The PCS, or Permanent Change of Station, is a common occurrence that takes place throughout a military career. On average, military families will move at least once every two to four years. When it comes to advertising to military families, this means opportunities and challenges for local businesses.
Military advertising is nuanced because you have to simultaneously market to create loyal customers while accepting the fact that loyal customers will soon leave you. Learn more about how to advertise to the military community and use PCSing to your advantage.
What Is PCSing in the Military?
Military personnel and their families move to a new duty station through a Permanent Change of Station. Because of the nature of military service, troops can find themselves moving from place to place to fulfill their duty and advance their careers. You can use this as a tool to reach new customers as a result.
It all starts with receiving orders from a commanding officer or another higher-up. This is when families are assigned their new base. As a result, they’ll need to make arrangements to relocate and start over, just as any other family moving would do.
From a business perspective, local companies are both losing and potentially gaining customers within the military community. This is why it’s important to understand how to effectively advertise to military personnel.
The military community commands well over $1 trillion in buying power. Staying in front of relevant audiences can be difficult when you’re hitting a literal moving target, but understanding the impact of the community and how to market to it can help your business thrive.
A Major Impact on Local Businesses
On average, Americans move around 12 times in their lives. It’s a common experience we all share, and it’s understandable that the process includes reestablishing roots.
This means finding new places to shop, eat, dance, receive healthcare, and do anything else that includes a good or service. The process of establishing yourself in a community as a military member means becoming a part of the local economy.
At the same time, PCSing can present challenges to local businesses. This is because it also means that after years of establishing a customer base, you lose part of it due to their requirement to move.
Reaching the military audience is more important than ever as economic hardships and the potential for more and more brands to advertise themselves are affecting the ability of companies to get their message out to potential customers.
PCSing can affect plenty of industries. The entirety of any local economy has the potential for identifying military families and providing their goods and services accordingly, but here are some of the industries that benefit the most:
- Real Estate.
- Home Services.
- Banking and Financial Services.
- Car Dealers.
- Retail.
- Hospitality.
- Healthcare.
From contractors to realtors to local dealerships and more, if you’re a local business owner near a military base, military marketing strategies are imperative for your company’s overall strategy.
Reaching the Military Community Undergoing a PCS
As with any market segment, if you’re going to have success reaching military families, you’re going to have to meet them where they are, with the right intent, and at the right time. Military marketing comes down to becoming engrained with the military community by providing solutions that meet the needs of troops and their families.
There are several methods to do so, but online marketing is a great option for reaching military personnel. Considering the amount of moving military families undergo, using the Internet allows businesses to market with localized offers directly to their prospective customers.
How To Advertise to Military Families PCSing Online
If you’re going to reach military families online, this means going where they are within the digital space. It also means putting forth content relevant to the military community, keeping them engaged, and accurately targeting the platform.
Of course, this can be a time-consuming endeavor, which is where we can help. Here at MilitaryAdvertising.com, the name says it all. We create curated content that drives traffic from the military community and provides ample ways to help you advertise to them. For example:
- Online advertisements on our websites.
- Custom offers and lead generation.
- Collaborative content curated for your brand and delivered right to military families.
These are just some of the ways we help local businesses reach the military community. Especially when you consider the frequency with which military members move through PCSing, using digital advertisements can help business owners reach more customers with less resistance.
If you are looking to reach this important market segment for your local business, MilitaryAdvertising.com is here for you. Contact us today to find viable solutions that help your company generate leads and create new business within the military community.