Soak up Local Competition

[Andrej]

What are some good adveritising ways to get the local market in your hands? Newspaper ads?

[Chicken]

When I had a photography business, I advertised in those free local papers (though this was in a small town), and that worked surprisingly well. Apparently people actually read those things :D Other than that, a mailing with a follow up phone call might work for a more personalized and agressive campaign.

[NetSolutionz]

The best advertising locally is word of mouth. Find your niche, get 10 - 15 people on it. Then from there people just seem to pass the word along. This is where the "You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" comes into play.

Try it! Hope this helps.

[mPowerHost]

I have a few boards up in some local shops as well as at the city centre (or mall as you US folk call it)...I'm amazed at how badly it works when you consider the newspaper is cheaper and works much better.

I'm thinking of buying a db of all businesses in my area that run web sites on shared accounts but my council wants £200 for 496 entries...I think I'll do it anyway and see what it gets me.

[Robert]

Originally posted by Chicken:

When I had a photography business, I advertised in those free local papers (though this was in a small town), and that worked surprisingly well. Apparently people actually read those things :D Other than that, a mailing with a follow up phone call might work for a more personalized and agressive campaign.

The magazines were free, but how much was the advertising compared to the cost of a advertising spot in a paid magazine?

[JeremyV]

I did a local advertising campaign early this year, it was direct mailings to brand new businesses in my area. Getting the addresses was easy. My local county has a website that lists all newly formed businesses each week. There were literally about 400 new businesses registered each month, so I had a wealth of potential clients, as you know most new businesses don't have a website and may not understand the benefits.

So.. I went through the list and found 100 that seemed like they would benefit from a website. I know ANY business could have a website, but some are more likely than others to embrace the idea.

Once I had the list made, I ran the envelopes through my laser printer, printing their address, my logo and return address, etc. Then, for the inside I included our package matrix, outlining each package, their features, and prices.

Then, I printed a short 3/4 of a page letter. It quickly introduced my company, what we offer, and outlined in a very easy to understand way the benefits of beating your competition by getting a website on or at least having a company email as opposed to mybusiness@hotmail.com or aol.com... etc.

Then at the end I enclosed a coupon for 15% off any hosting package, and thus by using a special coupon code I could track the sales generated from the mailing.

All of this was printed on the company full color letterhead, included two of my business cards, etc. Really trying to drive the name and logo into people's minds, even if they don't choose to order hosting. Also, if they have a business card sitting around, they may give it to a friend who might need hosting, etc...

Anyway, after all said and done I think it worked ok. I had 100 mailings, 8 of them came back to me due to wrong or no longer existing addresses. So that left me with 92 that made it into someone's hand. I had 4 direct signups via the coupon code. That is about 5% return. BUT, after the mailing I also had quite a few signups from people who were located locally, but did not use the coupon. Since that was the only local advertising I did, I can only assume they also receiving the mailing and just forgot to use the coupon, or they heard about it from a friend who got one. I think it was 3 or 4 people that signed up that way.

So really it may have been closer to a 10% return, which isn't too bad considering how extremely cheap these mailings were to send out.

Box of 500 envelopes from staples = $4.00
100 stamps = $37.00

Then really, all of my stationery was stuff I already had on hand, or if you print it on standard paper it would cost almost nothing per each page.

All in all you can assume 40-50 dollars per 100 mailings, or .40-.50 cents per mailing. Sure, that 40-50 bucks may get you thousands of clicks on a banner or a link at a hosting directory, but I really feel brand recognition is important, as well as the benefits of giving people tangeble goods to look at rather than briefly seeing a link or logo.

I may be doing this again given the results the first time, but I'm about to get my own mailing scale and meter machine to help even cut costs and time down even further :)

[Chicken]

With a 5%-10% return, I'd not even consider doing it again, I'd make sure to do it again. Be sure to send it to the people you sent it to last time who didn't order, they might next time around.

[jvn]

Yes, those *free* throw-away papers are read and are well worth the $$$$. for service businesses. As a remodel contractor, it was my main ad method (other than signage on vehicle). Good service brought word-of-mouth referrals, but you need some ads to get the initial work. Same applies to hosting and most businesses.

I reccomend finding local companies that are advertising in the service directories and select the ones that fit your target market. The fact that they are advertising indicates they want more business - its just a matter of convincing them of the advantages of having their own site as mentioned above.

[Gatman]

Wow, I was considering doing that very same thing. My letter was going to use a tri-fold with different sections. It would start with something like 'Is your business on the World Wide Web? and 'It's not as expensive as you think!'. Then prices in a section, steps they need to take. Business cards etc.

I have several small aspiring web designers who are trying to find work who have committed to use my services exlusively so kicking work to them helps us both. The designers range in price and skill level depending on what the potential customer is willing to spend.

Hearing that makes me really want to get my campaign going. :)