The type of media that a business implements merely depends on what the business is trying to achieve in their marketing and advertising methods to promote their product, service or image to reach potential customers and leads.
As marketing continues to evolve, new methods — typically referred to as “new media” — have emerged. These methods are mostly said to deliver better results than other tactics — known as “traditional media” or even “old media”. However, this doesn’t mean that traditional media is dead as it still does have its place in the media mix.
As with any strategy, each decision made has a purpose whether it’s to increase brand awareness, request different types of subscriptions, or drive leads / purchases. Of course, there are solid digital channels that accomplish these objectives, but some audiences are still better reached through traditional channels.
Before getting into discussion, I’ll start by providing you with the definition and examples of the two types of media:
Traditional Media: Traditional media refers to mediums that are part of our culture for over half a century. Companies have used these methods for many years to reach consumers and motivate them to make purchases. Up until very recently, these marketing and advertising styles were very effective, and helped businesses make a profit. These forms include:
- Television
- Radio
- Print advertisements
- Billboards
- Direct mail advertisements
New/Digital Media: New media are forms of media that are native to computers, computational and rely on computers for redistribution. Many of these methods have been around for several years, but have only gained prominence recently. These forms include:
- Search engine optimization
- Pay-per-click advertising
- Content marketing
- Social media
- Email marketing
The New Age of New Media.
New Media, the type of media that we all love in this generation. For this section, I’ll take you through the many different types of new media and why each of them is good for a business.
Search engine optimization: a series of processes by which a website improves its rankings in search engines like Google. SEO is crucial for online marketing, because without search rankings, your website may never attract targeted customers. The use of keywords is one of the ways SEO can improve a website’s ranking. Through matching up keywords to the words or phrases that people are searching for, websites are more likely to show up in searches. Therefore, more exposure to a business.
Pay-per-click advertising: With this, you can choose which keywords and phrases you want to trigger your advertisements. Then, if your bid is the highest, your ads will display above organic search results for those terms. A benefit of PPC is that results are instantaneous, meaning PPC ads can provide direction to your business’s website the minute they’re clicked to go live. If a business wants to quickly boost sales, PPC is a great option.
Content Marketing: This type of new media is in the form of written content like articles, videos and my blog that your reading right now – all to appeal to potential audiences and business networks. Consumers tend to react very well to companies that provide entertaining, engaging, or useful content which have value; making it more likely for consumers to learn more about an unknown company.
Social media: And of course, we have to mention social media - it would be rude not to bring it up. Social media networks like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are used by businesses to establish connections with their potential customers, and also strengthen the relationships they have with current ones.
Having the ability to answer questions, respond to feedback or encounter conversations with potential customers are all advantages for businesses utilizing these social platforms. Also, for certain companies who might just be starting out or do not have a huge budget; social media would be a more realistic and cheaper option.
Traditional Marketing Isn’t Dead.
Many people think traditional marketing is dead; or in other words, no one uses it anymore. However, that’s not the case. People are so obsessed with new media nowadays that we forget that traditional marketing can still be effective for businesses in this day and age. Here are some instances where traditional media could be a great option.
If a business is seeking the attention of a particular audience, traditional media such as billboards and radio can be great method to increase brand awareness. According to Commercial Radio Australia’s annual listening summary, radio audiences reached an “all-time high in 2018 and have grown by 12% over the past five years”. It is one place that digital is not supposed to be the primary attention grabber. Billboards have also shown success, depending on the range of your target age group.
Print advertisements such as those in newspapers and magazines continue to be used to attract large groups of people at once. In a situation where businesses need to cover a wide range of age groups- traditional media such as print publications could be a good option. Given that there are cost savings, people still get that printed newspaper or magazine.
Brand awareness in the age of digital marketing and direct brands can be a challenge. But TV still works well for the task. The most expensive form of marketing – television ads – still have the power to reach broad and targeted audiences, depending on the reach of the channels selected.
The most important case to make for traditional components to a media plan is attribution. Although you can’t credit that billboard, radio spot, or print ad to a direct purchase, you could assert that it had an impact earlier in their journey. The best performance is accomplished when you combine both digital and traditional media that fits with the businesses marketing standards and capabilities.
Arguing which type of media is better than the other really depends on a business’s aspirations through media planning. Even though both new and traditional media has its own different uses and benefits for a business’s marketing strategy, as mentioned before its performance is most effective when both types of media are used together.
Businesses need to ensure that they don’t just focus on one kind of media because who knows; that missing half of disregarded media could be the added boost that your client or brand needs to see an increase in revenue.
Do you guys use new media or traditional media? Or both?
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