If you know how to use offline advertising for your internet business, you could get a load of customers that you otherwise would not have had.  Not only that, it could bring your online business to the attention of local people that could give you business just because you are local.

Most internet marketers never use the benefits that local advertising can provide them, although those benefits could depend a great deal on the type of business you have.  There are several ways in which you can advertise offline, both locally and nationally, and which you use could depend upon your available budget. Forgetting price for the moment, here are the various options, though I am sure that you could think of others.

Is your product sports or health related?  Or does it relate to some group or club that has local premises?  Why not go to your local sports club or health center and ask for permission to put up a poster advertising your products or services?  Stress that you are helping the club to provide a full range of services, but if they insist on payment, then try it for a while and compare the price with the return.  You should normally be allowed free adverts, especially if you are a member of the club.

Many local stores and shops allow adverts to be placed in the window or door of the shop, or inside on a specially designed rack.  These are normally charged but should be no more than a dollar a week or so.  The great thing about such local adverts is that the population in your town or area get to know your name, and associate you with somebody that can provide something for them should they ever need it.  You can get a phone call weeks or months after placing the advert.  You must include your phone number in your advert in order to gain trust, and make it easy for people to contact you.

Your local press is another excellent way of getting known locally as an expert in your field.  Local press adverts are normally affordable, and you can advertise both your products or services and your website in either the classified adverts section, or even take out a block advert withing the publication itself.

There is also the national press, although you will pay more for these adverts. However, the publicity you get might be well worth it.  If you can afford one initial advert then try it, and decide on your future national offline advertising strategy from that.

Going back to local, how about local radio?  Local radio can be a very fruitful advertising medium and also costs a lot less than you might believe. If you have a good confident speaking voice you can even record your own adverts yourself.  You can keep recording at home till you get it as perfect as you could and then send the CD or MP3 file to the radio company. In fact, you can have it recorded by a relative or a friend and it can be worked upon till it is right.

All the radio station has to do then is to play the MP3 file, or CD, whichever medium they prefer to use, and you get local exposure.  The same is true of national commercial radio, although the more listeners the more you will have to pay.  However, offline advertising need not be restricted to store adverts, newspapers or radio.  How about television?  There are some local commercial TV stations that will broadcast your ad, but for the time being these do not come cheap.  Its worth a though though.

Magazine adverts are very popular, and how often have you come across a magazine advert for money-making ideas that are no longer used online?  They have been demonstrated to be questionable online, and some MLM programs belong to this group that have now gone back to magazine publishing.

That is how many started off, such as some of the earlier Ponzi schemes whereby you send so much money to the person at the top of a given list, and add your name to the bottom. Theoretically OK, until you calculate how many people would have to be involved after only five repetitions involving only twenty letters sent out, and some recommend 100.  That means ten billion participants after 5 repetitions of the letter – don’t make me laugh.

However, we are getting off-track.  You can do well with magazine advertising if such an obviously faulty scheme can. Advertise your own program or business using a magazine, and you are sure to get a load of customers.  The same is true of putting your URL and phone number on the side of your van or car, and using a good signature on all of your correspondence:  make sure that all your letters include your URL and email address after your geographical address.

However, no matter what offline advertising method use, whether it is free to you or very costly, its effectiveness is calculated from whether or not it gives you a profit.  A free advert making you $10 a week is worth less than one costing $1000 that earns $1011 dollars a week.   That is how to use offline advertising for your internet business:  compare expenditure with income, and if the latter exceeds the former, then it works for you.