Know-How Exchange : Research/Metrics

If advertising didn't make a return no-one would do it. However, it's also very easy to waste money on advertising by not targeting properly, not having the advert and message tuned to the market, and not focusing on what you want the advertising to achieve (eg build awareness, make direct sales etc). Google ads may be a way of testing and refining before spending big money on other advertising media.

One of the issues with general advertising is that its messages take a blanket approach: they go out to everyone when really, "everyone" is not your customer. Before you go ahead with commercial-style advertising you need to be clear on who you are targeting, why your message matters to this specific client, and how much you want to spend and over what period of time.

Advertising's strength lies in offering sustained messages over time so that when the ideal client is in need of your product or service, they think logically of you as their first choice because your advertising has positioned you as the obvious choice, and because your advertising has conditioned people to recall and act on your name.

Direct connections with contractors may help you. Likewise with plumbers and specialist installers.

Agreeing with Saul and Gary,commercial advertising can offer great return on investment if certain conditions are met. You need to be clear about your marketing strategy (segmentation, targeting and positiong: who should prefer your product over alternatives and why?) and its execution (value proposition in quality and price,location and image).This allows you to carefully target,craft and test your message.

Beyond this, advertising directly to consumers shows the best returns in my experience when:
1) unaided brand awareness is important in your product category;i.e. consumers need to remember your name before going to stores and/or ask plumbers and installers for brands. If that is not the case, you are better off strengthening your connections with stores and plumbers (Gary's point)

As a contrast,consider office furniture company Inofec (chapter 1 in my book) with the fashion retailer in chapter 9 of my book. Most people are not involved and thus do not really attend to or remember advertising for office furniture when they do not need it. However, when they do need it, they need it fast (high 'situational importance') and will either ask their general office supplier or search for products online. Therefore, Inofec gets great results of supplier connections and of Google paid search ads. In contrast, many customers are involved in fashion and a carefully targeted and crafted advertising message may get them to check out the fashion retailer and its products.

2) your product has a strong consumer advantage over alternatives and you can demonstrate this by showing very satisfied customers. Advertising works wonders in broadening reach for 'hidden gems'; those products that 2%-5% of the customer population is crazy about but the rest does not know yet.

In a Journal of Marketing paper (Slotegraaf and Pauwels 2008), we show that permanent sales benefits of marketing actions are most likely for brands under 3% market share but with a strong product advantage.

Wishing you the best; please let us know what you decide!

You need to pay close attention to what Dr. Pauwels has written. There is no way you can apply the experience of other companies to your own situation unless you are sure all the parallels apply. Every company and every market is different. Even then, the strength/appeal of your copy and offer for your target audience can make the difference between working and failing.

The best approach is probably to hire an expert and construct a relatively low-cost experiment for your product/market. Find out what works for you (and what doesn't) before you blow your entire budget on advertising. If/when you identify a winning formula, then you can expand it and take full advantage of what you've learned.

Don't rely on studies that show advertising effectiveness in some unrelated market(s) or in an aggregate of markets. No matter what they show, you can't be certain the conclusions are relevant to your circumstances.

All of that said, advertising can be extremely powerful in generating awareness and sales. Don't run away from it just because it seems daunting at first.