Essay Sample: Marketing Strategy for Pet Shop

When marketing a pet store or a product in general, the right marketing techniques must be chosen, and it is done correctly. The best way to gain attention for what is being marketed is by trying out different marketing techniques through experimenting with chosen strategies for the promotional subject. Finding out the advantages and disadvantages of advertising and publicity advertising can help narrow down the techniques to use. Posters are a great choice for advertising for any company, they allow a versatile range on what can be advertised. They are a great way of gaining peoples attention for your product as they can be in different sizes and in different locations such as billboards at bus stops when people are waiting for the bus, having them in supermarkets such as leaflet stands as they are convenient, people can keep them for future reference and on hand as they are a handy size and in the actual shop window to gain passer-Byers attention. The average price for them to be printed off in small size is around £15 per 500 printed posters (around 10p per poster) and a small commission to the stores that will be advertising these leaflets. For the larger posters, it would cost around £25 per poster for the windows and around £240 per bus shelter for 2 weeks.  I have chosen to use posters as one of my marketing techniques as they are one of the cheaper options to use compared to something like radio adverts, they also allow me to create a direct message to potential customers. On the poster I designed I was able to include everything needed for a person to get in touch with the company and have a striking message to gain people’s attention. 

However, there are some disadvantages to using posters for advertising such as they are expensive when wanting to use the method of sending them to people's houses as they cost around £500 to send a small amount with Royal Mail. They also can easily be ignored by people at bus stops, walking by the shop window and within supermarkets, they may also easily be destroyed by people if they are no longer interested in them. Posters need to be thoroughly checked before going to be printed as the smallest mistake can turn someone away from them. Social Media is also a fantastic way to advertise a product as there are so many distinct kinds of platforms to advertise on. It is quite easy to find the right platforms to advertise on, the right wording on the advert, and what is going to be advertised. I have chosen social media as one of my advertising techniques as it is easy to manage what and where my product is being advertised. For the social media platforms, I have chosen to specifically advertise on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Snapchat, and Twitter. When advertising on each of these platforms I have a £100 budget for all of them as I can choose the amount per app and it is equal between them all  For Instagram and Facebook, I have chosen to go through the company as it is easier to go through the Facebook brand as I can choose how much of a budget I have for the number of ads I choose to put on the platform every month. I also get to choose what demographic I want to advertise to on the app, I would choose to advertise to users in the city of Derby and some districts within Derbyshire and certain communities such as pet groups, animal lover pages, and within Facebook & Instagram  Market as it would be easy to reach the attention of people looking for animal products and I also get 100% creative control on how my advert looks. For TikTok, I have also gone through the actual companies’ websites as they also allow total control of where to advertise, how much you can budget for ads and creative control on what the adverts look like. The areas I will choose to advertise on TikTok are similar to Facebook & Instagram as it would be for people who care about animals that I would choose to advertise to. Then on Snapchat and Twitter, it is also the same budget but with these two companies, I cannot control what demographics my advertisements will be shown to as there are no set areas on these two platforms as Snapchat advertises between stories and Twitter places adverts on personalised timelines. 

There are several disadvantages to using social media for advertising, there is the chance of not getting any engagement for the company in the first place if the advert is not promoted enough by the platforms meaning there will be a low return on investment. There is also the chance of the company’s name being tarnished if the advert is exposed to online trolls which send hate below the adverts and steer away potential customers. It is also very time-consuming which means if the advertising is not up to date and constantly active the company adverts can fall behind other companies.