I get angry when I see companies buy pricey media such as print, television, radio or outdoor and they don’t take advantage to tie that media buy to the web in an effective way. What do I mean by this?

Take for example a large billboard on the side of the highway that has a message about a specific offer from a company, and the only web address displayed is the company’s main domain name eg, www.company.com I feel that this is a wasted advertising opportunity to have just your main domain name listed. Much in the same way Danielle pointed out when off-line link-bait is often not leveraged properly on-line, targeted messages, spaces, interactivity and landing pages should be created and matched on-line for off-line media buys.

I believe that every advertising buy should have a targeted message behind it and accordingly specific media creatives and goals to go along with it.

Recently I found a couple of examples of companies that are tying print and TV to web pretty well – Marathon Oil, Prudential, Fidelity, Chrysler and Burger King:

Marathon Oil print ad:

www.marathon.com/garyville

Prudential print ad:

www.prudential.com/retirementincome

Fidelity print ad:

www.fidelity.com/rolloverleader

Another company that’s doing it well from Television spots to the web is Chrysler with the Jeep brand. They have an interesting campaign which features singing animals having fun around the 2008 Jeep Liberty. The TV spot is very catchy and they use the web URL www.jeep.com/sessions to bring visitors into the site and have an interactive view of their Jeep Liberty. A truly great and targeted campaign.

A couple of reasons to have specific landing pages for these TV, print and off-line campaigns are as follows:

1. targeted messaging.
2. better interactivity and audience response.
3. higher conversion.
4. tighter tracking, analytics, and return on ad spend (ROAS) information.

When are some good times to use specific URL’s and landing pages for off-line advertising and marketing?

1. Trade show exhibitor – if you are spending thousands to go to a trade show and display as an Exhibitor, you want to make sure you can track and manage those leads. Create a specific landing page for booth visitors to follow up with your company and put that on your print at the show. For example, if I am a chemical company and I exhibit at a scientific show in Boston, why not create a campaign and page around www.chemicalcompany.com/bostontrade2008 and have targeted lead/follow up forms on that page so that you can channel and track leads. A special offer always works well.
2. New product launches – with a new product launching, take advantage of the internet’s great interactive media capability. Don’t just send the traffic to your company’s main homepage and let all the traffic from a targeted message be lost in the rest of your site.
3. PR campaigns – drive traffic to a specific message on your site and as above, leverage the web’s interactivity to track response from users.

In some cases a campaign is worth creating an entire micro-site. An example of this is Chrispin Porter + Bogusky’s creation of WhopperFreakout for Burger King.

When using off-line media, don’t be afraid to match the on-line component pound for pound. The results will astonish you, and your target audience will be that much more pleased and responsive!

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