Broadcast marketing is the concept of promoting or putting something out there without encouraging a response. It’s the opposite of engagement marketing. Despite the availability of robust social media tools, most users of social media are still engaged in broadcasting rather than engaging with their users.
Here are a few examples of broadcasting:
- Advertising an article you wrote to a Linkedin forum and hoping people will read it.
- Tweeting a promotion you are running.
- Updating your Facebook status that promotes your latest blog entry.
All of these are examples where the marketer is not engaged with his audience. He is simply putting it out there without the intention of soliciting an action by the audience. He may hope that he gets a reaction from the audience but he did not put enough forethought into how he crafted message to improve the odds of a reaction.
So why, despite all the powerful social media tools available, are most business, organizations, and do-it-yourselfers still engaged in broadcast marketing? For most of us, it’s what we have always been used to. The medium to which we communicate maybe different, but it’s the same old boring messages. For many others, there is a lack of education on the strategic principles involved in getting past broadcasting and into engagement. And then for others, it’s considered cheap. It doesn’t cost you a lot to simply post to a forum or open a Twitter account and promote the heck out of your latest ventures.
If you engage in broadcast marketing, then you may as well just take out an ad in your local newspaper while you’re at it.
Not putting enough effort into creating a strategy can costs you alot. You can lose out on opportunities to strengthen your brand, spread your message, and boost your bottom line.
Always ask yourself two things;
- Will others spread the message I’m giving?
- Will others engage with my message?