Category: Advertising
7 Discouraging, Surprising, Yet Hopeful Truths About Modern Aerospace Marketing
BDN routinely uses research to understand, benchmark and report the trends and realities impacting the work we do as aerospace marketers.
In our most recent survey we asked aerospace marketers questions about their approach to budgeting and planning, goal-setting, goal accomplishment, their most effective tools and techniques, and levels of satisfaction with their company’s marketing performance.
We wondered, “Is there a correlation between those who plan and those who get results?” “Are some tactics consistently much more effective than others?” And, “Do budgets equate to higher perceived performance?”
It turns out that the answer is yes to all these questions, yet there is still much to be learned. Today we are providing a high-level summary of our findings with key takeaways and insights that shine a light (not always a flattering one) on our industry and our profession. This is ideal for those who want a quick read.
Anyone who would like more in-depth charts and findings may request the complete survey results here.
And remember, these results are suggestive, not scientific.
Key Insights & Takeaways
Finding: Regardless of their annual revenue, aerospace companies are still under-spending on marketing, with many high-revenue businesses spending just as little as their lower-revenue counterparts.
Insight: Shame on us. It’s hard to believe, but 20% of the $100,000,000 businesses have marketing budgets under $100,000. That’s an embarrassingly small .001%, and far below recommended spending and benchmarks for both B2B and our industry.
Takeaway: The budgeting process in larger companies sometimes defies logic, with decision-makers removed from the realities of individual functions. Verbatim comments tell us that more than a few companies are actually cutting marketing because industry conditions are bad. Huh? Marketers who work for an organization like this can either use data and measurement to become agents of change from within, remain ineffective, or run.
Finding: Most marketing budgets have stayed the same since 2015; a good number have increased; and very few have been cut.
Insight: Yes, this is positive news, but remember, budgets are still below accepted standards. Harvard Business Review generally suggests investing 3% of revenue in marketing, with adjustments made for specific scenarios.
Takeaway: Management probably believes marketing has everything it needs to be successful. After all, they have added or maintained existing budgets. But we can and must do better. If you are working with a limited budget, stop defaulting to old school tactics that can’t be measured — and when management wants you to do the same old, same old, explain that you can’t afford anything that fails to deliver ROI. Position yourself as the expert and start showing results to upper management that will justify the higher budget you know you need.
Finding: The majority of respondents say they do have and follow a marketing strategy and plan, yet there are striking differences here based on company revenue. More than 90% of the largest companies have a plan; less than 50% of the smallest do.
Insight: The survey shows that those with a strategy and plan are more satisfied with their company’s marketing performance than those without. It also shows that, as spending levels rise, so do levels of satisfaction with overall marketing performance.
Takeaway: A strategy, plan, adequate budget and measurement are the keys to your marketing success, regardless of company size. But if you are working with a smaller budget, strategy and planning become even more critical to ensure that every dollar spent is associated with an expected, measurable outcome.
Finding: Most respondents reported success in accomplishing key objectives. Improved brand awareness, improved customer engagement/relationships and increased sales were most frequently cited. Interestingly, 12% of those spending less than $100,000 report that they accomplished none of their objectives last year – no one spending $1 million or more said they accomplished nothing.
Insight: Regardless of budget, brand awareness and leads were cited as top successes. Because brand awareness is more difficult to measure it may be a more comfortable “metric” for some marketers. Challenge yourself to achieve more measurable objectives moving forward.
Takeaway: People are reporting success, and that’s good. Let’s just make sure those claims of success are based on data you can defend.
Finding: The most effective digital marketing efforts were websites (83%) and email marketing (79%). The highest marks for ineffective tactics were social media, blogs and online display ads, yet plenty of marketers also found them effective.
Insight: One, people are divided about what works in the digital realm. Also, while websites are recognized as effective, less than 50% say their SEO is effective.
Takeaway: We think the sheer volume of new and changing tools and options overwhelms many marketers. The first step to using the right digital tactics is understanding them – make time to get smart and use data to determine what is and is not working.
Finding: The most effective traditional marketing efforts were events and print advertising, yet print advertising also was most frequently called out as ineffective.
Insight: We continue to rely on old school tactics, perhaps to appease older, old school management, that are less likely to be measured.
Takeaway: If you are using events and print advertising (often the most expensive tactics) make sure you are tracking results. There are tools and techniques that make it possible to know if these approaches are working.
Finding: In 2016, marketers overwhelmingly say their No. 1 objective is increasing sales, followed by improved customer engagement, increased leads and improved brand awareness. Also, their No. 1 challenge is acquiring new customers, followed by lead generation and measuring ROI.
Insight: Hurray! Marketing exists to drive sales, and we are heartened to see folks acknowledging this connection.
Takeaway: Take a look at the relationship between marketing and sales in your organization. Are you using a CRM and marketing automation system to facilitate tracking, measurement and accountability? Are you working harmoniously toward a common goal? Or is there friction and finger pointing? Make mending and strengthening these relationships — adding in accountability for everyone — a priority for the good of the business.
Next up:
Keep reading next week for verbatim comments from more than 30 respondents who wrote to us about the challenges, opportunities and trends they are experiencing in their aerospace marketing work.
Don’t forget:
If you liked this blog post, you may also be interested in these free BDN resources:
- How to Develop a Marketing Communications Budget
- Budget Planning Checklist
- Marketing Planner
- 30 Days to Better Digital Marketing
Aerospace Advertising: What We Learned
When it comes to advertising, there’s one thing we can all agree on — things are changing.
Our month-long look at advertising was filtered through the lens of aerospace marketing professionals who shared their thoughts, experiences and insightful comments.
There were no true eureka moments — some findings were predictable and many a bit surprising — but we did learn a lot and uncovered several valuable takeaways.
While the survey shows that print is still important, the comments add some revealing caveats. Some marketers support print but characterize it as somewhat of a “necessary evil,” acknowledging that it is “unaccountable, expensive and slow,” yet driven by the belief that it is still necessary to reach older decision-makers.
Digital is valued because it is “trackable, targeted, and interactive,” and we are encouraged that marketers value measurement. Respondents are increasing their digital spending and most agree that digital advertising will ultimately displace print. The only real question is when it will happen. The cost difference between print and digital was mentioned quite frequently — BDN predicts that gap will close. As digital demand increases, prices will, too.
The comments make it clear that for the time being, print and digital are both important. As one respondent said, “an integrated strategy involving digital and traditional communications works best,” and this is a position BDN generally agrees with.
With clear goals and a smart strategy, the correct mix of tactics is generally quite clear, and for us, this is the key takeaway. Start with a sound strategy and the tactics will take care of themselves. This complete marketing plan template — customized for aerospace and defense — can help.
To see complete survey results, click here. To view marketers’ preferred publications, click here. And to read respondent comments, click here.
Don’t forget — this listing of 300+ A&D-specific media is a useful tool for advertisers. Download yours here.
Advertisers Speak Their Minds
Part three of our April focus on advertising is a recap of written comments accompanying our survey about “The Role of Advertising in Aerospace & Defense.” The majority of respondents provided written comments. An array of 20 representative remarks, some edited for space and grammar, are included here. To see what your fellow advertisers had to say, read on.
Now, if you don’t want to miss a single comment (and believe us, you don’t), you can download an expanded written summary of what 75 marketing pros really think about A&D advertising.
Meanwhile, here is a recap of how industry marketing professionals responded to our request to “please share your comments about print and digital advertising as they relate to marketing programs for aviation, aerospace and defense.”
We hope you find it as interesting and enlightening as we did.
‘Print is Dead’
“Digital is the way to go. Print is dead. It is old news before it is even published and mailed. Websites that engage the customer base and apps that provide utility with advertisements are a gold mine for us.”
“Targeting options in digital advertising offer much more bang for the buck than traditional print advertising options. I received my new AC-U-KWICK today and promptly threw it in the trash.”
“Print media has become outdated and hard to justify. Digital media is more trackable, targeted and interactive.”
“As a small company trying to displace the big boys, we have our best success with sales letters and road trips. Our limited print ads have yielded zero sales. We strongly feel that traditional print ads (blue sky, aircraft, product shots) do not help a small company break through. But we also strongly feel that a non-traditional campaign combining multiple outlets could. We believe that non-traditional print ads will be more and more effective as our prospects replace their old school vanguards with younger staff. So, we are focusing hard on how to make a non-traditional approach work.”
“Flight International, Aviation Week and other high dollar placements are getting the axe in favor of a more diverse and digital-centric strategy.”
‘A Break from the Digital Onslaught’
“Print has sustainability and is ideal for increasing image and brand awareness.”
“The current generation of decision-makers still relies on print for in-depth reading and information. Digital is fine for transitory news, but not for critical study.”
“There is too much digital advertising through social media and emails, so I ignore it. But with print I take my time and read through the entire magazine looking for information that may help my business. It provides a break from the digital onslaught.”
“Digital advertising is still not as effective as print. There are still too many old school decision makers who are not technically savvy.”
“Print is still the way to communicate to C-suite execs.”
‘We Need Both’
“In today’s market, print and digital advertising must work hand-in-hand in the marketing mix. Online presence reinforces the branding efforts through traditional print media and gives a valuable sense of immediacy to the messages.”
“An integrated strategy involving digital and traditional communications works best. The publications still have influence, and working with them benefits our company.”
“While I still focus primarily on print advertising, I usually look for a digital add-on. This could be a digital copy of the magazine with hot links to advertising, or a banner ad that is included as part of my buy.”
“Print is still a necessary evil, but digital brings much more value.”
“When your marketing challenge is establishing brand awareness, print advertising tied to measurable digital landing pages is still a good investment. For the selling of an established product or service, there are more effective channels.”
‘Editorial Still Beats Advertising’
”The industry as a whole seems focused on placements to say they were in a magazine rather than executing a real strategy.”
“Editorial, whether print or digital, still beats all advertising. Print, when distributed at high-profile industry conferences or trade shows, is effective. Ads in daily or weekly newsletters are also effective. Digital ads and digital directories are my least favorite — there is so much noise on web pages that they go unnoticed, and most of the time they are annoying.”
“For our company, it seems that when new clients find us it always start with a Google search.”
“Advertising helps promote our brand, but direct mailers and other activities engaging customer prospects are most effective in generating/closing sales.”
“Print is unaccountable, expensive, slow and perfect for the bathroom or La-Z-Boy recliner. Digital means fast feedback, video demos, click-through tracking.”
Don’t forget — this listing of 300+ A&D-specific media is a useful tool for advertisers. Download yours here.
Read Additional Insights
For a PDF document with the complete, must-read comments, click the image and don’t forget, we welcome your feedback — so tell us what you think!
People’s Choice: A&D Marketers ID Preferred Publications
Because our industry is served by more than 300 aerospace and defense publications, a comprehensive survey determining individual preferences is simply not feasible.
Instead, to identify and understand trends, we asked an open-ended question: “If you could only choose to advertise in a few industry publications (print or digital), what would they be?” By not requiring respondents to refer to a list of choices, we hoped to uncover trends in a more organic fashion.
Here’s what we learned, based on the number of write-in “votes” (shown below) for each publication, and congratulations to the top five: Aviation International News, Vertical, AOPA Pilot, Aviation Week & Space Technology, Flying, and Rotor & Wing.
So, what do you think of the list? Is it consistent with your experiences? Whatever your opinion, we’d love to hear from you in the comments section and facilitate a dialogue about the role of advertising in aviation, aerospace and defense marketing.
Next Up:
Our series on the “The Role of Advertising in Aerospace and Defense Marketing,” will continue next week as we share verbatim comments from more than 100 industry marketing professionals who took our survey. Watch for it on April 19.
Don’t Forget:
A more substantial overview of survey findings is available here. Also, if you find our blog and other resources to be useful, please share them with a friend!
We asked: Does the future of aerospace include advertising?
Advertising — once the mainstay of BDN’s business — is now a source of ongoing discussion, debate and uncertainty within the Aerospace and Defense industry. Our team routinely fields a great many advertising-related questions from clients and colleagues. We find that in general, people want to know if advertising is relevant, effective and worth the investment — and they often want to know about industry trends and understand what their peers are or are not doing.
This survey, “The Role of Advertising in Aerospace and Defense Marketing,” was designed to get a sense of trends and how advertising is used and viewed in our industry today. Based on more than 150 responses, from marketers covering a broad array of industry segments, it is not a scientific but is certainly suggestive. We hope you find it useful.
Key Finding: Advertising is in decline, and people who once advertised are no longer advertising.
While 93% of respondents said they have advertised in the past, just 72% say they advertise now.
Key Finding: In general, the majority of advertising budgets are increasing or staying the same. Fewer budgets are declining.
Key Finding: The majority of respondents think print advertising is still relevant and effective in our industry, but many are unsure.
Key Finding: While print is still important to respondents, digital is growing in importance, with spending split fairly equally between print and digital.
Next Up: Our series on the “The Role of Advertising in Aerospace and Defense Marketing,” will continue next week as we reveal industry marketers’ preferred publications. Watch for the People’s Choice results on April 12.
Don’t Forget: BDN’s Complete Guide to Aerospace & Defense Media is a great resource for industry advertisers. Download it here.
Effective Strategies for Print & Online Aviation Marketing
Writing for BDN, Jill Fontaine recently interviewed Carol Dodds, Vice President of Advertising and Partnership at Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA
), to discuss a variety of issues that impact aviation industry marketers. Carol provides key aviation and aerospace brands a selection of print and digital advertising opportunities and for over 9 years has successfully connected advertisers and marketing professionals with their target audience of general aviation pilots, aircraft owners, and aviation enthusiasts.
Jill: AOPA represents many influential brands in the industry. Can you give a few examples of brands that are creating innovative print campaigns?
Carol: Bose, Garmin and Icon are among those that I always suggest people reference for great ad content. We are also seeing smaller companies create very engaging content in their ads. Genesys Aerosystems always impresses me with their smart print ads that they couple with blogging and online content on topics that people are genuinely interested in learning about. They do a really good job educating their potential customers about a product that, at times, can be difficult to understand.
Other companies, like Blackhawk Modifications, are getting very creative with their print ads, while saving money and maintaining high visibility. They are getting dominance across a 2-page spread without buying the 2-page spread. It’s actually pretty clever! On the right-hand side, they’re buying a full-page ad and doing a great bold image with a short headline. On the left-hand side of the spread, they’re buying a 1/3-page vertical ad and tying them together with color and branding, this is a perfectly functional “2-page” ad. And honestly, that leaves us with only editorial that can be placed on the page with their 1/3 ad. So really, they’re getting ad placement right in the middle of an article. You couldn’t ask for better visibility.
Jill: What a trick! Is this something you’re sure you want to be sharing?
Carol: Of course. I think it’s really clever marketing. I always want our advertisers to get the best “bang for their buck” and this is a great way to do it. I also think it shows just how versatile print advertising can be. You have to make it work for you and the budget you have. You don’t have to buy a 2-page spread to get good visibility. I work hard for my advertisers, and my main goal is to get their message out there, no matter their budget.
Jill: What marketing trends are you seeing in aviation print advertising right now?
Carol: I’m seeing that the most successful and eye-grabbing ads are those with bold images, incredible beauty shots, or very tight detailed shots of a product. A lot of advertisers are coupling these bold images with dramatic one-word or one-phrase headlines to keep it simple and clean while still getting the reader’s attention. This style is very effective, but is hard for some, more traditionally rooted, companies to accept.
I’ve also been very intrigued with the advertorial direction that some ads are going. With this style, we see brands using smaller images and focusing on telling their reader a story.
Native advertising or “editorial-like” ads often feature a customer’s testimonial or content that educates the customer about the brand. You have to have amazing copy in order to pull this off though. You want the copy to feel like part of the magazine’s content, not an overt promotion. That’s the trick. Give the reader the opportunity to learn something of value instead of being sold something.
Jill: Do you think one ad style is more effective than the other one?
Carol: No. It’s trial and error, really. Advertisers have to see what works for their brand and their customers. Some of the best ads I’ve seen have been combinations of both styles. They’ve successfully incorporated a beautifully branded image with the right amount of editorial content. The combination of the two often provides marketers more comfort because they don’t have to go buck wild in one direction or another.
Jill: Has the 24/7 accessibility to a brands message via the Internet and social media affected the way that AOPA readers and advertisers view print advertising?
Carol: Yes, I think it has. People can access information about your brand any time they want to, so picking up a magazine is now only one of many ways they can learn about your product. This is one of the challenges that aviation marketers today have to overcome. We’re an industry that is very comfortable in print advertising and sometimes it’s hard to educate brands on the true need for online, social and video marketing. Good marketers use a hybrid of print and digital to engage on more levels with their customers. Advertisers should be using print for serious branding and story telling, then driving the customer to an online page where they can take action on the information they just received from your print ad.
Jill: Is online advertising effective on its own?
Carol: I’m a firm believer that online advertising is most effective when it’s backed up by a branded print advertisement that tells the story of a product. I don’t know any successful brands that have focused their marketing strategy solely on print or solely on digital marketing. Both serve different purposes and different parts of the sale cycle. Advertisers should be using print to drive traffic to their website. This is why print is still relevant. If a customer is reading a magazine, they’re most likely relaxed and have some time on their hands. If that same customer is online, there is a much shorter attention span and a much smaller window to deliver your message. It’s important to understand that people are distracted online and now have an expectation about online advertising. Advertisers can use their print campaigns to deliver a bold idea and drive them to do further product research or take an action on your website or landing page.
Jill: How can marketers successfully integrate a digital marketing strategy into their existing print strategy? Will it require additional budget?
Carol: It’s not expensive or difficult to carry over a branded look and feel online. It’s about providing customers with brand consistency. They see your brand in print, they should also see it online. Think of the print ad as brand education and the online ad as your call to action. Online ads encourage your customer to pick up the phone, click on the contact info, find a sales rep, or even make a purchase. There’s a sense of urgency in online advertising, and that’s the key. Most of the print advertising opportunities these days comes with an option for online advertising as well. At AOPA we always encourage our advertisers to do both, and we also offer them a large range of different platforms and different price points to choose from. It comes down to distributing your budget across online and print. For a campaign to be successful, you shouldn’t have your entire advertising budget in one area.
Jill: We’re talking about creating a funnel of sales leads here, starting with print and ending with an online call-to-action. How important is a company’s website in this process?
Carol: If there is one place where a marketing strategy loses its steam, it’s the website! As marketers, we spend so much money on print ads and online visibility, but when a customer finally shows up at the website ready to buy, they often fall into an abyss of unorganized or unrelated information. We essentially throw them into a dark room and cross our fingers that they can figure out how to buy our product. Ineffective websites don’t happen by permission though, they happen by omission. Make sure to lead your customers to exactly where you want them to land on your site and keep it up to date and engaging. Print and online ads won’t convert to sales unless your website is ready to handle the traffic that is being directed to it.
Jill: Where does email marketing fall in to all of this? Seems like it should be as important as the website in converting leads to sales.
Carol: Definitely. Email marketing is not a thing of the past; it is still a critical part of any effective marketing strategy. At AOPA, we find it effective to add marketing content to emails that our members are already expecting from us. It may be a renewal notice or an account reminder, but we include some effective marketing content that reminds our member to take advantage of another benefit we offer. People get so many emails. The more you can combine your messages into one email, the more likely you are to reach your customer.
Jill: Let’s talk a little bit about the sales team’s involvement in this process. Is it important for marketers to get buy-in from their sales team to develop these ads for print and online?
Carol: Yes. It is so important for marketing professionals to educate their sales counterparts on the importance of innovative marketing. Here at AOPA, we do our own media marketing and it’s very much a team effort with our sales force. We involve the sales team in the front end of the process when we’re developing the message, the images and the execution. When you involve the sales team early on, you ensure that the customer transition between marketing and sales is efficient. We want everything to be easy and seamless for the customer. You don’t want it to feel like a cold call when the sales team talks to the customer. The lead generation work that marketing efforts produce is very important, and the sales team wants to be involved and informed. They need quality information so they can successfully close the sale. We ask our sales team for copywriting input to ensure our ads have the right “voice”. Sales people understand the language that our customers speak. That comes in very handy for writing effective marketing material.
Jill: I’m glad you brought up understanding the customer. In addition to insight from your sales team, do you see value in engaging with customers in online forums and social media platforms?
Carol: Yes, I see value in online engagement. But I think it’s a very particular type of conversation. We use it to put ideas out there and to get a better understanding of our customers wants and needs as AOPA members. Online forums and social media sites aren’t the places for us to be “selling” our members a specific product. Forums are meant to be a place for open opinions, not blatant promotion. So yes, I think it’s an important way to gather customer insights, but it’s not a place for a sales pitch. We see social media as more of a customer service function rather than a direct marketing function.
Jill: Do you have any other advice for our readers who are looking to improve their print and online marketing strategy?
Carol: Be thoughtful and precise about your message. Be clear in how you write and what you say. Remember that people won’t give you more than a few seconds of their time for you to sell them something. They will, however, enjoy and appreciate a message that offers them new information or something of value. The offer and message you select and how you select them determine the success of your marketing campaign.
To improve your advertising even more, make sure you have a compelling value proposition. Here’s a useful guide with examples, a checklist, and more.
Advertising Planning
While digital strategies are growing in popularity, print advertising in industry trade publications is still being used by many aerospace, defense and aviation marketers. As a service to the industry, BDN continues to make available this directory of more than 300 niche publications.
The directory was last updated in 2015, so if you’d like to suggest an update or addition, please contact us here.
To download the directory, click here.
To learn more about digital advertising, click here.
Digital Advertising: How and Why it Can Work for You
Aerospace marketers unanimously cite budget constraints as one of their most significant professional challenges. As many have been forced to re-evaluate how and where to invest their limited marketing dollars, paid digital advertising has become a viable alternative to traditional methods — and with good reason.
Digital advertising is often considerably more affordable, targeted, immediate and measurable than traditional advertising.
But is it right for our industry and your business? Let’s define three options and how to use them most effectively.
Pay-per-click advertising, or PPC, is widely used in aerospace marketing. In fact, Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman are all using it extensively.
In PPC, advertisers pay a fee each time one of their ads is clicked. Search engine advertising is one of the most popular forms of PPC, but it is not the only option available. PPC ads may be placed through website publishers, directly through social media (Facebook and LinkedIn) or through an ad network like Google Ad Words.
Benefits of PPC advertising include the ability to track conversations and the fact that you only pay for the actual website visits that occur. Additionally, most PPC platforms allow you to set a strict spending limit, so costs can be monitored closely.
In aerospace marketing, PPC is well suited for a specific campaign, like a new product launch. As opposed to SEO efforts, which may take more time, you’ll get instant recognition with targeted audiences through the use of specific, carefully selected keywords.
Bonus Tip: Purchase the names of your competition as keywords. If a prospect searches for that competitor, they’ll see your ad at the same time.
Here is more information to get you started.
Display advertising is the online placement of visual ads on targeted websites. Display ads may be purchased directly from a publisher or through an ad network like Google.
Before you purchase from an aerospace industry-specific publisher, explore ad network options. Many websites in our industry are overrun with competing ads in limited space, potentially diminishing the chance that visitors will notice and engage with you, and you’ll probably be surprised by the precise targeting that is possible with other options.
And while it has always been challenging to quantify the effectiveness of print advertising, digital methods offer instantaneous information about click-through and conversion rates of web traffic that comes to you as a result of a digital ad. Monitor and measure everything you do, and adjust your spending to support what works best.
Learn more about display advertising here.
Retargeting, sometimes called remarketing, is a type of display advertising and is an excellent tool for businesses with long sales cycles, where lead nurturing is essential. Retargeting works to bring visitors back to your website site over time by regularly showing them relevant subject matter ads when they visit other websites. For example, if a potential customer is doing buying research and visits both your website and that of a competitor, retargeting provides you an opportunity (that your competition may not be using) to lure them back with a clickable special offer or a promotion for interesting content.
Retargeting works as users visit your website, their machine gets cookied. This cookie passes important data to retargeting platforms like Google and AdRoll, signaling that the user has visited your website before. The list of cookied machines gets added to the retargeting list and will begin displaying ads for your website.
Learn more about retargeting here.
Measurement is an essential part of any digital marketing effort. The goals of each online campaign will determine which metrics you should track and analyze. Impressions can indicate the success of a branding campaign, clicks can show increased web traffic, and form fills or conversions represent increased leads or even sales.
It’s important to remember that digital advertising is a tool that should be employed strategically as part of an overall marketing plan. BDN’s digital media coordinator Savannah Ivanitski works with our team and our clients to develop and deploy effective digital marketing strategies. Contact us to learn more.
You may also be interested in: Aerospace Marketers: 5 steps to establish or improve your use of social media…and the FTC regulation you need to know now
7 Keys to Breakthrough Messaging for Aerospace and Defense Marketers
Memorable, iconic messaging looks effortless, but it’s anything but. Drafting the right three words (like “Here Comes Hope”) may take three minutes – or three hours – but is essential to effective marketing.
But how do you do it? Well, the truth is, most people aren’t wired to write goose bump-inducing copy. It can’t be done by committee, and it is less likely to come from someone within the company. I’m not sure it can be taught – but do know that understanding how to recognize it is important for all aerospace marketers.
7 Keys to Effective Messaging
- Tells a story, succinctly
- Makes you feel something
- Is audience-centric
- Feels authentic
- Does not require an explanation
- Transcends the expected and the ordinary
- Has something extra – a spark of creative genius – that elevates everything and makes the message sing. We call it the X factor. And you can’t have effective marketing without it.
The United States Armed Forces consistently delivers exceptionally strong marketing campaigns anchored by some of the best messaging in our space.
We’ve featured a few examples here, but you can easily find more with a couple of quick searches. They more than meet our criteria for inspired messaging. Do you agree?
You’ll find even more information about messaging in our Value Proposition Guide. It’s an in-depth resource that includes actionable insights, a checklist to evaluate your own value proposition, industry examples, and more. Or, take a look at our Portfolio, to see work examples and inspiration, all specific to aerospace and defense.
Critiquing An Aerospace Advertisement: AugustaWestland
Dear AgustaWestland,
Nothing about this ad makes sense to me, so I am assuming it was designed by a committee. Most likely it was a last-minute endeavor, and perhaps this was the only thing everyone could agree on, but your customers and employees deserve better. Your helicopters deserve better. And your brand deserves better. Heck, even the koala bear deserves better.
The most effective ads are simple, but layered with meaning. They don’t have to be literal. But they do need to artfully combine words and images to connect and communicate with readers, and they must tell a story that your audience cares about. Great ads are often deceptive in their simplicity, because they appear to have been created effortlessly. They trick you into believing anyone can do it. So you start out with a lofty vision and a great idea, then somehow end up with a bear, a helicopter and a cockpit.
Marrying the right idea with the proper imagery, inspired copy, and flawless execution isn’t easy.
I don’t mean to pick on the nice people at AgustaWestland — I have friends there. No one knocks it out of the park every time. But this particular ad, quite honestly, is more than I can bear.
Over to you, folks. Am I off base here?