Last nights Apprentice, week 5, lead by Sir Alan Sugar, was all about selling photography. The teams had to choose photography art to sell. You may ask what the relevance is to the graphic design and the website services we offer? Well we too are in the business of using imagery that appeals to a particular audience to promote or sell goods and services.

It came of no surprise to me that the success of the last nights winning team came down to two things:

1) Target audience size
2) Quality of leads

At the end of the day the greater the audience the more products or services can potentially be sold. In this case the target audience of horse imagery was far greater than that of say the narrow audiences of lip images or seafood.

But the missing trick that the apprentices failed to realise while buying the art was to gain a current client list from their chosen supplier which they could use to sell to. Only one team did this and to me it too was the difference between success and failure.

For more information on the series visit their Website

In this day and age the possibilities for new media and its mix with traditional medium as promotion are endless, but however good your methods are at initially attracting the target audience the follow up is crucial.

Yes, I agree that instant new media methods such as email, pdf attachments etc can work well but more often than not printed literature cannot be ignored.

A well planned, designed, written and produced piece of literature is worth it’s wait in gold, especially when used to back up initial response.

I guess it comes down to good targeting and knowing your audience. It’s true to say that most sales processes still (and will for a long time to come) demand a postable response. Whoever your target audience is though, the confidence given by printed literature is hard to beat.

If you know what SEO means (Search Engine Optimisation) then you may be familiar with the terms ‘Organic Searches’ and ‘Pay-per-click’.

For those who are unfamiliar, an Organic Search is where a key phrase is entered into Google or similar search engine and the results are not sponsored or paid for, they come up due to the relevance of the search. Pay-per-click, however, is the opposite and are generally titled ‘Sponsored Results’ they appear according to how much the promoter wishes to pay.

My view is that both cannot be ignored or part of your target audience may be. However it goes without saying that organic searches are far more popular and effective. Particulary from a cost point of view as they do not cost per click and are generally user preferred due to their accuracy. Statistics show that Organic Searches are 6-8 times more likely to be chosen than Pay-per-click links.

At Titman Firth we tend to assess the required balance on a case by case basis as every business has different needs. Often though if a potential client’s budget for Pay-per-click is far higher then that for SEO/Organic Searches we aim to reverse the balance resulting in increased traffic and long term cost effectiveness.

Interesting topic this, once upon a time a company who wanted to promote itself on video would have needed a huge budget to shoot, film and edit a production, and that’s without the cost of putting it onto video or DVD.

Now following the popularity of blogs and podcasts your business can add video blogs to the list!

Some companies may find the informal nature unsuitable to their target audience and I agree, but to some (particularly those where their staff are their product like with consulting firms) the benefits of what blogs and podcasts offer is only made stronger by video. With this medium comes a unique honesty as the result tends to house less bells and whistles and is less polished. Furthermore, the content is open to comment which brings a natural verification.

They are cost effective to do and place on line and when done right can reflect and enhance your brand while increasing traffic to your site. The Radio 1 Chris Moyles show launched Chris Moyles’s first video blog this week and from early reports has certainly made an impact!