In 2023, it pretty much seems like marketing = digital. Companies focus almost entirely on creating ads for platforms like Google and Bing, building up a social media presence on Facebook and Instagram, and responding to the daily whims of a certain Mr Musk.
Now, we’re not going to tell you to ditch digital and revert to going old school. It’s not an either/or scenario, not at all. Our message here is that traditional marketing should be part of your toolkit, combining it with your existing digital efforts to really start dominating your market.
Does Traditional Marketing Still Have a Place?
You know what we’re going to say in response, the title of the piece kinda gives it away. But the thing is, old-school marketing techniques still work. Of course, you need to season your techniques with a few modern spices, but the core of the tried and tested methods is still very much identical.
But we’re not going to just give you a generalist overview of why you should add traditional marketing to your digital pipeline. No, we’re going to give you a little bit of utility and go into evidence-based reasons why this stuff still works.
Going Geo-specific With Your Ads
Traditional methods like billboards, flyers, and local radio advertisements, amongst others, are excellent for targeting very specific geographic areas. Just like laser-focused online ads that target a researched group, these are super effective.
For businesses focused on local clientele, traditional marketing provides an effective means to reach and engage with the community. It fosters a sense of connection and trust with local consumers, enhancing brand loyalty and word-of-mouth referrals.
And we all know how much the ‘tribe’ mentality matters when it comes to building that relationship with your customers. Once you manage to engage and dig a little deeper than what other brands achieve, you’ve got them hooked.
Case Study: Why Flyers Work
Let’s take a quick deep-dive on flyers. Back in the 90s, our letterboxes would be absolutely flooded with annoying direct mail ads. Most people would just throw everything in the trash (hence the term ‘junk mail’), without even reading anything.
Nowadays, however, the situation has completely flipped. We now delete emails without abandon, with spam arriving faster than we can even get rid of it. Direct mail, however, so seldomly arrives that we often even look forward to it.
The UK’s Royal Mail, to illustrate our point, found that over 90% of direct mail is opened. Compare that to email marketing campaigns, and you’d be lucky if two out of every ten recipients even considers your mailshot.
Hard Copy, EEG Brain Waves, and Banner Blindness
Okay, we’re going to go a little science-based here. You can have the same exact bit of text copy on a magazine ad and its digital equivalent, yet your brain actually reacts to each in a completely unique way.
We Don’t See Digital Ads
According to a recent study, banner blindness is far more extreme in web advertisements compared to newspaper equivalents. This means that when we browse the web, our brains automatically erase the ads around the content we’re trying to consume.
This has huge implications on how you can use advertisements in traditional media channels, perhaps even diverting some of your Google Ads budgets to old-school implementations. If people are actually seeing your ads in magazines and newspapers, surely that can be far more effective compared to the digital equivalents.
Hard Copy Engages Our Brains
Further, a study conducted by a neuromarketing firm (yes, these companies exist!) TrueImpact used EEG brain wave measurements to analyze the efficacy of paper marketing vs digital media ads.
The results were surprising, and will have the Michael Scotts of this world rejoicing (with the Party Planning Committee getting involved, of course).
You see, our brains require far less effort to consume direct mail (to the tune of 21%). This means paper ads are simple to understand, and it’s way easier to remember them.
Another study by Temple University seems to further support the above findings. They observed that when consuming paper ads, the ventral striatum part of the brain, which is connected to valuation and desire, was far more active.
There you have it. We’ve given you stats. And we’ve given you the science behind the efficacy of traditional printing methods. If the cold, hard numbers won’t convince you, we don’t know what to tell you. Okay, okay, it’s this: traditional marketing works, people! Don’t underestimate it.