising:

Outdoor advertising cannot be used as original advertising. A long message cannot be given through outdoor advertising, which is usually read only by a fleeting glance It is not useful in selective advertising, or for specialty products. It has a low retention value. The effectiveness of out­door advertising cannot be accurately estimated, and considerable waste is likely to be there. It can be damaged or destroyed.

The fifteenth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Press Advertising.”

Advertisement through the press, that is, through newspapers, magazines, journals, etc., has today become a very common method of advertising. With the growth of literacy and the development of the press, the establishment of various newspapers and periodicals in many languages catering to different sections of society, different tastes and specialized professions, the press has become a very effective advertising media. Advertising is also a very useful source of finance for the press. It is the main income of the newspaper company.

(a) Newspaper Advertising:

Daily newspapers have acquired immense importance as media of advertising. Advertising in newspapers can be either through classified advertisement or through unclassified advertisement or display advertisements. Effectiveness of newspaper advertising depends on the selection of a proper newspaper, its circulation, time of issue and readership. It also depends on the selection of approp­riate space.

Merits of Newspaper Advertising:

Newspaper advertising has a general and wide appeal. Newspapers can accommodate adver­tisement of different sizes and content. The advertiser can repeat the same advertisement as long as he desires and as frequently as he desires, or he can periodically change the advertisement or insert a series of advertisements. Selective advertising to a certain extent is possible. It is also possible to estimate the effectiveness of advertise­ment by having keyed advertisements.

Limitations of Newspaper Advertising:

Newspaper- advertising has a very short span of life. Unless the message is repeated a number of times, advertising is likely to be ineffective. The get-up of newspapers, the newsprint used and the quality of printing is not conducive to attractive advertising. The use of colours is not always possible. There is likely to be considerable waste in advertising. There is a large element of change involved in newspaper advertising effectiveness. Illiteracy also affects the utility of newspaper advertising.

(b) Magazine Advertising:

Magazines, both of general readership and specialized reader­ship such as sports magazines, women’s magazines, youth magazi­nes, trade and professional journals are also commonly used forms of press advertising. The selection of the right type of magazine can considerably increase advertising effectiveness.

Merits of Magazine Advertising:

The life of a magazine is much longer than life of a newspaper, thus providing greater retentive value to the advertisement. The reference value of maga­zine advertisements is also greater. The get-up of magazine adver­tisements is more attractive and use of colours is possible. Selec­tive appeal is possible by the selection of appropriate magazines or journals. Waste in advertising can also be eliminated.

Limitations of Magazine Advertising:

Advance planning is necessary for magazine advertising. Repetitive advertising is not always possible. Magazines have limited circulation and, as compared to the cost of advertising, the results may be only to a limited extent.

The sixteenth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Film, Radio and Television Advertising.”

In recent years, with the spread of the cinema and the radio, these forms of advertising have also attained much popularity. In foreign countries where commercial TV has come into use, TV advertising has also become a popular form of advertising.

(a) Film Advertising:

Advertising in cinema houses is carried on both by the use of cinema and slides and the use of short commercial films which are displayed before the main feature film or during the interval or intermission. Effectiveness depends on the selection of a proper theme and the efficient use of audio-visual technique.

Merits of Film Publi­city:

Film publicity has a wide appeal and can transcend barriers of language. It is an audio-visual technique which can have maximum impact on audiences. Both senses of sight and hearing are used to impart the advertising message. Repetitive adver­tising and coverage of selected geographical areas are possible.

Limitations of Film Publicity:

The cost of preparing slides and commercial films is very high and their distribution over large geographical areas also needs heavy expenditure. Selective adver­tising is not possible. Effectiveness cannot be measured. There are also complaints that film advertising interferes with the entertain­ment and very often the artistic level of commercial films is very poor. There can be considerable waste in film publicity.

(b) Radio Advertising:

Commercial Radio broadcasting has become a very common form of publicity in many countries, and has been started on the All India Radio also. Advertising is carried on either by the use of short commercials, also known as Spot advertising, or by the use of sponsored programmes. In spot advertising, short advertise­ments of the duration of a few seconds are introduced as a part of the usual broadcasting programmes.

The advertisements may consist of jingles, dialogues, opinions of well-known personalities or such other advertisements. Sponsored programmes going on for fifteen minutes or more may be prepared by advertisers, for combining a popular programme with advertising. Both forms are popular with advertisers.

Merits of Radio Advertising:

Radio advertising has a very wide coverage and can be used for a very wide appeal. It is suitable even for illiterate people. Repetitive advertisement is very common. The impact of the spoken word is much more than the impact of the written message.

Limitations of Radio Advertising:

Radio advertising can­not- be selective and cannot be used for detailed explanation of the product. The usual impact of illustrations is not possible in radio advertising. Memory value of radio advertisements is also limited, as there is no physical message or advertisement for further refe­rence. Cost of radio advertisement is high, and effectiveness is comparatively limited.

Very often radio advertisements are not effective because listeners either switch off their radio sets, or pay no attention to the message. On the other hand, listeners complain of compulsion to listen to advertisement messages, or the surfeit (overfulness) of such messages in non-sponsored programmes.

(c) Television Advertising:

Television is the latest medium of mass communica­tion and is now extensively us­ed for advertisement. It uses audio-visual appeals to contact consumers of general utility products. Like radio advertising TV advertising may take them for short commercials as well as sponsored programmes combining entertainment and publicity. This medium is now popular for advertising in our country.

Merits of TV Advertising:

TV advertising is very successful mass communication medium. It combines the charac­teristics of salesmanship and advertising. The appeal can be a very personal appeal. Demonstration of the product and audio-visual appeal is easily possible, making a very effective impact on viewers.

Limitations of TV Advertising:

Television broadcasting has only a limited geographical range and therefore, the coverage of a market is limited. Advertising on TV is expensive and not suitable for small or medium scale advertisers. In many countries, TV is still a luxury possessed only by a small section of the people, thus reducing its effectiveness as a means of communica­ting with the bulk of consumers. There is also an element of compulsion in TV advertising, which is not liked by TV viewers.

TV advertising is, however, a medium having a very great potential, with the development of TV advertising techniques and reasonable growth in the popularity of TV as a means of entertain­ment.

The seventeenth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Direct Mail Advertising.”

Direct Mail Advertising:

Advertising is also carried on by having a direct contact with prospects through the use of the postal services. The advertising message is sent to selected prospects by means of circular letters, sales letters, catalogues, price lists, brochures and similar commu­nications. There is no personal contact between the seller and the prospect, but the seller contacts any individual directly through the medium of the post office.

In direct mail publicity the advertiser prepares a list of pros­pects who would possibly be interested in the product. This is known as the mailing list. The publicity material is carefully prepared, attractively printed and assembled. The material is then posted to the prospects who appear on the mailing list. The prospect is expected to contact the advertiser for further information or to place an order for the product, so that proper feed-back about the reaction of the prospects is easily available. Reply-paid envelopes or postcards are used for this purpose.

Merits of Direct Mail Advertising:

Direct mail adver­tising has a direct individual approach to the prospect and hence, some personal touch is possible. Direct mail advertising can be on a selective basis, with careful selection of prospects, which will increase effectiveness of advertising. It is possible to provide detailed information about the product, thus creating greater and more lasting impact.

It is possible to measure the effectiveness of the appeal and make suitable changes in the content of the appeal as well as in the mailing list to ensure maximum effectiveness and minimum wastage. The use of action devices also increases the response from prospects.

Limitations of Direct Mail Advertising:

The coverage or prospects through direct mail advertising is only a limited coverage. Direct mail advertising cannot really be considered a means of mass communication. The success of mail order advertising depends on the existence of up-to-date mailing lists, and the administra­tive machinery required for updating the lists may prove to be very expensive. The cost of preparing and posting the advertising material is also very high.

The eighteenth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Display Advertising.”

Point of Purchase Advertising:

Advertising, as we saw earlier, is a means of assisting the sales­man in his function of selling, by attracting the attention of the prospects and arousing their interest. The same role is played by the proper display of goods. Display of goods in shop-windows, exhibitions, trade fairs and such other forms is a preliminary which, though it does not form a part of the sale itself, paves the way for successful selling.

Proper display of goods attracts the attention of the prospects. An advertisement can only provide an illustration of the product. A display, on the other hand, allows the prospect to see the product at first hand, and in such a setting that an immediate impact is made.

Many prospects decide to buy a product because they are attracted by the display and interested in the product. A good dis­play makes an immediate appeal to the eye. Display is a very useful dealer said, adding to the attractiveness of the shop and extend­ing an invitation to prospects to enter the shop.

Display takes various forms. The most common of these are window-displays, interior displays such as show-cases, show-rooms, and exhibition and trade fairs.

(i) Window Displays:

The main purpose of window display is to attract the attention of prospects as well as non-prospects and to invite them to enter the shop. The selection of a proper site and position of the window is extremely important for successful window display. A window opening on a busy thoroughfare and leading the prospect into the shop will provide maximum effective­ness.

Sufficient space should be allocated to the window, and the arrangement of goods should be artistic and pleasing. The display needs to be changed at regular intervals to provide novelty. The use of attractive lighting, decorative material, rotating stands and such other devices will add to the attractiveness of the display.

(ii) Interior Display:

The inside of the store or shop, the counters and show-cases are also useful in attracting the attention of prospects and creating a pleasing atmosphere inside the shop. The interior display should be both functional and decorative. It should provide the customers and salesman sufficient space to allow free movement. An orderly arrangement of goods creates a favour­able impression. The lighting and colour-matching needs special attention. The overall effect should thus be pleasing, and orderly.

(iii) Show-Room:

Show-rooms are special enclosures or pre­mises where goods are displayed. Such show-rooms are especially useful in the case of industrial goods or durable products requiring large space. The show-room provides an opportunity for prospects to see, handle and study the product. The show-room attendants also act as salesmen providing information and clearing objections of prospects.

(iv) Exhibitions, Trade Fairs, etc.:

A very ancient and successful method of advertising one’s product is the use of fairs and exhibitions. Local fairs, national and international trade fairs, trade exhibitions are a very useful method of exhibiting and dis­playing one’s products and creating a market for them. Fairs and exhibitions provide prospects with the opportunity of observing and handling various products, studying their features and merits and comparing their performance. It is also looked upon as a form of amusement and combines business with pleasure.

Trade fairs are organised by trade associations, government agencies and other agencies to provide a common forum for manu­facturers to display their products, demonstrate them and attract or exploit new markets. It also provides an opportunity for advertising and creating brand consciousness. International marketing is largely based on creation of consumer awareness through trade fairs and exhibitions.

Advertising Specialties:

These include a wide variety of items, such as calendars, book matches, pens, pencils, knives, key rings, diaries, memo pads, cigarette lighters, blotters, rain hats and so on. They are given to advertising targets without cost or obligation. Advertiser’s name, address, phone number, and a short sales message are imprinted on the item. The advertiser can choose from around 5,000 specialties in the market. Advertising specialties are reminder type of promotion, it is hoped that they will lead to customer’s orders and re-orders. However, they have limited space available for sales message. They are also costly.

The nineteenth advertising idea we recommend to students and small businesses is “Scientific Advertising.”

When we use scientific or fact-finding approach in planning and execution of our Advertising Campaign, it is termed as scientific or rational advertising. Fact-finding and problem-solving approach is based on reason and it is supported by facts and figures. Advertising decisions are objective decisions. Scientific advertising has four stages- 1. Preliminary investigation, 2. Media planning and financial planning, 3. Evolution and execution of planned advertising programme, 4. Testing of the results or effects of advertising.

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