Does Advertising Increase Probability of Winning?

[tosca]

Why do we advertise our dogs? Ego? Promote a stud dog? Promote a breeding or litter? Or - do we advertise with the hopes that it will improve our chances to win?

Does advertising improve winning? I've had judges tell me 'How can you not put this dog up when you can see how much the owner is spending on advertising?' Based on this comment, one would think that advertising would improve your winning frequency?

But - with the expenses of showing going up almost daily - gas, entries, parking, hotels, food, cost of grooming space, handling fees, etc., etc., are we becoming a 'can/can't' sport? Do you have to choose between going to a show or advertising a win?

What do you think?

[Elaine]

I think that the answers will vary depending on whether you’re showing a special or a class dog. We do not have any specials out and we don’t do much advertising beyond our website. I can’t say for others, but for us, advertising on our website is simply of way of letting people know how proud we are of what we’ve bred.

Now, if we were to special a dog, we’d definitely include advertising as a big part of the cost, and we’d try to have a regular priority space with Dog News and the Chronicle. We would not be focused so much on the breed magazines. I see the breed magazines as a way to advertise semen or puppies to people in the breed, but not really a top priority for campaigning a dog in the Breed ring.

And what was it Pat Hastings used to recommend: if you're on a budget, save up until you can place three consecutive ads in Dog News... but a single ad will have little impact.

I think most judges say they don't pay much attention to ads, and yet they seem to scan Dog News cover-to-cover and can tell you the winning records (ad copy ) of all the heavily advertised dogs. So, I guess it works.

About the cost of advertising a top special... it is so far beyond us, I can’t even begin to imagine the money the big guns spend. When you look at the advertising budgets of dogs like the beautiful little white Poodle Vick, there is really no point in even trying to compete. Ron Scott does a fantastic job (along with Infocus by Miguel by Miguel Betancourt www.infocusbyMiguel.com ) but they are not on my budgetary planet.

[mosso]

In answer to the question: GOSH! I hope so! :)

I'm a huge fan of ads (I love to look at them most of all). There are different categories of them, I think (some ads can be more than one of course):

1) instructional (trying to address a part of the Standard)
2) sales ads (litter or breeding announcement - indiv dog sales)
3) fancier type (an ad meant to share a dog or win with the fancy)
4) working type (meant to generate wins, make friends and influence people)

There are probably more types.

The type can dictate the magazine of course (you might put a working-type ad in Dog News, but a fancier-type might only go in a small breed publication or specialty catalog), as well as content.

I'm working on an ad for myself (vs someone else) right now ... I'm only taking out the one ad, am putting it in a breed-specific magazine ... I won't be specialing this dog. So, I want to make it memorable (maybe one that folks will remember in a few years ... sort of like how many Afghan Hound fanciers remember the ad with the barely clad fellow that appeared on the back of the Afghan Hound Review, and dang if I can remember the dog...) - and I want there to be a record, if the internet, gawd-forbid, shrivels up and disappears, that fanciers can go back and look at to see what the dog looked like.

Of course, the other thing is, these breed-specific magazines, they're the stuff that future-judges look at - probably future judges don't buy collections of the last 10 years of DogNews, like they do of their breeds' magazines - so I guess they have value that way too. I recognized a lot of breeders/exhibitors from their ads, even if those ads were from the <gulp> 1980's... (when plaid ruled?).

But here's something - I saw a dog, who was heavily advertised in the all-breed mags, win big, ranked high, and I don't think that dog won solely, or even primarily, due to the ads ... I think he won, even with his major movement flaws on both ends, and incorrect parts, due to lack of knowledge of the judges ... I say that, because those same judges put up equally faulty dogs, at other shows, who were NOT advertised. The common thing that I could see was "flash", and a very "stylish" appearance. It was eye catching. Incorrect, but eye catching.

Likewise, I saw a judge put up, consistently, animals with the same movement flaw - I heard others say the judge was very political (before and after that show). But, I don't buy it. I think the judge mistakenly put up the same flashy-looking movement flaw consistently. If I had a dog I was showing with that same flaw, I'd probably take it to that judge! (and I'm a nobody!).

Another aspect of advertising (sorry to be so longwinded) ... I suspect that what you see is what you get. The more folks see a certain thing, the more it becomes acceptable to them (unless of course they chant to themselves "high shoulders are bad, high shoulders are bad..." for 6 months at a time ... or something similar). I think it's human nature to become accustomed to things, and seeing them again and again, well, one could easily fall into the trap of seeing a flaw as less "awful" (for want of suitable caffeine levels...).

of course we expect judges to maintain their knowledge of what is within each breed's Standard, but I think judges are human.

So, I think ads can increase winning, yes, probably, but maybe not quite in a way that could be termed "political", at least not as often as I hear cries of, ringside, from the "losers". I like to think most folks have the common sense to spend money on a decent dog.

I dunno, what do you think?
stir

[Elaine]

Ann probably has some great insight here, since she’s been involved in advertising for decades and has seen trends over time.

My thoughts are these: Publications like Dog News, Dogs in Review and the Chronicle are important for a special, but you really have to have the big bucks to run your ads regularly or you’re pretty much throwing your money away. I am on the fence about the value of print advertisements in the Breed magazines. I guess it depends on your breed and how successful your particular breed magazine is. Last time I saw Afghan Hound Review I thought it was stunning. It seemed well supported, the ads were beautiful, the dogs were beautiful, and I can see using the magazine as a reference for years to come. For Dobes, we now have two monthly magazines... count em T-W-O. I hope this doesn’t step on anyone’s toes here, but two per month is too much. The last time I saw issues of both breed magazines (June) they were so small, they looked more like Breed Pamphlets.

Seems there simply isn’t enough interest in our breed to sustain two monthly publications. The two are dividing an already dwindling market, and I don’t see that as beneficial. The size of the publications leave me with the impression that the interest in the breed is way down. And, add to that, we typically aren’t seeing the best dogs in the magazines anyway. Even more on point, what we see in many of the ads are photos that should never be published. Many many many win photos from show photographers belong in the back of a drawer; they are from the wrong angle, snapped at the wrong moment, etc., conveying to the viewer that the show photographer was simply impatient to move along to snap the next dog / next mediocre photo. Seems that photos taken by anyone but the show photographer are almost always superior. Consider that there isn’t even one win photo used in all of Trotyl's ads, except the class win from the 2006 National.

People seem to use the Dobe Breed magazines less now a days. Not sure why that is, maybe because people have websites now and like having absolute control over the photos they publish, (e.g. being able to change the photos once a week, once a month, 5 times a day, etc. maybe it’s just cheaper to put photos on you own website... maybe people realize that they get more feedback from their websites than from a print ad... really not sure). For us, when we see a Breed issue that is not well supported with good dogs, it turns us off to even considering placing an ad in the next issue.

[tosca]

The problem is thus: Advertising's likely/probable/obvious influence of judging has created a 'have and have not' situation in the dog show ring. Due to the influence of advertising, it seems that lesser quality animals may be pushed to the forefront, oftentimes leaving higher quality animals whose owners are not well-heeled standing in the dust.

With regard to the 2 doberman pinscher magazines - this breed has never supported 2 magazines that I can recall in almost 30 years in the breed. Now, with the cost of showing escalating exponentially, I can't imagine that 2 magazines can, or will, survive.