March 4th, 2009 by Jeff Dedrick

Buying leads can be very smart or very foolish – depending upon which way you play your cards (so to speak). Some people say that when you buy leads you waste your money. It’s true; it can be risky and can often result in little return on investment. But that is only when you buy unqualified or untargeted leads. Buying leads can be extremely lucrative when you buy quality leads. They will cost you more, but the return on investment will be impressive.

There are several different types of leads that you can buy. These include email leads and phone leads. Email leads need to be extremely targeted as the person has a choice whether to open the email or not. If the email is not targeted to the lead’s interests, then you are wasting your time. On the other hand, a highly targeted group of leads can respond extremely well to emails.

Cold calling phone leads are the old fashioned method, but still work well in many circumstances. You will have to get used to rejection when buying phone leads, but that is the nature of the game. You should have some success, too, if the leads are quality ones.

Before you buy leads, always ask or find out what sort of information was utilized to target them and how they were generated. This is very important information and if the lead seller or broker cannot or will not tell you, then move on to someone else as they are likely selling unqualified leads. These bring no benefit to you; they only benefit the company selling the leads.

One of the best ways to getting qualified leads is by generating them yourself. This involves using a system that can pre-qualify the leads for you. This means they are exclusive only to you and can be targeted for your business.

Should you buy leads? Only you can truly answer that question, but when you do decide to purchase leads, make sure you find out how the leads were generated and, of course, what sort of information or incentives were used to target the leads. You must know all of this information before proceeding to avoid disappointment.

Advertising, business leads, leads, Marketing, mlm leads

March 4th, 2009 by Jan Maurer

Research in advertising is done in order to produce better advertisements that are more efficient in motivating customers to buy a product or a service. The research can be based on a particular advertising campaign or can be more generalized and based on how advertisements create an effect on people’s mind. Lots of approaches are involved to go about conducting an advertising research like economical, psychological, demographical and sociological.

When designing an advertisement for a particular product many things should be researched like where it should be displayed, whether the advertisement can be printed in newspapers or magazines or broadcasted on television or radio or published on the Internet. Many methods are undertaken to collect relevant information. The research itself is of two kinds, syndicated and customized. Syndicated research is a single research done by the company that is available to other companies as well. Customized research is research based on certain criteria and is done for a particular company and its results are available to only that company.

Pre-testing or copy testing is a type of customized research that determines the in-market efficiency of an advertisement before it is released or before the final production. The more the pre-testing is done the more likely that it will be a successful advertisement and each pre-testing should be applied number of times. This can done by studying the level of attention the customers have, motivation, brand linkage, communication and entertainment. Flow of emotions and flow of attention are broken down and studied individually. The results are applied on the advertisement that is still being developed to recognize the weak points and replace them. A reliable feedback loop can guide the researchers, client and the agency to work in harmony. Tests should be applied during the storyboard stage of ad making. This is an early stage and the results are highly predictive. During this process images are selected and used as integrated campaign print ad.

Post-testing or ad tracking studies are either syndicated or customized. Studies are done over a period of time or continuously. The in-market research is done to understand a brands linkage, performance, awareness, and preference along with product attitudes and usage. They are done by, conducting interviews either on phone or Internet. Testing the finished advertisement provides the confidence and gives an idea whether it is following the strategy.

All the above studies should facilitate the client’s advertisement development make the end product easier to achieve. The study should contain rational information having not only surface knowledge but also provide deep in-sight that will open window to a customer’s mind. The customer, too, should provide precise information based on facts and not based on imaginary thinking and self-delusion.

The basis is to provide in-depth understanding about the consumers for improving on the advertisement techniques and other marketing decisions.

The rapidly changing likes and needs of the customers are difficult to track, but should be studied in order to increase the quality of advertisement.

Advertising, Business, Business Opportunities, communication, Ecommerce, Home Based Business Opportunities, home business, Marketing