The advertising world has close to 1500 advertising agencies of which a vast majority are independently owned but represent a minority of revenue generated in industry. So how does a small to mid size agency compete?, simple they adapt to their environment. That is beauty of not being mighty oak and being a sapling, you can move with wind and not snap in half. They are becoming more innovative in their approach to advertising and this has proven to be fruitful. The major advertisers are beginning to see this for themselves and they are starting to look to lesser-known agencies for creative development and marketing plans.

An example of this is recent action by Masterfoods when they shelved advertising efforts of their agency of record to allow a lesser know Japanese firm to work on their Twix campaign. Recently Charles Schwab (NYSE: SCH) and several other major advertisers have been reevaluating their campaigns and some are looking at smaller and lesser-known agencies for that glimmer of light.

So as most consumers have learned through out years that sometimes bigger and well known isn’t always better, it looks like advertisers are beginning to see this as well.

Source: New Age Media Concepts - 888-463-9237 www.namct.com

oWeb design something or create a new service that makes people return

oCreate a great resource – and give it away. No I don’t joke about such things!

oOffer a guarantee. If your product is that great, stand behind it

oMeasure your ads. You won’t believe how many of my clients don’t do it! They use same old techniques, just let them run without seeing if they actually work. If an ad isn’t working – Stop running it - AT ONCE!

oDon’t use same publications as your competitors. Ad salespeople are most highly trained in world, and are trained to tell you that it’s a great idea to go with their magazine or whatever – as your competitors are in it too.

Yellow Pages are very good at using this technique. Beware.

oVow never to lose a customer. If you ever get an upset customer – find out why, and try to win them back