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Shotgun vs. Rifle Marketing |
Article Submitted by: charen smith

Tuesday, 20 October 2009
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When you're marketing your business, do you go at it with a shotgun approach or a rifle? How do you design your posters printing - for everybody, hoping that you hit somebody along the way? Or do you take careful aim and try to hit your target many times? Whoa! Let's backtrack a little bit. What's ‘shotgun marketing' and ‘rifle marketing' anyway? Have you ever tried using any of the two to promote what you have in your business? Let's just consider how each of these ammunitions is used. A shotgun usually discharges shells over an area with the shooter hoping to at least hit some of the portions of his target. According to the dictionary, shotgun means to cover a wide range of area in a haphazard manner. Hence, a shotgun approach to marketing is where you as the marketer scatter your marketing efforts over an area and hoping that you hit somebody along the way. Similarly, your marketing campaigns such as your print posters can also do the shotgun approach by designing it and coming up with a message that can very well include everybody, while hoping and praying that someone might get interested and take you up on your offer. If you're looking at posters printing, it's basically marketing with billboards and huge banners on areas that get larger quantities of standard visitors, with the hopes that you catch the attention of one of them. Some of the usual shotgun marketing strategies are bulk mailings, putting an ad in newspapers and magazines, cold calling, and as I've mentioned, billboard postings. Radio and tv commercials can also be considered as shotgun approaches to promoting one's business. This kind of marketing approach is practically easy to put up as you don't have to research much on your clients and prospects. The idea is to come up with generic print posters for example so you can cover an entire area and pray to at least hit somebody. And since you're covering much wider vicinity, it can help you to introduce yourself to a larger market. The downside to this is that as what the dictionary have said your marketing efforts would be haphazard and scattered, not to mention that you're doing it sporadically. You haven't researched enough that you provide a generic message, which gets you more costs along the way. Some might even say that you're wasting your time and money because you don't get much of the results you should have when you're targeting your marketing campaign. Rifle marketing on the other hand, allows you to bring your marketing efforts into focus. You take careful aim that's why you get to hit more of your target clients more times than you can count. Before you even pull the trigger, you make sure that your prospect is right in the center of your target. This type of approach is easier to do if you know and understand your target market very well. Hence, you need to research on your target audience. By getting to know your target audience better, you'll be able to provide them with a marketing campaign that actually fits what they're looking for. You're aiming for accuracy here that you'll be able to have more hits than doing a shotgun approach to marketing. And because rifle marketing allows you to customize your marketing message to your target market, you get more personal and innovative with your ideas. Your marketing collaterals are bound to be opened more often as they would look different and unique from the rest of the marketing tools out there. So which one is better? I'd say according to the purpose and business you have. If your purpose is to basically get people to know you, then a shotgun approach would do very well. This one can certainly help you promote awareness of your business. But if you're looking at getting results, then rifle marketing is what you need. You get to target more of your clients and prospects, and you're able to fit your marketing campaign to the needs and wants of your target audience. For comments and inquiries about the article visit Posters Printing and Print Posters Article Source: http://www.ArticleBlast.com |
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