The term media advertising or advertising media means the use of media to advertise products and services to a relevant audience. Today, the list of advertising opportunities across different formats of media is virtually endless. The use of advertising is crucial to the long-term success of any business. It is critical though that a business owner must adopt a logical and level-headed approach to this important activity. This enables the advertising dollars to be spent effectively and keeps marketing costs from getting out of hand which can make a huge dent in overall profits! But there are key points to understanding what media advertising is and how it can help your business.

Magazine Advertising
The key to successfully advertising in magazines is making sure you know your target audience. While magazine advertising can be highly significant in promoting a product or service it does little good if the ad is placed in a magazine that is not even opened by the target market. In addition it is important to keep in mind those magazine promotions with glossy pictures and catchy ad slogans are very expensive and time consuming to produce. Failure to reach your target audience in the right magazine at the right time means ad dollars that are just being poured down the drain. Savvy business owners will do comprehensive market research to understand who their target group is and what magazines that group is interested in reading. Magazine advertising is desirable with its long shelf life with high pass-along readership. Magazines have high readership rates and strong loyalty. Then after carefully determining in what magazines the ad dollars are best spent they will carefully and strategically plan out their ad campaign in conjunction with their chosen magazine. This truly means collaboration between magazine layout staff and marketing staff from the business buying the ad space. Inexperienced business owners who do not control how and where their magazine advertising dollars are being spent often find themselves being relegated to the back pages of obscurity in the magazine they are hoping will launch their business to new heights.

Newspaper Advertising
This aspect of media advertising is struggling to survive.  With the proliferation of online news services many people choose not to read a traditional newspaper.  Newspapers across the country report a downturn in profits and a loss of revenue from the selling of ad space.  But as dour as this may be for those in the newspaper business this can be a boon for the savvy business owner.  If you can determine that your target market is likely to look for your advertising in a newspaper in many places large amounts of ad space can be bought at a discount. This enables the business owner's marketing dollar to go much further.  Large amounts of ad space that just a few years ago would have cost a premium can now be purchased at a much lower price.  Newspapers can still give flexibility in production: low cost, fast turnaround with ad shapes and sizes that have excellent quality for inserts. Newspapers can also provide high local coverage and immediate (daily) delivery of your message.  In addition marketing studies show that newspaper ads rank highest for believability for all media. Newspapers also have special targeted sections and shopping guides with extraordinarily high Sunday readership. But it is still important to understand that there are downsides to the business owner wanting to market their product or service since the newspaper can have a very busy and cluttered competitive advertising environment that must compete against other ads and the newspaper copy. Also there can be little control over ad placement and it is important to keep in mind that there is a limited life span of the ad because of the very nature of the newspaper. But even with all this it cannot be overstated that the key to using newspaper media advertising is making sure that your advertising will reach your chosen target market.  If it does-great, if it does not it's time to move on to more lucrative ways to spend your advertising dollar.

Radio Advertising
Many business owners make the mistake of overlooking this aspect of media advertising.  Radio advertising makes up about 8% of all U.S. advertising expenditures.  One of the biggest benefits of using radio advertising is the immediate delivery of message and the high frequency of message (you can repeat several times per day). Radio also works well to reach a local audience with a selective format.  In addition the availability of radio is high making this type of advertising easy to access. Typically radio advertising has a low cost per exposure and a low production cost.  Probably one of the biggest benefits of radio advertising is that the business owner can reach an exclusive and captive (yet mobile) audience. But radio advertising has it's drawbacks including but not limited to: the business owner is limited to only an audio message and there is typically high channel switching by radio users.  In addition the message expires immediately with virtually no shelf so the user must be able to distinguish it among high advertising clutter. The bottom line becomes thorough market research before committing any marketing dollars to radio advertising thus the business owner or marketing manager can determine if the advertising dollars needed will be effectively spent.

Television Advertising
Many people view television advertising as the highpoint of media advertising.  Combined advertising expenditures for broadcast and cable television are approximately 24% across the United States. The biggest benefit to using television advertising is the immediate delivery of message and high frequency of message (you can also repeat several times per day). Television carries a very high impact and is considered best for stimulating the senses.  There is high mass audience coverage and advertising in this medium is viewed with high prestige. But television also has very high costs for both production and airtime. There is also limited audience selectivity and like radio the message expires immediately with virtually no shelf life. There is extremely high advertising clutter that forces the user to be able to distinguish the target message quickly and effectively. Even with the drawbacks of television advertising this remains a highly effective way to reach a chosen target market.

Direct Mail
Many people might be surprised to learn that direct mail advertising receives a significant portion of advertising expenditure (approximately 20%).  This is partially due to the fact that this type of media advertising has the highest response rate of all media.  Direct mail can also be designed with a high level of selectivity and quality control making it desirable to many business owners and marketing managers. Because of the nature of direct mail it is also easy to measure for cost and response and easy to test for effectiveness. Creative marketing managers can develop direct mail advertising with a high degree of both personalization and flexibility. Direct mail can also have a long life span with no advertising clutter since the user is only opening your piece.  But direct mail can be expensive and must compete with an over saturation of the market as people get a lot of junk mail (complete with its negative conations).

Outdoor Advertising
While outdoor advertising receives the smallest amount(less than 1%) of United States advertising expenditures it is still important to the overall picture of media advertising. This type of media advertising has the highest reach and the lowest cost of all advertising venues. It also has a neighborhood level selectivity that other types of advertising do not with a very high frequency of reach. Outdoor advertising has a potentially high impact because of its size but it is limited to only very short and simple messages. There can be some image problems in poor locations with hard to measure results. Coupled with those drawbacks there are high initial costs along with the negative conations about visual pollution. Business owners and marketing managers will have to carefully determine whether outdoor advertising can be an effective part of their overall marketing plan.

Yellow pages advertising

This often overlooked vehicle of advertising can be an effective tool in the marketing plan. Yellow Pages advertising get about 5.9% of all U.S. advertising expenditures. There are a very high percentage of new buyers with a very high percentage of active buyers. Yellow Pages advertising completes the marketing process by bringing customers in and is the second highest media in ratings for believability. A huge benefit of Yellow Pages advertising is that it reaches a huge percentage of adults in the average month and is available in almost every home and business. It has a long shelf life and of course is open 24 hours per day. Yellow pages advertising is a measurable media for both cost and response and leaves the promoter with an ease of testing. Yet in order for Yellow Pages to be truly effective as a media advertiser the following drawbacks must be considered: There is high advertising clutter since all of it is ads and this is coupled with a high cost for competitive positioning. In addition more directories mean a lower reach per directory and more heading can mean lower reach per heading. It is also crucial for the business owner to know that generally you can only change your ad once per year.

Online advertising
This aspect of media advertising may very well be the leader. The advertising world has moved ahead significantly especially over the last 15 years and online advertising is now moving ahead of the more traditional forms of promotion vehicles like magazine and newspaper advertising. Studies show that more and more companies are increasing their online ad spending. This is mostly due to how cost effective it can be and how easy it is to monitor and track progress. There are many online sites that can give a detailed breakdown of the effectiveness of online advertising.