Print & radio vs. digital marketing: Which one is better?

You need local customers to know about your garden center.  You need your neighbors to know about your garden center.  You need people thirty miles away to know!

But how do you get the word out about your garden center?  What is the best marketing strategy for garden centers?

Many garden center owners think about placing an advertisement in the local newspaper or buying an ad on the local radio station.  But research finds that newspaper and radio ads are not necessarily the most effective ways to get more customers.

The Modern-Day Customer’s Purchase Process

The modern-day customer’s path to purchase is complicated.  Customers today hunt for the best deal or product by using the internet.  Also, they vet businesses by checking their websites and online reviews.

Instead of a customer choosing to visit a business because they heard about it on the radio or saw a print ad, customers look at all their choices within fifty miles on the internet.  Then, they decide which business to engage with.

This means that not only does your company need a strong internet presence, but you need the data that informs your customers’ purchasing decisions.  You need to know what decisions people are making and why in order to develop an effective marketing strategy and get the highest rate of return on your marketing investment.

Why Print & Radio Ads Aren’t the Most Effective Marketing Strategies

There is more to advertising effectively than simply placing ads.  You must analyze what ads are working and how well they are working.  You also need to decide if (and how) you should change your marketing strategy.  This is a major reason why print and radio ads may not be the most effective ways to advertise for your garden center.

Print & Radio Ads Give You Little Insight

Print and radio ads give you little to no data on how the ads are doing—meaning how much foot traffic they drive your way and how many dollars they generate in revenue for your business.  They also don’t give you insight into customers’ perceptions of the ads.  Are customers responding positively to the ad?  Is the ad generating negative feelings in potential customers?

Print and radio ads cannot provide you with this kind of data and feedback.

Print is on the Decline

According to Pew Research, there was a 335% decrease in physical newspaper circulation in America from 2000 to 2020.  So, physical newspapers (and their ads) are not reaching as wide of an audience as they used to.

Print and Radio Ads Stay Static

With print and radio, ads stay static meaning that they stay the same for the entire time the ad runs.  You can’t change it.  You can pull it and create a whole new ad (and incur the associated costs), but you cannot easily change it to adapt to new products or services that you want to offer.  Print and radio ads just are not very flexible.

The Advantages of Digital Marketing

Digital marketing has significant influence on our purchasing decisions.  It also has several advantages that print and radio marketing do not offer.

Digital Ads Give You Valuable Feedback

You can monitor the data behind your advertisement or marketing content piece.  You can see how many clicks, views, and ad revenue you receive from marketing materials.  You can also compare marketing efforts to see which ones are more successful than others.  Then, you can analyze this data to determine what was successful, what needs to be changed, and what path you should take moving forward.

Digital Marketing Influences Consumer Behavior

93% of people read reviews online before they purchase a product or service.

Also, consumers are 70% more likely to purchase from retargeting ads, which are ads that target consumers who have already purchased from a business.  Think along the lines of, “Thank you for purchasing.  You may also like these items.”  Digital marketing allows for easy creation and delivery of retargeting ads to customers.

Digital Ads can Target Customers Easily

You can easily edit your materials to speak to your audience.  For example, you can target mothers in Columbus, Ohio, who are between the ages of twenty-five and forty-five, work professional jobs, and enjoy gardening.  You can get that granular and you can get that specific with your target audience with digital marketing.

Digital marketing is also one of the best ways to reach out to your local audience.

Digital Ads are Flexible and Adaptable

By using digital ads, you can adapt content to reflect your new services, change content to market specific items, and revamp marketing material to reflect trends and popular tastes.  Digital marketing efforts also allow you to stay competitive in the market since digital marketing is used in about 58% of small businesses in America.

Your Money Goes Further

Research finds that businesses can make up to $36 for every $1 spent on email marketing, thereby making it one of the highest return on investment (ROI) marketing efforts.  Overall, digital advertising has a higher reach per dollar spent compared to print and radio advertising.  Simply put: your money goes further with digital marketing.

When do print & radio ads make sense?

Investing in print and radio ads makes sense if you’re trying to get customers on a local level in addition to your high-quality marketing efforts online.

Think about what people are going to do when they hear about you on the radio or see you in the newspaper.  They’re going to go to your website and social media channels to check out your business.  Further, research finds that people often question the legitimacy of a business if it has no website or doesn’t have a high-quality website.

If supporting your local newspaper and radio station is your goal, then investing in print and radio ads makes sense.  A lot of newspapers, especially on the local level, are struggling financially.  Income from advertising keeps them alive, so if you want to financially support your community, then that is a good reason to invest in print and radio advertising.

Keep in mind that print and radio ads can be effective if they are part of a larger marketing effort that includes strong, quality digital efforts.  But in today’s world, digital marketing is still the most effective marketing tool and has the highest ROI for small businesses.

Need Help?

If you need help creating and maintaining digital marketing materials (such as a blog, newsletter, or website) for your garden center, then feel free to reach out to us at McCusker’s Marketing for Garden Centers.  Garden centers are our specialty!

McCusker’s Marketing for Garden Centers provides high-quality, custom marketing to family-owned, independent garden centers.  We specialize in getting our garden centers more foot traffic, helping them to compete with big box stores, and telling our garden centers’ unique stories.

We at McCusker’s Marketing for Garden Centers love garden centers, we love making America more beautiful by uplifting local garden centers, and we’d love to help you in your garden center marketing journey.  We can’t wait to meet you!

Phone: 440-822-9260
Email: Rebecca@McCuskersMarketing.com