How Much Does Marketing Cost?

Posted by fionamceachran under Marketing
From http://www.abnormalmarketing.com 5137 days ago
Made Hot by: sprout_insights on October 27, 2010 4:01 pm

This is a very important question for business owners wanting to attract clients to their products and services, or put together a marketing budget. This question can probably be aligned with a similar question – How long is a piece of string? When it comes to determining the cost of marketing or the money to be spent on marketing the answers vary a lot.

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Comments

Written by yoni67
5136 days ago

Fiona,

AWESOME article! It is so encompassing and well written that you should send this for publication in a textbook. It is that good!

Yoni

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Written by fionamceachran
5132 days ago

Hi Yoni

Thank you for your feedback. That is such a great compliment.

Fiona

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Written by GlobalReach
5136 days ago

Great article, Fiona! Having a realistic view on marketing cost (both time and money) is essential for starting and running any business. I agree with Shawn’s comment, too – “marketing should really be part of your product, your business, your service.” (My friend Sarah Mitchell has been writing some great stuff on Asset Based Marketing: http://www.bizsugar.com/Marketing/asset-based-marketing-content-as-an-asset/)

You’re right, marketing is complex. It can be overwhelming to think of all the choices and variations. You need to pick the marketing that will be the best investment – the biggest asset – to your business. But how do you know? It’s helpful to keep an eye on what others in your field are doing. What works? What doesn’t? Get input from marketing experts to find out why they think their particular marketing service is essential. Then, make the most logical decisions you can about what you can do yourself (and is worth spending your valuable time on) and what you should assign to an expert to get the best possible results and return.

Thanks for sharing this post!

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Written by fionamceachran
5132 days ago

Thanks Ann-Christin

I find that when asking businesses about their marketing costs, they start to talk about how much they spend on advertising.

I think some real education is needed so small businesses understand HOW they should allocate their budgets, and not just spend on "advertising".

Thank you for sharing the article from Sarah Mitchell. It's a great idea for businesses to start looking at their marketing channels as assets. It may be easier then to decide where to spend the company's time, resources and budget.

Yes “marketing should really be part of your product, your business, your service.” And in fact, marketing IS part of your product, your business and your service - there is no escape :)

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Written by ShawnHessinger
5136 days ago

Hi Fiona,

You are right that marketing will cost you either in terms of time or in terms of money (or both.) It probably depends upon the kind of marketing you plan to do and the kind of business you are in. But I think there's also something to the idea that marketing should really be part of your product, your business, your service...Seth Godin's "Purple Cow," if you will. So probably as important as asking how much marketing you need is the question, what kind of marketing is best for your business.

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Written by fionamceachran
5132 days ago

Hi Shawn

Yes, I do tend to stop some people when they start going on about "free" marketing. Just because it is free, doesn't mean there is no cost ;)

It largely depends on the resources you have available too, and the budget you have available. If you have a sizeable marketing budget you can use this. If you have a small and limited budget, you need to give more time. I think it depends more on which resource you have - time vs money - rather than what kind of business you are in.

And you're right, different kinds of marketing are best for different kinds of businesses. There is no all encompassing solution that matches every business type.

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