I hope you enjoy this little video. Aside from the cartoon, I think it’s fun because the ‘product positioning’ is WAY overdone! It’s like a bad movie where every popular brand out there is visible, even though the story is just so-so. Read More→
Helping small businesses for over 20 years
Archive for Advertising
If you’re one of the small local businesses trying to move your marketing online, this article is for you. Perhaps you already have a website, a blog, and even a page on Facebook. If you do, great! You’re making progress. Depending on whether you are doing the work yourself or hiring it out, you may have missed the opportunity for some of the best free advertising you can get — listings in some of the larger online directories… the ones that count. (Being in a bazillion small meaningless link-farm directories doesn’t help and you want to stay away from those!)
The biggies:
- Google Places (aka Google Local)
- Bing Local
- Yelp
- Manta (click “Add Your Company”)
If you’re a restaurant you should also be in:
Entering the data into these sites will be a bit repetitive, but that’s okay. Different search engines serve up results from many different sources and you want to make sure you’re included in the ones that matter. This is a really basic list, there are lots of other good, solid directories, but folks just starting out should worry about these first.
Most of these sites also offer upgraded ‘paid’ listings or other features. For now, just stick with the basic free listing, you can always upgrade later. Ideally these listings will include a link back to a website, but if you don’t have a site, put up a page on Facebook and link to that.
When provided with the opportunity to enter a description about your company you are writing for both a human audience and computers. For the humans, it needs to be well written sales copy that tells the potential customer what benefits you offer them. Why should they come to YOUR business and not the guy down the street? For the computer audience (search engines) you need to make sure to include your primary keywords. Those keywords are likely what your customers are typing when they sit down to find you online. Give it some thought, and ideally, do some keyword research at Google’s keyword tool. It does make a difference: the search engines are smart, but they may not be able to tell the difference between “dog sitter” and “pet sitting service”. Customers are more likely to type in ‘air conditioner repair’ than ‘hvac service’, which is industry jargon that the general public doesn’t use. Part of the challenge is writing for this dual audience, AND making it fit in the limited amount of space. The great part is, this information can be re-used over and over, including on your own web site!
The book “Duct Tape Marketing” by John Jantsch is easily one of my favorite business marketing books. Jantsch takes tried-and-true marketing concepts and breaks them down into understandable, usable, basic methods – suitable for the average business person.
In no particular order, here are my favorite strategies:
- Identify your ideal client (page 2). This is actually chapter 1 in the book, and for good reason, if you don’t know who you are marketing to, you will have no focus in your message. If your business is handyman services, your ideal client is probably a 40-ish woman who either doesn’t have a man around the house or has one that isn’t getting household projects done. How you relate to that market segment is completely different to say, how you relate to a single 20-ish woman.
- Develop a core marketing message (page 20). This isn’t the “mission statement” popularized in the 80s that became a self-aggrandizing joke. Jantsch focuses on setting one’s business apart from the competition. It’s more than just a slogan, too. For Hampton Roads locals, think in terms of WAVY-TV’s “10 on your side” brand. If they didn’t actually deliver on the message, it would be nothing more than a slogan, but the community at large knows WAVY’s history of getting involved. It’s what set’s them apart from the other stations in the area.
- Match your business identity to your message (page 39). Identity includes everything from your logo to your to your website to your outgoing voice mail message. All the components of your identity should clearly identify your company, it should appeal to your target market, and it should differentiate your firm, as well as support the most important aspect of your core message.
- Writing an effective ad (page 115). While this strategy was developed with focus on small display ads, the premise and techniques are perfect for Pay-Per-Click (PPC) ads, such as on Google or Facebook. He talks about writing headlines that get read and a powerful call to action.
- Become an expert (page 156). This is just part of the whole PR chapter, which is quite involved. I’ve seen the same concept in other books, and that is to become a source for reporters when they need to get an expert opinion on an element of a story. The PR chapter goes into detail on how to reach the right media outlets and even outlines the elements of a good press release.
These are just some of the high notes from the book, which is chock full of practical techniques. Jantsch builds on the basics of good marketing practices in a way that the average Joe-business-owner can understand and immediately put to use.
While Microsoft has had some growing pains in developing their “Bing” search engine, they seem to be moving along. In any case, since Bing is on the rise it would be foolish not to add your business to their local listings. It’s free. Free advertising is ALWAYS good.
https://ssl.bing.com/listings/ListingCenter.aspx
You have to have a Windows Live ID, but that only takes a few minutes to set up, so don’t use it as an excuse.
Make sure to take advantage of all the category and services fields, just like on Google Local, the more information you provide, the better your listing will work for you. For instance, instead of just saying “handyman”, spell out “tile repair, cabinets, faucet installation, etc.” Really use the space they provide to get specific to capture more of your potential audience.
From what I could see, the only way Bing Local is handling verification is through the regular postal mail, so it takes a few weeks. Perhaps they will add the instant phone verification like Google has in the future. Who knows?
Take 10 minutes RIGHT NOW and add your listing. And if you don’t already have a Google local listing, add one immediately!
Press releases are a great way to get media coverage of your business as well as links to your website. The trick is getting the press releases to the right people. There are several ways to go about this, some are free and some cost money.
For now, let’s consider the free options. There are many, many sources out there that will distribute your press release for free. I found a fairly comprehensive list of free press release sources in an article on Mashable.
Another source of contact information is to pay for access to a site such as Mondo Times. They maintain comprehensive lists of staff members, editors, etc., for most newspapers, magazines, tv stations, etc. Each record contains the name, phone number, fax number, email address, and street address. The basic membership gets you access to each individual record, but they can be painstakingly slow to build one record at a time. The costs for specialized purchased lists can add up quickly.
When choosing to promote your business with press releases, you may want to consider hiring a professional writer to help compose it. A professional can help maintain the focus of the information, as well as write in a professional format that media folks are used to reading. I work closely with a few professional writers, so please contact me if you need help with this part of your marketing campaign.
