Let's Talk Advertising (Don't say anything about word of mouth)

M

MaksimumAuto

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So last week I signed up for 4 months of YellowPages advertising. I'll be the 2nd search result in the Baltimore area on MSN, YeloowPages, and Iphone search engines. It's costing me $125 a month. The add hasn't gone live yet but I'm questioning it's return already. What lessons have you guys learned from your marketing campaigns. And please...please...please...don't say anything about word of mouth...I know it's the best.
 
pretty much.....doesnt work! waste of money...



online will yield better results, but the actual book will suck for you as no one uses it anymore, well hardly!



I did it and paid 155 per month for, get this.....ZERO phone calls off it!
 
It's really all about your location and how people in YOUR specific area look for services. by and by it's a total and complete waste of money. You'll find a few here and there that seem to be in the right location that people look it up. but ask yourself this question. If you were in need of your service and knew absoultly nothing about how to find it how would you do it? 99% of the time I just google it and go to whatever websites pop up first. (mine has always been #1 in the flint area and I never paid any company a dime to do it) I rarely ever even know if there's a phone book in the house much less use it. I've never bothered going on yellowpages.com or switchboard or any of those goofy a$$ sites for anything. And I don't think any of my customers do either. The very best things that have worked for me is simple. My website that is properly SEO'd (dreading having to do it all over again here soon) WOM (it really is the best) and sites like this. Think about it. If people google detailing what are the chances of this site popping up? most will give a click and maybe read a bit. Some might even sign up and check their region to see if anyone is local. etc etc etc... Be an active member of as many detailing related sites that interest you and people will find you. But tossing out a cool hundred plus a month to something that more often than not never works is a fools folly. Think about the the product or equipment you can get with that money. Since you've already signed on I truely hope your in one of those oddball locations that it works for and you see a ROI. But if not don't get too bummed a LOT of us have tried it before and learned the same hard lesson.
 
Advertising is the necessary evil of doing business. How successful your marketing is, depends mostly upon the audience you are trying to reach and your location in the country.



I do advertising on the Internet, Printed Media, and also radio. Having an internet presence today is a necessity. However others are still people in my area that do not use a computer, so I have to reach them by other means. 80% of my business comes from the internet.



Also, my market is filled with competition that just have a better location than I, so advertising is the only way to get my brand out there. The Yellowpages and Yellowbook will pay for itself if you could get just one full detail a month, which going by your site, you should have no problem in doing. The way I see it, the Internet is the best (google adwords I find to be fairly successful for generating calls), but others still have their place.



I like your site..... Good luck with the yellowpages, and if you have time and we have an opening on OCT 4th, maybe you can come down to the shop and we can talk more about advertising.
 
Your success with Yellow Pages will depend on your geographical area, and your type of market. You will find those of us where it has worked, and those of us that have found it useless.



Personally, in my area, it would be useless. For me, direct un-addressed ad-mail seems to work the best, and has yielded some good returns on the rather inexpensive cost of doing it. Your experience may be different if you tired my method, it all depends, so take anything we say with a grain of salt that we all live in different geographical areas.



That said, my personal thought, you could have done a lot worse with your marketing dollars. Good luck !
 
Find high traffic businesses that do not advertise other businesses very much and convince them to advertise your business! Give them a small stack of business cards to leave near their front desk/register and let them do the advertising for you. If you work at a business full/part time ask if they will help you advertise your other endeavor; if it doesn't interfere with their interests I don't see why they wouldn't oblige. I've gotten lots of business from advertising at my other full time job, including my boss! :up
 
Paid advertisements like adwords is a starting point. But it wasn't until I optimized my site that I really started getting anywhere from 15-30 emails a day for quotes or appointments. After getting to the 1st page with Organic Ranking(the left side of a page on a search engine) I received much more traffic and then once I made it to the top 5 the calls have become so abundant that I can pick and choose which jobs I want to do. Jakerooni touched on this a bit already, but also consider Google Maps. I submitted multiple times to Google maps with the target market's zip codes(Not necessarily yours) and nosw when you type in Detailing+My City I show up in the top three results. Now that, along with my Organic Ranking already gets me plenty of traffic. I can't tell you enough how important SEO is, because you can do great work and have a $20,000 website but if no one see's it your not going to be happy. I like the forum's on Digital Point. Look it up and you can learn a lot, and there are many other sites that can help you with SEO. Most people are going to go to the first 3 sites in the Organic results, so that's where you want to be, and like Jake said it doesn't have to cost a dime to get there, but it is alot of work and it doesn't happen overnight. Also, don't try to go with some company that says they can get you there in a week for $100, that's just a scam. Here's the link to Digital Point, if i'm breaking any rules, please just take out the link.http://http://forums.digitalpoint.com/



Hope some of this helps, I know it's alot to take in but just keep at it and when you're phone doesn't stop ringing, don't blame me.LOL
 
I have found that the phone book is the #1 place to get my business. Costs me about $450/year for per book (2 books in my area) but it is well worth it. The first month I got 3 details out of it and was excited. 1 of those customers told 3 of his friends and I was off and running. I would estimate since the phone book came out in June I have received almost $5K in detail bus from it.



I tried newspaper, radio, discount cards.. no response like the phone book.
 
i advertised in the Yellow Book for the first time this year @ $200 mo. and boy it was i disappointed. I might as well have just burned the money as i didn't get much response from it at all. I maybe received 6-8 phone calls from my ad and that was it. I could have used that $2,400 on other things for the business . . . . . but as everyone says it all depends on where you are. Some people have had great success with the phone books and others not.



I will never advertise there again as long as i live in hawaii.
 
I highly urge you guys to give directory listings a shot. Just make sure that you have a credible website for people to be directed to. I've made my initial $500 investment back within 3 days of going live.
 
Well I did the ad thing in the AT&T Yellow pages. It is the pay per call service. They have another number besides my cell so they can track it. I was supposed to get an email at the end of every month so I can dispute the calls. My first bill was $22, and it was 1 call from Kansas. I live in Ohio. Of course I pitched a fit and they removed the charges. I have never gotten another email with the calls listed. I can never get to speak to the right person when I call. They never return my call after I complain. One lady threatened to take me to collections. (we were online). I told her to call me right then and I could explain to her that I was a Mobile Detailer in Ohio. I could not go to Kansas or anywhere outside area code 614. Big headache. Do the free advertising on line, cards,fliers, etc. The ad in nice in the phone book though. Just wish AT&T would keep their promise. Still waiting on things to be corrected!
 
Pay per call...mhm....see I'm not liking that too much. I use my $125 per month ad on Yellowpages.com as a medium for people to use to reach my website. If they call straight from the yellowpages.com ad..then great...but I'm using it to get quality traffic towards my website.
 
Do you have the local "Pennysaver" type publications in your area? And, web search improvement has got to be a major benefit.



BTW, not to get to far off the topic.......your business name looks a lot like the name of a guy I know in this area who owns a hockey school, Dave Maksimum. Any relation, per chance??



I'd be interested in hearing about the effectiveness of various media outlets for this type of business.



One other strategy to consider, aside from those that have been mentioned here (and I suppose they all have different potential benefits, depending where you are and how well ads/PR is done) are things that don't necessarily cost money. For instance, a few ideas:



> Any opportunity for a local newspaper, local publication, TV station, business magazine, etc. to do a business profile on you & your business?? You might have to call them and "volunteer".



> Any local small business group(s) you might belong to, leverage, word of mouth? Chamber of Commerce links?



> Charity events that might highlight your business? Donation of something that gets you in a publication?



> Participation in any car show(s) in the area where you have a few customers show their cars in your "show area".... as examples of your work? Sort of like, "co-marketing", except they volunteer to show their cars with you. Maybe the wrong season; it might cost something as a vendor.



> Are there any radio/TV business highlight shows in your area? Maybe on local cable stations? I see them every so often around here. You might have to "call them and 'volunteer".



> Does anybody do a car maintenance/repair/DYI show for cars in your area; on radio (like around here) or on TV that you might be able to make an appearance on? You could talk about car detailing/car care...."highlight" winter preparation, as an example for this time of year. You donate the time & advice, they mention your name & business on the air. You might have to call and "volunteer".



Just my opinion (and ideas)..................I could be wrong :)



See ya. :wavey



PS - if they work for you, I'll send you a consulting bill :d
 
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