Monday, October 19, 2009

A Few Tips on Calendar Advertising....

Following up on my last post, here are some ways you can maximize the promotional value that you receive from calendar advertising:

1. Distribution is Key

This is the one aspect of calendar advertising that most often gets overlooked and unfortunately it's the most important. Those calendars you bought won't do you any good if they don't leave the box. In fact, you shouldn't even commit to a calendar advertising program unless you've determined what kind of distribution plan will go along with it.

Will you mail them? Deliver them in person? Send them out with your drivers? Have people pick them up in your store? Some savvy marketers will go so far as to hang the calender in their client's office themselves (with their client's permission of course). What better way to guarantee proper placement of your ad?

2. Who's going to receive them?

Clients...prospects....high traffic places like your local convenience store or the post office? Think about where you're going to get the most eyeballs of people who will spend money with you or the most eyeballs in general if that's more appropriate.

3. Think about WHERE you want people to see your message.

This certainly ties into calendar selection. Where do your clients or prospective clients make their buying decisions? In the kitchen? If so consider a food themed appointment calendar. At their desk? Commercial or Year at A Glance calendars are prefect for this purpose, as is the much smaller desk calendar.

4. Remember it's not necessarily about which calendar YOU like......

It's which calendar best appeals to your target audience -- and most importantly which one is most likely to get hung on a wall. You may hate muscle cars and like Norman Rockwell, but if your client base is mechanics, which calendar is more likely to actually get used?

5. Think about the message you're sending about your company.

If you're a Mercedes dealer, chances are your customer base isn't going to be too eager to hang up your $1.30 wall calendar. By the same token if your plumbing company serves a working class area and you're handing out $10 calendars personalized with your customers names, some customers may decide that you'd be better served giving out a less expensive calendar and lowering your prices.

6. Don't order them too late in the year.

Ideally you want to get the calendars in your clients hands at some point in December, so don't wait until mid November to order them. As we move into November, production backs up and inventories of the more popular calendars can disappear. Remembering that distribution is key, handing out calendars in January is generally too late. So get them ordered early enough in the fall to allow plenty of time for proper distribution.

These are just some of the concepts that will help maximize the effectiveness of a calendar program. If you'd like to discuss these a little more in depth, just drop me an email at sboyages@promoresource.com.

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