

Confessions Of Patch Salesperson: "It's Been A Disaster" - lloydarmbrust
http://www.businessinsider.com/confessions-of-patch-salesperson-we-sell-garbage-2011-6

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lloydarmbrust
"Here's the real issue with Patch: They're selling a branding advertising
campaign to small businesses that should never put their first dollar in that
bucket. It should be on Google AdWords, where it's measurable and it's cost
effective, whether it's a Groupon or AdWords type play."

This makes sense. I've been in the newspaper game for more than 10 years, and
I couldn't sell a banner ad to an SMB with a straight face because it's not
what they need.

What a small business needs is search-engine optimized website with social
media hooks. Banner ads are a waste of cash... the ROI is not there.

~~~
mrkurt
I used to be in your camp, actually, and I've come around based on a number of
things I've learned recently. The real problem is not that SMB's shouldn't be
buying brand advertising, the real problem is that they shouldn't be buying
brand advertising the way large businesses do. Shoehorning them into the same
sales strategy/pipeline won't work at all.

As a matter of fact, they already buy and see value in brand advertising.
Local businesses that sponsor local sports teams are simply building brand
awareness. They'll pay money to slap their logo on any number of things
_without_ expecting some measurable conversion, and they still see value
there.

Social media makes this even more interesting. All these small brands are
creating engaging content and looking for ways to get it in front of people.
Rather than worrying about converting to sales, many of them are attempting to
do things like pick up Twitter followers and encourage content sharing. It's
very much a brand based activity.

