Anemic Advertising
Definition:
Anemic Advertising is a serious and fatiguing marketing ailment that develops when a company’s advertisements fail to produce the desired outcome, causing your business to hemorrhage cash. This usually results in decreased sales and the destruction of profits – which are the lifeblood of your business.
Causes:
Anemic Advertising is generally caused by weak and ineffective advertising copy, ad messaging, the absence of psychological triggers, a feeble call-to-action, utilizing the incorrect advertising platform for the intended target audience and the lack of foundational and goal-focused marketing cohesion.
Symptoms:
In most cases of Anemic Advertising, a shocking lack of goal-focused planning and marketing integration are usually to blame.
Other signs and symptoms of Anemic Advertising may include:
- “Awareness only” advertisements
- Sparse sales leads generated
- Missing ad tracking system
- No marketing synergy
- Disconnected “spray and pray” campaigns
- Stagnant sales despite increased ad spending
- Advertising irritations and annoyances
Health Implications for Small Business
Building an effective advertising campaign is no longer a straightforward process, especially in the digital advertising realm. As your target audience seeks to block and ignore more and more annoying and disruptive, if not just downright irritating, advertising content, relentless business advertisers search out even more new ways to interrupt and annoy potential customers.
Go figure.
These ways include, but certainly aren’t limited to, pop-ups, auto-play video and creepy, follow me as I scroll down the web page to explore your content, (stalker-esque) banner ads.
In addition to ineffective digital advertising, let’s also not forget to give proper credit to the [continuous outbreak] of irritatingly annoying offline advertising [ailments] too. You know, stuff like the trashed direct mail advertisements that cost smaller businesses like yours thousands in wasted dollars each month. My point being, there is good reason why the government has to step in with DO NOT CALL, DO NOT MAIL, CAN-SPAM and the many other pieces of advertising legislation, like the newly enacted influencer marketing endorsement rules.
It’s NOT your fault!
I do get it. Smaller businesses like yours who display all the classic symptoms of Anemic Advertising are merely copying what they see the big dogs doing [when it comes to advertising]. This is a condition I call Cloned Marketing. But why is it so prevalent?
It’s simple really…
First, as a smaller business, you just don’t have the *BIG* marketing muscle of a larger company. By “muscle” I’m referring to financial resources. This includes the top human resource talent to get things done and the big advertising budgets they use to strong-arm their way to a bigger return-on-investment. Keep in mind that bigger in this case doesn’t exactly mean better because their advertising methods are usually plagued with inefficiencies.
Second, if your marketing isn’t integrated and goal-focused, your advertising will suffer from a Splintered Strategy. Excessive splintering leads to fragmentation, which causes Fractured Foundational Marketing.
The cure for Anemic Advertising is actually prevention. Implementing a goal-focused foundational marketing system [like Organize Your Marketing] will clear up and cure this deadly marketing disease.
Related Conditions:
Banner Blindness
Crippled Copy
Jaded Junk Mail
Treatment:
If you suspect you may be suffering from Anemic Advertising and it’s beginning to hinder your growth, get in touch to schedule a Marketing Health Check.
Sources:
https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/313009/consumers-fed-up-with-too-many-intrusive-internet.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/31/technology/internet-advertising-business.html
