Paid V.S. Free Marketing Strategies

by katsuma

Paid V.S. Free Marketing Strategies

When talking about online marketing, there are basically two types of advertising to choose from. There is paid advertising and free advertising.

Depending on who you are talking to you will get different opinions concerning the matter, but the fact remains that you can get desirable results from both paid and free advertising.

What's The Difference?

When I refer to paid advertising I am talking about things like: PPC (pay per click), Banner Advertising, Ezine Newseltter Ads, Youtube sponsered videos, etc…

Free advertising methods would be things like: article marketing, SEO (search engine optimization), video marketing, facebook, Twitter, forums, etc…

So lets take a look at some of the pros and cons so that you can choose a strategy that will work best for you.

Free Marketing Strategies

Pros

• it is free
• you can meet a lot of cool people in the process of marketing i.e. facebook friends, youtube friends, twitter, forming a tribe etc…
• if you are putting out content, it will continue to work for you for as long as it is on the web
• your results will start to compound
• you can form a lot of key relationships
• you can brand yourself with videos, a blog, fanpage etc… (this is BIG)
• if your content is good it can go viral

Cons

• it takes more of your free time
• it has a large learning curve
• it can take longer to build up momentum

Paid Marketing Strategies

Pros

• immediate results
• you learn what works very quickly
• it is very automated
• you get key insights into the numbers of a profitable campaign
• the ability to expand quickly (if you find a profitable campaign you can put more money into it, or move into other mediums)
• it is consistent

Cons

• it requires a budget
• your profit margins are lower
• you can loose money if you don't know wh! at your doing
• it can seem intimidating at first

So Which Is Better?

The answer is that they both work. Both paid and free marketing strategies will work if you take the time to learn them and take action.

I am not perfect and I may have missed a few pros or cons to either side, but I want to make the point that both methods have their strengths and weaknesses. It is just a matter of finding which method will work the best for you.

If you are super busy and have a small budget of a couple hundred bucks, then maybe you should consider paid advertising. If you have a lot of free time and little or no money to invest right now then choosing a free strategy would be the best option.

Paid V.S. Free Marketing Strategies