Too often in client conversations does the notion of advertising get laughed off. The three main motivations for such a quick dismissal are:

1. Too expensive
2. No ROI
3. We don’t need to advertise, all of our work is referral driven

I think I probably deal with #3 enough on this blog, so today I thought I’d look at the other two for a moment.

What normally gets dismissed is the idea of planned advertising or actually putting together a campaign. However, when a decent deal in a conference program comes up, firms are often pretty quick to throw out a few hundred extra dollars to maximize the impact of their attendance.

From my perspective, it’s the “one-offs” that should be dismissed from the marketing budget, if your firm isn’t willing to follow up with regular placements elsewhere. One ad a year in a program isn’t doing much for your brand awareness and often in the realm of AEC marketing that’s the only real reason we would advertise.

With all of this in mind, I couldn’t help but highlight Facebook advertising as a cost-effective advertising option for architecture/engineering firms and contractors alike. With all of the targeting criteria that can go into an ad, the dollars are incredibly well spent – even when you only evaluate the impressions received. Once you start to look at social reach, long term fans and interaction…the value increases exponentially.

Whether you follow AdWeek/Vitrue and believe a fan is only worth $3.60, or you lean towards the higher $136.38 value that Syncapse came up with isn’t really that important, because either way your ad dollars WILL result in fans – it’s almost a guarantee (unless your ads are really off the mark, that is). Not to mention the metrics that Facebook offers allow you to constantly monitor, tweak and improve your ads – a benefit only larger agencies generally have when it comes to online display advertising. And just for the record, I love the new metrics dashboard FB recently launched, very nice.

So, AEC marketers, I urge you to take a second look at your marketing budgets and consider whether or not a $500 ad spend in Facebook over the course of a month or two isn’t more valuable than that $500 conference program spot with a shelf-life of about two days. When it comes to ROI and cost effectiveness, there are few options out there that offer both and with so much control.