Generally speaking, any advertisement will take some time before it starts to work. Some marketing experts reckon that it can take customers as much as five exposures to your message before they will consider buying what you’re offering.

If you doubt this, next times you watch television make a note of how often the same advertisement will come on during your favorite program or a night’s viewing. Anywhere between three and five seems to be the magic number. So if you’re planning to run just one ad in one publication then you may as well as forget it and save your money.

I have found that it usually takes about three months of advertising in a monthly magazine before I see any return on my investment. Of course it may take longer, but I make a point of reviewing our advertisements every three months and those that aren’t performing well are either axed completely or revised.

When working out your budget try to come up with a six-month or annual marketing budget. Then make sure you to stick to it. It’s so easy to get carried away with bigger and better ads in the vain hope that this strategy will reap rewards. It won’t and it doesn’t.

Work out a budget that you can comfortably afford – and stick to it.