Built consumer awareness by optimizing high advertising spend across multiple channels
HotJobs had great success using banner advertising in 1997, but significantly decreased their spending in this channel for a few years when advertising prices began to skyrocket in 1998. A year later, they had great success advertising in the Super Bowl. Their ad cost $400K to produce and $1.6M to air – in a year where the company generated $2.5M in revenue. The ad drew a huge number of visitors to the site even during the game, which came as a surprise to the executive team. HotJobs also achieved great press after the Super Bowl as they were the only advertiser to make their creative available to the press, who used it in news stories reviewing Super Bowl advertising.
via » HotJobs Case Study: Vertical market entry strategy the key – Startup Review Blog.
This is a great example of how effective advertising can be when done in the right way and at the right time. The important thing to remember from this example is also how much risk the company was taking. They invested over half of their annual revenue to what was most likely only a 30 second spot. You’ve got to plan things out extremely well and then take the risk.
In order to ensure a sufficiently large supply of listings, HotJobs gave the product away for free to the first 100 corporate customers. Many corporate recruiters would then refer consumers to HotJobs.
What’s the lesson to be learned here? You MUST find ways to incentivize your clients. That’s a good principle all around. Building trust and creating incentive is the foundation for a successful business.