Online vs Traditional Advertising

By Ashlei Jackson, Qlixite

As the saying goes, “Nothing Changes if Nothing Changes.” However, if everything out there is changing except for you - you can bet you’re getting left behind. The growth of online information technology has changed the landscape of business marketing. The internet has replaced or vastly altered traditional advertising mediums such as magazines, newspaper, radio and televisions. All of these once “print only” mediums have online versions. With a good strategy and market awareness; businesses can utilize the internet to achieve effective and cost efficient marketing. Below are a few comparisons drawn between online and traditional -only advertising.
• Online Advertising is Targeted
Instead of spending time and effort (as well as lots of money) to send out mass mailings and junk mail with low return on investment, businesses can allocate their money smarter and more efficiently with online advertising by targeting specific audiences who are actually searching for your business, product or service.
• Tracking and Conversion
Here’s the big question - How many people have actually seen your ads? It’s very difficult to measure the effectiveness of direct mail, newspaper and TV advertisements. Online advertising however, empowers businesses with powerful tracking tools that can measure the smallest details such as impressions, conversions and ‘click-through’ rates.
• Entry-level and Ongoing Fees
      Yellow page ads can be very costly. Internet advertising has yet again empowered the business users to control their budget (sometimes daily) by allowing various bidding methods and low initial fees. Due to the targeted nature of online advertising and the ability to track the effectiveness of ads, making instant adjustments to campaigns is much cheaper than traditional advertising mediums which require a firm commitment and investment in advance.
• Internet gives businesses control.
The biggest advantage of Internet advertising is that it is the most powerful communication tool available. It can reach households and other businesses via computers, mobile phones and tablets. Rather than allocating your efforts on finding different mediums for various regions and audiences; you can focus on what you do best and let your clients come and find you by setting up targeted campaigns.
• Better Branding
Any form of advertising helps in improving the branding, but online advertising stands a notch higher in effectiveness. Internet advertising can expose a small business to potential customers all over the world. When used for the right products and in the right way, it has the potential to reach more customers for less money than any other form of advertising.
Online advertising is a powerful tool for businesses to have in their marketing strategy to effectively get the word out and achieve their marketing goals.