10 Practical Tips
We all know that it is a huge effort to create wonderful products, set up a website that carefully and effectively describes them, make it easy for clients to buy our work, and then do it over again. But we also realize that we have to attract people’s attention to what we offer, and let them know why giving our product line a try is a good idea. We have to market what we sell.
Although advertising is only part of a marketing plan, for every business, some definition of advertising is an utter necessity. That’s why, as we near the end of this ten-part series on establishing a CBD business, we’ve decided to let you in on what we’ve learned about advertising our products in an environment of developing procedures and rules and persistent prejudice.
If you’re only now joining this series, you can see what we’ve discussed to date here – Starting a CBD Business, Tip 8.
Tip 9 follows.
9. Advertise Productively
Advertising CBD is not like other advertising
Entrepreneurs in previous eras took out newspaper ads, stationed sign spinners at busy intersections, sponsored TV and radio programs peppered with their ads, papered neighborhoods with brochures, and, well, devoted budgets to many other worthy efforts.
Now there’s digital advertising, and only unwise companies ignore the opportunities available on Google, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and elsewhere online. But for us it’s different. Facebook deems CBD an “unsafe supplement” and forbids CBD ads. This is also true of Google and many other digital outlets.
The remaining new advertising arenas include earned media, developing your personal fanbase, and such traditional advertising options as billboards (new because billboards have gone digital) and email lists, plus old standards like print publications and radio. You should look into all of these and decide whether to include them in your marketing budget – more about that later.
Marketing Influencers
A marketing influencer is, according to Wikipedia, “a form of social media marketing involving endorsements and product placement from influencers, people and organizations who have a purported expert level of knowledge or social influence in their field.”
This is allowed under a restrictive set of rules you should read for yourself if you’re giving thought to hiring an influencer. Bear in mind that if the influencer makes a disallowed statement, your product may well be banned.
What To Do?
But now let’s talk about what you CAN do. At the present time, you can advertise on Pinterest. You already know this: that’s probably what brought Angie’s Gardens to your attention. Kudos to Pinterest for what we think is “seeing the light.”
There are signs that some social media are looking for ways to offer advertising to CBD businesses. Twitter and Instagram allow businesses like ours to promote brand awareness, so long as we don’t promote actual products. We’ll all have to keep an eye on the developing situation.
Advertise Where It Counts
Speaking of a marketing budget, it’s certainly not “Money for Nothin’.” You must have a realistic marketing budget or join the legion of young businesses that simply fail. Consistent, ongoing advertising targeting those most likely to purchase your CBD product will expand your base over time. A powerful combination for growing any company is concerted advertising efforts to appropriate market segments teamed with developing trust and retaining your existing customer base.
Question for Us All
Do you advertise on Pinterest? Are you collecting examples of what works for your product line and what was a futile effort, even if it was beautiful? Please let us know; we’ll spread ideas around, so all of us can move up a notch in effective advertising.
We’ll be back next Saturday with the last tip in this series. Please, if you like this, share it!
Bear in mind that the information in this article is the best we can find right now. The situation will change with time.
