There is no doubt that we are living in the technology age. As a businessperson, you have seen the old marketing tools largely replaced by new, internet-based techniques. Ads are embedded into websites; pop-ups, as annoying as they are, continue to, well, pop-up on our screens to promote products; email campaigns are prevalent, especially the ridiculously irritating spam that shows up in our inboxes; instant online shopping has cut into the brick-and-mortar shopping scene.

With all of this change, many people feel that older marketing tools, like flyers, are no longer relevant. In fact, some even claim that flyer printing costs more than it generates in added revenue. Well, I vehemently disagree, and let me tell you why.

You can print only what you need

One of the newest and most popular techniques in advertising is to place an ad online, and pay the vendor who hosts the ad based on the number of people who click on it. While this is logical in a way, since you only pay when someone actually looks at your ad, it is still inefficient. You cannot control how many people – or what type of people – click on your ad. With flyers, that is not the case. You can print exactly as many as you need (be careful not to print too many) and put them in places where you know the type of people that will see them. Are you targeting college students? Put 1000 flyers or so in various places on campus. Are you looking for female customers between the ages of 30 and 50? You might want to put some appropriately themed flyers in the JC Penney or other department store. You have much more control over your flyers' affect than you do your online ads.

You can target a specific group

Not only can you target a specific group with flyers, in some cases you can create your own group! Organize a club of customers and people interested in your product or service. Have regular meetings, and plaster the meeting place with your flyers. While this may seem a bit unorthodox, it really is a great way to interact with your customers, which is the best way to improve your marketing strategy. Club flyers printing is actually a growing trend, and one you might want to look into.

You can make special offers

You can include, either on the bottom of your flyers or on the back, special offers for your customers. These come in the form of “pull-off” stickers or portions of the flyer that can be torn off. The benefit of this is that you can give customers a great deal, but you can control the exact number of deals you give away. That is extremely difficult to duplicate with internet advertising.

You can take advantage of location

When you do a flyer printing, you can post them wherever you want. That means you can target specific types of customers, as we talked about earlier. You can place your flyers in certain neighborhoods or on certain streets. There is a lot more flexibility here than in internet ads.