Benefits Disadvantages Is dropshipping for you?

9. Marketing
195
Low-cost marketing strategies
Now that you know who to market to, it’s time to do the actual marketing. First I’ll 
introduce some free or low-cost marketing strategies, and then I’ll go over some 
tactics that involve a bigger financial investment.
Display ads
The marketing world has come a long way in the last several years. Display ads 
used to be those annoying top bar or sidebar banners that would flash to get your 
attention. Nowadays, display advertising is much more organic, which means they 
can form an effective part of online marketing strategies.
Take a look at this display ad from Volkswagen:

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9. Marketing
196

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9. Marketing
197
This is an excellent example of 
what great display advertising looks like
. It’s 
interactive, eye-catching, and fun. Don’t get me wrong: there are still tons of awful 
ads on the Internet. If you want your ads to get people coming to your store, you 
have to follow some important guidelines.
Make it about the customer.
No one likes to be sold to, but people do like 
products that benefit them. Your ad should solve a problem the viewer is having. 
How do you find these problems? Through research, especially psychographics. 
A specific product you sell can solve one or many problems, but you have to find 
out which angle to take. In short, make your ads about how the viewer’s life will be 
better with your product.
Be thoughtful about where to run ads.
Dropshippers who run ads and place them 
everywhere see few results. Remember, you’re not selling to everyone in the world. 
Heck, you’re not even selling to everyone in your niche - remember what I said 
about negative buyer personas. You need to think strategically about the kinds of 
sites that would benefit you the most.
A good technique is to visit influential sites in your niche and look for an advertising 
page. You’ll often find this in the footer or sometimes the navigation bar. Ideally, 
you want to build relationships with these influencers. Start by sending an email 
inquiring about ad space, asking about rates, etc. Don’t try to force anything, 
and don’t work with sites that aren’t right for you. Let the conversations happen 
naturally, and you might be surprised at what happens.