I’m pretty sure I read printing is as dead as radio. Hmmm. Yes, I’ll admit Spotify and Pandora are popular, but the last time I checked, my new car has a radio. And radio stations and DJs are still around. And money spent on radio advertising is still paying off!
Will radio stations one day be totally gone? Maybe. Will print media one day be non-existent? Perhaps. But more likely than not, neither one will die tomorrow and neither one will perish completely. They will evolve instead. As business owners, we just need to be nimble, open-minded, and willing to evolve with them.
The problem with marketing blogs…
The problem with blogs on the subject of marketing is that far too often they are biased. The business owner/author is pushing for digital marketing…or stumping for print media…or extolling the virtues of some other current interest. They seek to move their business or career in one direction or another, so they naturally push the narrative that will serve them.
There are other business owners and industry leaders who don’t want to seem antiquated. They create a “forward-looking” or “agent of change” image using buzz words that make them sound like brilliant trailblazers. Right away, it’s a contest for who can look like they’re out in front of everyone else.
But you know as well as I do that just because it’s blogged doesn’t mean it’s true.
Digital marketing VS traditional marketing
To affirm which type of marketing is best, digital or traditional, is rather ridiculous. Marketing depends on too many variables: individual talents, the type of business, the buying patterns of customers, the nature of the product, the form of service, etc.
Is digital marketing a great choice for your business? Sure! Or would traditional marketing make more sense? Possibly! It all depends on you, your business, your customers, and your team.
An example. Let’s say you’re ready to launch a branding strategy for a private school in a moderately affluent neighborhood. Will you need a website? You bet. Do you need a social media presence? Of course. When parents stop by your school for a tour, should you have a printed brochure? Absolutely.
Oh, but the website offers the same information you might argue. Yep, and they’ve probably already been there and still chosen to come to campus and see it in person. Those parents are mulling over whether to drop several thousand dollars a year for a decade into an educational institution. Leaving with a well-designed brochure containing amazing photos, glowing alumni testimonials, appealing teacher-to-students ratios, impressive accreditations, and other accolades may be the very thing that moves the pendulum over in favor of your school.
And now, what if you inserted QR codes into the brochure which led parents to branded school videos…or to a page with numerous testimonials from parents…or to pictures of graduates who are now community leaders? You’ve likely just closed the deal! And you did so by combining the best of both marketing worlds!
Integrated marketing strategies
When COVID-19 hit, I recall a good friend of mine saying that in-person networking was now dead—people are always in such a hurry to kill things. The reality is that in-person networking is still alive and strong. COVID-19 certainly ushered in a new era of Zoom meetings and online networking, but most business owners are still utilizing traditional networking methods. They understand that the best marketing is integrated. They know that in-person and online networking can likely coexist, evolve, adapt, and can even converge in some creative ways.
I suppose it’s possible that one day the print medium might actually die. But when the first television was turned on in 1939 at the World’s Fair in New York, there were many that proclaimed radio to be…you guessed it…dead. Well, considering what’s in my car, it seems the radio has been “dying” for 83 years. So, let’s stop sending out obituary notices for printing, shall we? You just never know what’s going to evolve, adapt, and survive in the marketing world.
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