Space to advertise?

The world is becoming more populated and the busier it gets the more people there are to advertise to. With more people to advertise to and more businesses flooding the marketing, advertising space is at a premium.

TV viewers are in decline so there are less and less people seeing adverts through that medium. Internet use is up so there are going to be more businesses wanting to advertise on the internet. The difficulty is finding the right web site to advertise on.

Where am I going with all of this? When I was going out for a run last night an Audi TT (new shape) passed me with company branding over it. It just happened to be an Estate Agent. I turned to my friend and said “What a great advert for that company. They are obviously doing well despite the credit crunch”. Then it hit me. What if that car was nothing to do with the Estate Agent but instead they just paid that person a monthly fee to brand the car?

The reality is that there is more space than ever to advertise. Paying individuals a monthly (or weekly) fee to brand a car is a great way to advertise your company (and seem bigger or more affluent than you might be) depending on what your business does.

The benefit to the car owner is that they earn money to subsidise the use and maintenance of the car.

So, there must be a downside. Well, yes, there is. Last year I was meeting a friend for a beer. He was ten minutes late because on his way his car was hit by a bag of fish and chips from a passing white van. The van was covered in the branding of a cement company based in Cardiff. My friend happened to work for a large construction firm and subsequently closed the account with the cement company and went with one of their competitors.

The lesson here is that anyone carrying your brand is an ambassador to your business and whilst you want to get maximum brand exposure you have to be careful not to destroy your brand in the process.