What is wrong with local marketing?

What is a good average marketing budget breakdown for a local ski hill, in a city of about 100,000 with nearly no tourists?

• Let's say I have $25,000 to spend on marketing locally. What is a good breakdown to spend on TV, Radio, Print, Outdoor, and Online percentage wise.

• Answer:

  So first of all, there is no set ratio. How much you spend on each element is determined by a combination of your budget, your audience, and your product. There are pros and cons to all the mediums you've listed. Your breakdown is going to be interesting because you have a very select group of people and your advertising, I am assuming, is only out there seasonally, which means you can focus most of your budget over a 4-6 month period. So back to your original question, I think you should consider the fact that you are targeting a niche audience--people in your immediate area who ski. According to a 2007 NSAA report, about 5.5 million people ski in the US--or ~1.8% of the population. In that case, even if we figured that, on average, people who live near a ski are ski more than the general population, you are still looking at a small segment of the population. So, now before you address the tactics, consider what your goal is. Is it to create awareness of the ski hill? Are people possibly unaware of its existence? Is it to promote events or special deals?  All this matters because the strategy will dictate the most effective tactic to use. I agree with Sean that Google Ads would be a good route--especially if you target people looking to purchase equipment in your area. And since it is PPC, you are only paying for the people that come to your site--which as Sean said above, you can get a good idea of how useful your ad money is. Still, radio can be a good tool for timely promotions, and relatively cheap compared to TV, to reach your audience. Especially if you can identify your audience and run ads at specific times when you know your potential customers might be open to considering using your ski hill--maybe during traffic reports on Thursdays and Fridays. Of course, depending on where you are and the station that has your audience, it can get expensive pretty quickly. But with promo codes and the like, you can still track success rates. And since you don't need to run ads 7 days a week, you can probably limit the flight schedule and save money while still getting the reach you need. In your case, TV would probably be too expensive; print and outdoor probably wouldn't help out unless you are just trying to drive awareness. So, without looking at your specific audience and demographic information. I would say splitting between online and radio would be the best way to go. And with radio, I would look for some kind of sponsorship deal--for instance, sponsoring a traffic report can be a good way to go, but can get expensive quickly. Like Sean said above, I would focus on online strategies--which can give a lot of value and can extend pretty far without costing as much as other mediums--CPM. Identify important keywords--maybe lump in with people searching for new equipment. Of course, since you are searching for a local audience, teaming up with local ski shops could also be a great way to boost attendance.