What exactly is "COMING SOON"?
During a drive home from Canada today, I noticed a new vinyl banner ad on the highway. The highway is a route that I've traveled over one hundred times, and I usually see any new advertising. The banner ad simply said, "COMING SOON!" and was hung on an old fence on the top of a hill, you can see from the highway, at the location of a former winter sledding park.
The "coming soon" banner carries with it a major weakness of most event advertising and marketing. It lacks any salient details to get readers to understand, care, or take action.
Point blank, what exactly is "coming soon"? Another sledding park? Where I live, we're currently in the middle of Spring. Snow isn't expected to fall for another 6 to 7 months. Maybe they're getting an early start on winter advertising. Which would be great for them, but purely speculative on my part.
Since I'm speculating ... another line of copy such as, "The Best Sledding Hill Ever – Coming Soon!" would be tremendously helpful to readers. Maybe even add, "Visit SuperSnowHill.com for more details." Yes, ten more words, but those words would have easily fit on the area available. If in fact, that's what's being advertised.
Here's today's takeaway ...
All your advertising and marketing needs to be crystal clear. Never assume people know what you mean in your advertising. Just because you or your team are passionate about something, doesn't mean others will feel the same way. Above all, readers should never say or think, "what are they talking about?!?!" when reading one of your advertisements.
If your advertising space is limited, give them a short and compelling reason to visit your website ... right now! (Or if they're driving, when they arrive.) And if you have more space available, add additional copy that will drive people to visit your website.
Bottom line, the reader of your advertisement should never have to guess what you're trying to convey! In my experience, I have never heard anyone complain about advertising in the following manner: "that ad was easy to understand and had all the right details!"
Want to get more insight to better event promotion? Check out the links below: