“Why aren’t your ads working?” - Roy Williams’ Wizardly Advice

By Allan Pulga

In a recent Entrepreneur.com column, Roy Williams – advertising guru and author of The Wizard of Ads – offered his advice to retailers who feel their marketing efforts aren’t drawing the customer interest they desire.

“Most entrepreneurs feel their business should be growing faster, but few know how to isolate the problem,” writes Williams. He says the elements that affect the growth of your business fit into one of the following four categories: Share of Voice, Impact Quotient, Personal Experience Factor, and Market Potential.

“What’s your percentage of the total exposure for all the business in your category?” asks Williams. Consider total signage, TV, radio, newspaper ads. Think about direct mail ads and web traffic as well.

“If there are news stories related to your category, do they mention your brand or someone else’s? What percentage of the word-of-mouth advertising is yours? Each of these things contributes to your total share of voice.”

Williams says share of voice CAN be purchased. But he warns that most advertisers spread efforts thin and attempt to reach too many people. The key is to make meaningful ads that your targets will remember. Trial and error is the only method to figuring which message, and at what frequency, works for you.

“Be an important advertiser to one of two audiences instead of an invisible advertiser to three or four,” adds Williams.

“I’ve never seen a business fail because they were reaching the wrong people,” says Williams. “But I’ve seen hundreds fail because they were either reaching too many people with too little repetition or delivering a message that no one cared about.”

Williams says to put message quality before quantity. “It must first be believable, so close the loopholes in your message.”

Loophole open: “Everything Must Go!”

- This message begs the questions: What happens if you don’t sell everything? You come up with a new angle next week?

Loophole closed: “Everything Must Go! Any jewelry not sold by the end of the day will be melted down and sold as scrap. So until nine o’clock tonight you can by finished jewelry priced way below cost!”

This factor is all about delivering the experience, product and value your potential customers are looking for.

“Are you exceeding your customer’s expectations or falling short?” asks Williams. “Do you have the brands they prefer, or are you pushing a weak alternative? Are prices high or lower than your customers expected?

“A strong ad will only temporarily prop up a business that delivers a weak experience factor. Unimpressive reputations nullify impressive ads. Have you been trying to solve an internal problem with external advertising?”

“What will be the total dollar volume sold in your product or service category this year?” he asks. “Do you know the total potential volume for your trade area? What percentage of that financial pie is yours?”

Williams explains that it is easier to grow small businesses than large ones because a business only selling 5 per cent of its market potential has almost unlimited room for growth when compared to a competitor already selling 40 per cent of its potential. The bigger competitor has to work much harder to hang onto the business it has.

“Uncommitted customers are the easiest to steal,” he adds.

“Examine your business through the four lenses of share of voice, impact quotient, personal experience factor and market potential, and you’ll quickly identify what’s holding you back.”