Online Shopping & Internet Marketing

Bigger is better is believed in by many. That’s exactly what some of the small firms think when they want to advertise their product. They think bigger and select a medium where they need to invest a lot of money, but do not reach the targeted market. Like if a company specializes in designing diet plans and want to help out people who had disappointing results from their individual diet plans, and the company chooses to advertise a full page in the local paper instead of running advertisement in a health magazine, obviously not many of the dieters will notice the advertisement and the advertisement doesn’t get the desired attention.

So the point is to come up with the best campaign, which will increase the probability of the ad getting viewed and the right customers trying to buy the product or sign up for the service. Studies and research can be carried out on the market and targeted audience can be narrowed down. Once getting the list of newspapers, magazines and magazines meant for the customers in mind, find out how many readers they have and the cost they ask for posting the ad. Special deals are offered by them from time to time and can only be found by watchful eye.

It is estimated that everyday people are subjected to around three thousand commercials. That is a huge number and if someone desires to be noticed, he should certainly be different. Not only the services and product sold should be unique in the market, so should be the advertisement. For example, if a business selling mattresses says, “We sell mattresses”, it will not make a statement and will be passed off as any other mattress advertisement. But if they say, “Our mattresses are of the finest quality”, it will make the advertisement stand out in the crowd. Other catch lines are “Are you suffering from back pain? Probably you must try our mattresses ”, are more specific and will catch the fancy of the people who are suffering from back pains since a long time. The advertisement should also focus on the uniqueness of the product and how it is better compared to the competitors’ product.

Focusing on the problems of the customers and giving a solution for them, is what a customer demands. A customer does not buy a product; he buys benefits in the form of a product. The real value of the product should be realized and a clear picture of it should be presented to the customer so he will be able to relate with the product. If the advertisement doesn’t specify the solution it can provide, the customers will never know of it. So focusing on the customers problem is what some ads miss.

The last thing missing in most of the advertisement is motivation for the customers. If the advertiser has designed the advertisement and the customer had read the advertisement, all efforts and money invested will be wasted if he doesn’t get up and do something about it. It shouldn’t be assumed that the customer knows what to do; instead the advertisement should influence the mind of the customer and should tell him what to do. Call of action is the final job of the advertisement. It should call for information, or visiting the store or even visiting the online store. The message should sound confident and clear.

Typical example is color when accompanied with audio, and writing. According to a study, big budget companies spend billions in the color market research, which helps in product and packaging development. Color, along with content, helps to pertain the interest of the visitor and makes him surf the website longer. A colorful article will make the reader read it till the end. Color makes things look more amiable.

Colors are known to influence the behavior of a person. Like blue color is said to have a relaxing effect. Red represents passion and love. A dating website can have red as the background color. Fast food restaurants have bright picture of food beautifully decorated pasted on the walls. This tempts the taste buds of the customer and the customer pounces on the food, eats and leaves quickly. And this is exactly the reaction expected.

Light effects can also be used to play with the mind of the on-looker. Advertisements, especially for food products, have strategically placed lights. The light effects trigger the hormones in the brain, which increases the hunger. If the same is placed in a slightly dim light, it won’t be equally tempting.

Countries around the world have different cultures that relate a color to an occasion or emotion. Climatic conditions also attribute to this. Like in America, people relate black to death and where as in Asia, white is related to death. People living near the equator like warm colors and people living nearer to the poles like cold colors.

It’s a must for an advertiser to have the knowledge about the colors and what they refer too. Black stands for elegance, sophistication, seduction and mystery. White stands for peace, pure, clean, mild and youthful. Gold stands for prestige, luxury and elite. Silver stands for prestige, scientific and cold. Yellow stands for warmth, happiness and cheer. Orange stands for warmth, playfulness, and vibrant. Red stands for love, excitement, strength, passion, and danger. Pink stands for nurture, sweet, soft, and security. Green stands for nature, fresh, fertility and abundance. Blue stands for cool, trust, belonging and reliability. And lastly Purple stands for spiritual, royalty, and dignity.

From the advertiser’s point of view, we can conclude that colors can determine the shopping habits of customers. Black, blue, red and orange attract impulsive buyers. Smart shoppers are attracted to pink, light blue and navy blue colors. Companies use colors in logo, advertisement, etc., to pass the right message to the customer. Wal-Mart advertise has a navy blue background and its catch line is “We sell for less”, which means smart customers are their goal. Mercedes has a silver logo, true to its class.