Every successful business owner understands that marketing is an important part of their business. After all, marketing brings in new customers, profits, and long-term benefits for your business.

In thinking about ways to market your business, you may have questions, such as:

• What’s the difference between online and offline marketing?
• Is one better than the other?
• Which is the better option for your business?

Our guide will assist you in answering these questions and more. As you read through, mark any notes or questions you have and send them our way at info@averista.com.Sign up for the Averista marketing newsletter to learn more marketing strategies to grow your business and reach your goals.

Let’s begin!

What Is Online Marketing?              

Simply put, online marketing involves promoting your business, product, or service on the internet via your website, online ads, or social media. Each marketing strategy has its advantages.

Social Media Marketing – See the engagement of your content and promotions

More than ever, companies are competing with one another on social media because the use of social media increases each day. By using social media channels, you can physically see what your audience thinks of your brand and marketing strategies. If you’re seeing lots of likes and shares of your content, congratulations, you’re doing something right! Customers are more likely to revisit a business that has a lively online presence.

If you don’t see the engagement you’re looking for, don’t worry.  You can recover and compete by reviewing your strategy and content to see where you might be losing your audience. Developing and testing a strategy can take the time you may not have as a business owner. By working with a highly effective marketing team, you can take content engagement to new heights and continue to focus on running your business.

Online Ads – Track your return on investment (ROI)

You can track clicks and sales when using ads online, so you can easily see which ads are the most profitable for you. This will help you to make smart decisions regarding future marketing strategies and campaigns. For a business to succeed in the modern era, investment and management are must-haves.

Unfortunately, there are times when a company fails to focus on these tasks. This is because it is extremely difficult for 1 or 2 people to handle a company’s operations at once, given the sheer number of tasks that must be completed for your business to stay afloat.

Website SEO – Organically attracting your target market

One of the most important aspects of online marketing is identifying and then interacting with your ideal customer base. Sometimes businesses get stuck in a rut because they don’t know or have too broad of a target audience.  Before a business will see continued growth, the question needs to be asked: Who are we trying to sell to?  Therefore, understanding your target market is essential.

When the team at Averista marketing starts working with a new client, we ask the same question “Who are you trying to sell to?”. The answer is usually along the lines of “everyone that needs our product” or “every person in a specific region.”  Is that your target market? Nope.

Your target audience is probably either male or female, falls into a particular age bracket, has a similar income range, etc… If you are serious about marketing your business, you need to be serious about finding out as much about your target market as possible. At Averista, we specialize in creating Ideal Client profiles to increase the likelihood your message reaches its intended audience.

There are also some negatives to using online marketing

Online advertising is effective and trendy now, but it can also be a major hassle. While it’s ingenious that advertisers can target you with advertising for things you searched days ago, it can be bothersome and turn you off a company.

Online marketing’s limitations include the necessity to keep up with shifting trends and the limited time to attract attention to your ad.

Online ads are fleeting. If an online ad is not placed properly for the most impact, your target market can easily be missed, or worse, they’ll ignore your message. It’s easy to scroll past an ad and click to the next page without even taking notice.

We’re sure you’ve heard this statement yelled in frustration before “Google has changed its algorithm AGAIN!” Whether it’s the latest social media platform or a change to the search engine algorithm, there’s always something new to learn. If you don’t keep up with important trends, you may find your brand left behind. Even worse, you may be spending time and money using strategies that don’t work anymore.  Keeping up with trends and algorithm updates is very important and time-consuming work.

If you’re like most Averista Marketing clients, you add more and more responsibilities to your overflowing plate each day. You probably don’t have the time (or dorkiness 🤓) to dive into algorithm updates or research trends in online marketing.  We’ll build a team dedicated to you and your marketing goals so you can focus on your business.

What Is Offline Marketing?

In contrast to Online-Marketing, there is Offline marketing which is typically anything that does not involve the internet. Print, radio, and television advertising are the most well-known mediums which fall under this type of marketing.

Offline marketing strategies have their benefits

Offline marketing can be impactful when it’s easy to understand. A billboard or TV commercial will often become part of a person’s daily life because of its ability to be seen repeatedly by the audience. The messages are often easier to understand and digest.  Your audience might drive by a billboard at 55 mph or see a 15 or 30-second TV commercial, but they will most likely do so, over and over again.

Printed marketing materials are often permanent. Unless a magazine, brochure, or newsletter is recycled or put in the trash, the advertisements found within will be permanent. Thankfully, the message can still work weeks, or even months, after publication.

Many offline ads are likely to be remembered much better than an Instagram ad for example, which is almost instantly forgotten. Think of all the popular Super Bowl ads and other commercials that we all know so well that they become part of our culture.  These ads are usually first launched on television, followed by a separate social media campaign to piggyback on the success of the commercial.

There are, of course, drawbacks to Offline marketing

It can be harder to measure the success of an offline campaign compared to an online campaign. There are many ways to measure the success of an offline campaign, but they are not as in-depth or accurate as those available for online marketing.

Typically, offline marketing can be more expensive than online marketing. Even a small run in your local newspaper or a single 30-second spot on TV can set you back a considerable amount. The more you know about your target market, the more likely your budget will be used wisely to capture the exact audience you’re looking for.

Offline marketing is the most traditional form of marketing. It tends to be used most often to attract older generations. However, this is only a generality. For example, you have an online store and target younger consumers. You may see a high ROI by handing out printed discounts or coupon codes to an audience of young adults at a music concert.  Your offline marketing is now driving online purchases.

Is it possible to decide which form of advertising is best for your company?

As we’ve shared, both online and offline marketing have their pros and cons.

You don’t have to choose one over the other. A combination of online and offline marketing tends to work best for businesses.

What you will need is to understand what you want to achieve marketing-wise, what your budget is, and most importantly who your target audience is. Study your audience and go with what you think will work best with them.

Averista Marketing services are available to you as well. We’re here to answer your questions and, once we learn more about your goals, to suggest a personalized plan to help you achieve them. Reach out to us today!

Then, track what you can to determine which campaigns bring you the greatest profits. Run new campaigns and track those. Experience is the best determiner. Analyze as you go and stick with what’s working best for your company until you find a new campaign that drives even greater profits.