Value for money

I was recently treated to a night out at a new Indian restaurant in town, accompanied by family and friends. The restaurant setting was inviting and warm and we soon settled in. As we sipped at our wine and enjoyed each others company we noted the above average service and the well designed menu. It wasn’t too long before we received our eagerly awaited meal. The food looked good and tasted delicious, but I will admit, the portion size was small. Unfortunately for some at my table this proved to be a breaking point. Although I was more than happy with my curry it got me thinking about what makes something value for money and particularly how this relates
to marketing.

With food it can be easy to associate quantity with good value but I would argue that a tasty and nutritious meal, prepared with fresh ingredients is far better value than a large meal of lesser quality. The same principal can be applied to marketing and design.

Good quality design and marketing that accomplishes the goal it set out to do is far better value than more inexpensive marketing that fails to achieve. The key word here is ‘goals’. It is near impossible to measure value for money with marketing and design if you have no benchmark to measure effectiveness against. There is no point spending money on marketing if you don’t have a goal you are trying to achieve in the first place.

If your goal is to launch a business that you plan on franchising in the short to medium future you are going to need to build a brand that people are willing to invest in down the track. In the initial stages of set-up it may be tempting to cut costs and settle for a sub-standard brand, but in the future this is likely to cost you. When it comes time to franchise, if you need to re-design the brand to effectively compete in the marketplace, you are not only going to have to spend more money but you will also lose some of the awareness that was invested into it in the first place. You would have been better off paying more for a quality brand in the beginning.

In the case of advertising, some mediums are far cheaper than others to place an advert in but if your target market is not reading or watching then you haven’t received value for money. It is better value to pay more for ads that reach your target audience than to pay less for ones that miss the mark. It is also better to pay the same price for a few ads that your target audience gets to see than receive lots of ads somewhere they are not watching for the same money. Once again the key to value for money is in achieving the goal you set.

If you are planning on spending money on advertising or design, think clearly about the goal you are trying to achieve before you get sucked in to a deal that seems too good to be true. As for getting real value for money – give me the tastier, spicier, smaller bowl of curry any day.