When it comes to marketing and advertising – whether it’s through digital platforms like social media accounts or SEO content or more traditional routes such as radio, TV, and print – you don’t have to – nor should you – pay full price.

What financial advisors call “cost synergy” – the savings in operating costs that result from the merger of two companies sharing the same goals – has mostly been explored in terms of savings in the supply chain, production, and shipping costs. However, it is possible to extrapolate this principle to gain a reduction in advertising or marketing costs.

There is a fine line – a balancing act if you will – that needs to be walked. Surviving in the corporate world requires attention to two seemingly diametrically opposed goals: to destroy one’s competitors and to simultaneously work in concert with other businesses. 

Let’s face the facts: nobody, no company, brand, or charitable organization reaches success on their own. Rather, successful entities become successful by carefully forming alliances and working together – pooling resources – on shared goals.

In this short article, we’ll take a look at some of the more instances where synergy helped companies reduce their operational costs, notably in terms of marketing and advertisement.

Hollywood – Would You?

Perhaps the most overt and well-known example of synergy being used to cut marketing costs can be found in the big movie studios of Hollywood. It can potentially cost a lot of money to promote a major motion picture. But many production studios have found ingenious ways to cut these costs significantly.

We have all seen examples of a movie studio teaming up with a fast-food chain to simultaneously promote their latest movie and to promote the fast-food chain in question. We have also seen examples of this type of punctual merger between movie studios and manufacturers of watches or cars.

The cost of the advertisement is shared between the movie studio and the partner company – fast-food chain, car manufacturer, etc. This cost-saving strategy works consistently for both companies. If it didn’t work, we wouldn’t be seeing so much of it. The question we should be asking ourselves is: Why don’t we see this apparently effective strategy more widely implemented on a lower scale?

Social Media Influencers

Social media may have changed the game as far as marketing is concerned, but it has not changed the rules. The desire for companies to associate with well-branded celebrities is still strong (though what constitutes a celebrity and the paths toward celebrity status sure have changed). And, likewise, celebrities – especially those on the come-up – are also looking to solidify their stature by associating with companies or brands they feel confident identifying with.

Being a social media marketer is one of the best entry-level marketing jobs on the market. But just because it is accessible to workers with little to no experience doesn’t mean that the position is less valuable. It only means that it does not call for an extensive academic background or lots of work experience in order to be carried out effectively.

A social media influencer may take photos of themselves or upload video content about their recent vacation in an exotic location. While this has the appearance of a vacation, to the social media influencer, this is a part of their branding – and as such it does come with considerable expense.

This kind of operating cost can be easily offset with a synergy approach: an airline that can give the social media influencer a free ticket in exchange for being mentioned in the influencer’s posts; a hotel chain offering free accommodation in exchange for being featured on the influencer’s social media pages, etc.

This type of practice is widespread. And it seems that both the social media influencers and the sponsoring company are reaping rewards from this partnership. The only mystery is why we don’t see this type of relationship as often in more traditional forms of advertising.

The More the Better

If you are given strict spending limits in regard to advertising, which scenario would be more favorable to you and your company?:

• 10 advertising spots in a given publication, TV channel, or online platform

or

• 20 advertising spots in the same publication, TV channel, or online platform for the same price

The answer is clear: the better option is more exposure, more advertising spots for the same amount of money. This isn’t a pipedream. It can be done through synergy – and is done by companies worldwide and on a daily basis.

Advertising or marketing costs can be shared when the message is meant to promote multiple entities.

A few practical examples

A shipping company needs to ship a product. This shipping company has the option of either producing marketing content that shows them shipping a parcel (for which they will cover 100% of the marketing cost), or they can produce marketing content that shows them shipping a product (for example, a yoga matt). In the case of producing marketing content that includes a product (i.e., yoga matt) the marketing cost can be shared by both the shipping company and the manufacturers of the yoga matt.

A dental surgery has recently opened in the area. They use social media to try to attract new customers. The dental surgery covers 100% of the marketing costs. 

On the other hand, the dental surgery also uses relatively new customer support software. If the advertisements run on social media would feature the customer support software, the dental surgery would share the marketing costs with the developers of the software.

It’s a win-win for both entities:

• The dental surgery shows that they are cutting edge, using the latest technological advances to better serve their customers, and customer support is a priority for them. Win.  
• The developers of the customer service software are shown to be trusted by serious businesses. They are shown to offer a useful and reliable product with real business applications. Win

The Bottom Line

Too many businesses are focused on surpassing -or outright crushing – other businesses rather than on working with other companies to achieve common goals: reach a greater audience of potential customers while reducing operating costs such as marketing.

We see, on a nearly constant basis, this type of symbiotic relationship at work in Hollywood between major motion picture studios and fast food chains, food and beverage companies, car manufacturers, etc. And we see this type of synergy used to mutually beneficial effects with social media influencers and small or mid-sized start-ups.

Are you taking on the burden of 100% of the advertising and marketing costs of your campaigns? If so, why haven’t you explored possible partnerships that could significantly reduce your costs while helping your company reach more people and solidifying the brand.