Why Ad Agencies, Ad Sales Reps, And Almost Everyone Else In Advertising And Marketing Hides From You The Actual Return On Your Advertising And Marketing Investment… And What You Can Do About It

Here’s a little dirt on the Advertising and Marketing industries from an insider.

This may be revolting to you if you’re a self-made successful business owner who’s invested a bit before in advertising and marketing, and wondered why it didn’t seem to work.  Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Here’s the scoop.  Most people in the advertising and marketing industries don’t want you to know if your investment makes money.  Some go so far as to actively hide it from you.  Either it’s a case of the blind leading the blind, or they’ve pulled the wool over your eyes.

• If you’ve ever heard the justification, “They have to see your advertisement 12 times before they respond…” you may be a victim.

• If your advertising sales person tells you how many people will see your ad, as opposed to how many orders it will generate… you may be a victim.

• If your ad agency tells you they’re going to create a commercial that “entertains” people because “people don’t want to be sold to…” you may be a victim.

This is why this happens.  You see, most people in the Advertising and Marketing industries don’t make their money when you make money.  In fact, just the opposite.  They make money when you spend money.

So when you run your hip new commercial with every local TV station, the ad agency gets their cut of your “spend” and they make money.

When you insert the biggest, most colorful, prettiest ad in the Yellow Pages, the sales rep gets his fat commission check.

When you run newspaper ads week after week after week, the ad sales rep who handles your account eats steak dinners on you.

Notice, none of these rely on you actually making sales as a direct result of running the advertising.  They only rely on you spending more money.

So it could be said most people in the Advertising and Marketing industry are actually just there to make you spend money (and to make you feel good about doing so with concepts like “branding” and “building your corporate image”).

They’re not actually there to make you money.

So they do things like focus on design and white space instead of sales message.  On logos and fonts, instead of understanding what it takes to compel a prospect to do business with you.  On catchy tag lines instead of creating an offer that demands someone pick up the phone and call right now to order.

Then they tell you, “You can’t really measure image.”

Hogwash.

When you spend a dollar on advertising and marketing, you should be able to know you’re going to get that dollar back in return, and it better bring friends.

That’s the type of advertising and marketing I create.  I create advertising and marketing that aims to get you a positive and sometimes astounding return on investment, directly traceable to the advertising and marketing I created for you.

And I get paid when you make money, instead of when you spend it.

The way I work is I accept a fee up front in exchange for the creation of an advertisement or marketing campaign I believe is most likely to generate a significant return on your investment.  This is my “keep the lights on” money.  The way I get rich is when my advertising works, my clients pay me a small portion of every dollar generated as a direct result of my advertising.

In short, I make my real money when you make money.

That’s the way I think everyone in Advertising and Marketing should work, and that’s the type of people I’d like to do business with as a successful self-made business owner.  So that’s how I approach my business, too.