Facebook

[banditboy]

Does anyone here use facebook to sell items or promote their business..?

I have a appliance repair business and would like more local customers... would facebook work , is it expensive...

Many thanx in advance,

 

[dhutch]

I would be interested in this. Obviously the key would be to target people by region and only advertise to a very local area.

I presume you are already on yell.com etc


Daniel

 

[banditboy]

ive not used yell.com...

i had enough grief getting yellow pages to stop giving me grief after using them....

 

[dhutch]

ive not used yell.com...

Well upto you, but thats where I would first look for a trades person, bar getting a recomendation.

Trade finder websites?



Daniel

 

[Johnmelad]

Yell.com

More like yell.con

 

[misterdubya]

My business uses networking sites. It's very productive, if your marketing is right. Facepuke generally earns me a weeks wage per annum. Twitter is far more successful.

 

[banditboy]

nice to know mister d

any pointers on how to use titter and fagbook for selling...

 

[Alarm]

My business uses networking sites. It's very productive, if your marketing is right. Facepuke generally earns me a weeks wage per annum. Twitter is far more successful.

Rash creams?

 

[Norcon]

Doesn't face book mean posting your "face" image up? Well thats what I'm assuming its about. Mug shots of idiots. 600 million of them I believe.
What potential customer of a business would want to see the big ugly mug shot of the proprietor posted up for all and sundry to see?

 

[Paul Barker]

In error

 

[Paul Barker]

ive not used yell.com...

Well upto you, but thats where I would first look for a trades person, bar getting a recomendation.

Trade finder websites?



Daniel

Unfortunately trade experience has proved the high cost of advertising in yell.com having their website built and going in the book has a very poor yield. It nowhere covers it's own cost. Pretty much the same for all directories as well.

If enough people were like you it would work, but clearly they are not.

The crux of the matter is, not enough work anywhere. The fix is not for tradesmen to spend more of their money which they aren't earning chasing the few jobs in competition with 10 times as many other tradesmen than 5 years ago when there was also more work.

The answer is to do a high quality job build a local reputation by word of mouth and reduce overheads so the present economic situation poor turnover puts food on the plate instead ofmoney in the pocket of advertising media who have become far too gready. You and we shall have to ride the storm of this recession by cutting your cloth to fit your pocket.

 

[First-time-buyer]

Ive found a few tradesman for just having a good honest website.

I once had an electrician who website gave a landline number, but the landline number did not work. Google earth brought up a random house so we sacked him off.

For me, I will look on google earth, make sure you look like a builder/electrician/plumber (van outside etc) before i contact you.

 

[Alarm]

PMSL, thats got to be the most stupid idea going.

Reason, some do not park the vans in sight (Garage, at the works office).
Some work from unmarked vans/cars.

So from Google Earth you decide of anyone is actually a trades person.

Funniest post for ages, put some more up.

 

[Paul Barker]

Also google earth is notoriously inacurate. I used to try and view properties from it before going. but I often found and this is more than just 10% of the time, geting on for 50% it send you to the wrong place. You look at a roof on it (for solar panels) and you are looking on the wrong roof. One occasion in Scotland it showed me a house a whole field away from my prospective customer.

Everyone in the trade (solar ) knows how inacurate it is.

Anyone who tells you otherwise is a complete amateur.

So how can you judge a tradesman from it? you can't even be sure you are looking at the right house.

there are extremely acurate maps available of houses which are the correct ones and the detail is much finer. But that service you have to pay for. Those people have a photographic log of all houses they can do you a very acurate and reliable survey which includes knowledge of shading issues and proper roof measurements. That service is well worth paying for and that service would not send you to a house in a different field.

 

[seasickstevie]

Mr Barker's post is most surprising!

I tend to use Google Street almost every time before I leave the house. I can't recall being 'sent' to the wrong address once. Sometimes it's impossible to see the house number, but usually move further along the street and you will find one, unless they're big font gardens. It's handy when Google's camera went around on bin day, 'cause some people paint their house number in big numerals on the bin.

It seems first-time-buyer thinks that the camera car managed to somehow go past everyone's house when no-one was at work. Very bazaar!