Just because your target market is smart does not mean they can’t be persuaded to do business with you. Even the ivy league elite are open to suggestion and can be convinced to buy something they aren’t necessarily looking for. Ground zero for this case study is Cambridge, MA. If there is anything that Harvard advertising has shown us, it is that customers like and use advertising to find what it is they’re looking for, especially when it is unobtrusive.
When businesses around Harvard were trying to attract new business, half were given the option to pursue billboard advertising in conjunction with a modest SEO campaign while the others were offered to have all of their adwords for three months paid for by the study’s organizers. Much to the surprise of the businesses and the organizers themselves, those who chose the less expensive outdoor advertising strategy along with SEO noticed incremental sales increases over three times greater than those who used just SEM like search engine advertising.
What can we learn from these results? Most importantly, businesses ought to recognize that local business is not internet business. While internet portals are used to find specific businesses, much of commerce isn’t need-based and is stimulated by the creation of a strong brand image or a strong message, seen repeatedly, that can actually compel even someone with perfect SATs to buy something that they hadn’t realized they needed.
Second, the Harvard advertising experiment shows us what statistics have been showing us for over a year: internet advertising has lost its poignancy. In some sense, it risks becoming as obsolete as print media advertising because as a medium, the portal is too crowded with too many similar brands that can’t differentiate themselves.
In conclusion, it should be obvious that every business ought to consider the less expensive and more winning strategy that worked in Harvard square. It doesn’t take a perfect SAT score to figure that out, either. For more information about Harvard Advertising please call Denny Orsinger at 847-462-8433.
