Personally, I have signed up to HomePages Friends (previously known as My Search Funds - which I think is a more apt name), and this means that I do an online search which gives me results. It uses a search engine to do this. Previously it used to use Google but currently uses Yahoo! Now besides the search engine results, it also targets the advertising. If for example I searched the word Joke, it would bring up a list of websites. Now if say The Joke Shop decided on PPC advertising, the search engine would realise that I was the target market and show the advert. If I ignored the advert, then The Joke Shop would not pay for that advert. If on the other hand, I clicked on it, then The Joke Shop would pay for that click. It would also mean that the person who visited was really interested. There is a negative side. If I wanted to read a Joke, then The Joke Shop would have paid for me to visit without it turning to a sale. At least it would mean that I have become aware of the site, so I may go to it in the future. In Marketing, familiarity helps. But not being there is a disadvantage.

I digress, so places like MySearchFunds want you to click on their adverts shown, so they can keep up their high ratings and keep earning money. So they actually pay you a part of their revenue for clicking on their sponsored links. The truth is that you were doing the search anyway and you are the target market which means everyone is happy. But it can be open to abuse, where people keep doing searches just to earn money. In the long run, this won’t work as you would be spotted abusing the system and your account would be closed. You would also lose any earnings you would have made.

But it does make you wonder about whether PPC really works or not. As for offline advertising, I think it could be helpful but you do need

• A memorable website name eg www.thejokeshop.com
• An easy telephone number eg 0800 000000000000 (obviously not a real number but you get the point)

However, people do tend to forget about the adverts unless it is really on their mind, or if they have been able to cut out and keep the advert eg from a newspaper / flyer.

Talking of newspapers… my experience with them is horrific. When running The Joke Shop, I placed an advert in the local paper. It cost £550 + VAT and hit 80,000 homes. I received less orders than 1 had fingers. I tried this twice. Needless to say, I did not do it again.

I personally feel that the best is to keep your clients happy and they will spread the word. Displease your customers and they will also spread the word. The saying a bird in the hand is worth 2 in the bush is a true saying. It also costs less to keep a customer happy than to find a new one!

You want your customers to constantly keep you in mind, so giving away promotional items like engravable gifts, printed balloons and pens, stickers, mouse mats, etc all contributes to keeping you as a business foremost in their minds.

I must say, I learnt a lot from The Joke Shop and really miss it!