Why did you choose that channel?

Back in the days of old, before the digital age, the media and mediums (ie channels) used to get your message to your audience were fairly concentrated. TV. Radio. Print (newspaper, magazine). Outdoor (billboards, bus stops, bus backs, shopping centres). Direct mail. And so on.

Today, with the rise of digital media, there are more channels to reach your audience. Sadly, some of the previously much-loved media platforms, such as newspapers and magazines, have taken a hit and have either shutdown or reduced significantly in size.

We’ve talked to a number of businesses over recent years that are keen to focus their marketing efforts on social media, predominantly for cost and what they believe to be greater reach. But why do marketers recommend the use of channels beyond social media? There are predominantly three factors we consider:

1)    Target audience (who is your target audience and where they are most likely ‘to be’, or most likely to come into contact with your marketing efforts).

2)    Objectives and goals (what are we trying to achieve and what do we want our target audience to do; ie, are we trying to connect with as many people as possible and drive them to our website / product / service, or are we trying to engage people in a conversation in real time and get them engaging with our brand, or do we just want to get our brand name out there and known with our target audience).

3)    Reach (what channel will give us the most exposure to your target audience).

Now isn’t the time for a masterclass on customer segmentation to highlight your target audience, we’ll save that for another time.  

Here we explore the pros and cons of some common channels.

Social media

Ok, let’s start with the one that is fast becoming the most popular medium. Facebook. Instagram. LinkedIn. TikTok. Threads. X. Pinterest. YouTube. And let’s not mention social media channels that businesses who operate internationally need to be aware of such as WeChat and Weibo in China, and Line in Japan.

The most impressive aspect of social media is the reach that is achievable. With its global reach it is superior in facilitating networking, engaging and connecting with a broad audience.

On the flipside, as we all know, there are more and more keyboard warriors in the online world. Your brand is exposed to negative interactions and online harassment, and there is a greater potential for misinformation to spread.

Unfortunately, social media is not something you can ‘set and forget’. It requires a significant investment of time in both management, but also in the development of relevant and engaging content.

Radio

We won’t lie. We love radio! Radio offers reasonableness, wide reach, and convenient message conveyance. And most importantly, it is the medium audiences often have on all day while working or driving. The subliminal and subconscious power of radio should not be underestimated.

Radio offers selectivity through geographic inclusion by countless stations and different program designs. The cost benefits are impressive, particularly against those of TV for both placement and development.

Sadly, radio does have significant competition in the attention of listeners, who are most often also primarily doing another task while listening to the radio. With this in mind, advertising on radio needs to be on high repetition for messages to be retained by the audience. Often, this means that radio can require a longer lead time for increasing sales.

Online advertising

Known as digital display in the industry, online advertising comes with various benefits thanks to the increasing amount of time consumers spend on the internet.

Benefits of online advertising are targeting specific customers, lower cost, full control with accurate statistics, improved customer interaction and wide range of formats. It is also often cheaper than offline advertising media (think newspapers, radio, billboards etc) because businesses can reach their desired audience even with a small budget. It also lets them compare costs and see how effective their ads are, so they can use their money wisely.

But what’s the flipside? How many times have you clicked on an advertisement on a website you were visiting? Or shutdown a pop-up advert? Exactly! Apart from audience control over shutting down an advert, we have to remember that the audience visited that site for another purpose, not to see our adverts.

Let’s also not talk about how some websites that heavily feature advertising, particularly adverts with a lot of images or video, can often have a longer loading time. We have all become so used to immediate download speeds of websites, that if a site loads too slowly, we disengage.

Billboards

Have you ever paid attention to those ginormous adverts along highways as you’re driving along, or on the sides of buildings in the city? Billboards. These are a great way to gain exposure for your brand to a mass audience due to their prominent nature.

A billboard provides a substantial and visually impactful way to engage consumers. The sheer size and strategic placement of billboards ensure high visibility, capturing the attention of passersby and creating a lasting impression. Billboards offers continuous exposure, reinforcing brand messages in consumers’ minds during their daily routines.

If you have noticed a billboard, you may have also noticed that you often have a very short time take in the message. The reality is that the audience passes by quickly. Effective design and messages are imperative with billboard advertising.

Events

Events will always be a staple of sales and marketing activities. When you’re looking to showcase your products, engage key opinion leaders and generate media interest, event marketing remains a key pillar in any marketing strategy.

Whether you’re organising a conference, exhibiting or attending, it is a great way to generate interest in your brand and build your presence in the market. Events represent the best opportunity to reach new customers in person and strengthen existing relationships with brand loyalists.

Hosting and attending events are very time and cost intensive exercises. Delivering a great event marketing campaign requires a high level of cooperation across the business.

Public relations (PR)

PR can help raise your business' profile and improve your reputation. If done well, it can be a cost-effective way to get your message to a large audience. Having said this, there is no guarantee of a successful outcome, or that your efforts will be picked up or reported on positively by media sources.

One of the major influencers for PR is credibility. Audiences are far more likely to trust messages coming from an objective source rather than the more obvious paid-for advertising messages.

If you have a good news story it can be picked up by several news outlets, exposing your message to a large audience. This means that your free activity has given your brand access to a large audience in comparison to paid-for advertising media placement.

E-newsletters

Be honest, how many times have you deleted an e-newsletter that you signed up to without reading the content? Yeah, us too.

Email newsletters can be super useful in your marketing if you know how to use them right. Successful but not too spammy, detailed but not too long– there’s a few different tightropes you need to balance to send out your best content.

For very little cost, if you have a comprehensive database, there are some great ways to target your audience with personalised content that caters to their specific wants and needs.

As you can see from this very short list, there are a number of channels to connect with your audience. We always recommend using a number of channels in your marketing and communications programs to achieve the best results.