New Business Advertising - Where What and How ?

Joined
27 Sep 2008
Messages
124
Reaction score
0
Location
Merseyside
Country
United Kingdom
The title says it all really.

New business start up and trying to get customers in a recession - how to do it ?
No sarcy answers please :mad: although some will not be able to resist :D .

In your own Self Employed experience what forms of advertising work and are value for money ?
 
Sponsored Links
Do you know what type of customers you want and how far are you willing to travel?
What's the business any way?
 
The business will be 3 fold.
Heating and boiler repair recovery (power flush).
Domestic electrics.
Handyman (mainly just to earn some money).

I will also market myself to the estate agent and landlord market seperately.

I am mainly interested in how people have got the public phoning them for work.
ie What forms of advertising have been succesful for you.?
 
Where ever you advertise (classified ads might be a good place to start), make sure you talk about benefits for the client, not the normal:
we do this and we do that etc.

Same goes for the introduction letter/leaflet for estate agents etc.
 
Sponsored Links
I see you are from Merseyside, and you will be my competition, but because I'm kind I will let you know how I plan to do things.

Im kind of in the same position as you, once I get my public liability I will be advertising in the local newspaper to start off with (little 2 liner adds don't get you work), gonna go for a largish advert around £100, I will be placing this once a month.

Then I may have leaflets printed, I will use vistaprint.co.uk for my leaflets, as they already do a good job on my business cards, which is something else you should consider, a professional business card to leave with the customer once you have done a grand job in their house :)

It is going to be really slow for possibly a year or so, and you will probably earn less than minimum wage in the first year, but (so I've been told) if you stick at it, and really plan things out, keep all your accounts spot on, word of mouth will spread the good quality workmanship you provide.

Also been told not to undercut yourself, you will get really really busy but not be earning any capital. Not as many people will go for higher quotes (not saying rip people off, just not undercutting), but would you rather do jobs for 4 customers at £50 each, earning you £200, or jobs for only 2 customers, at £100 each, earning you the same.

There are peobably free business courses in your area which give advice & tips from advertising to keeping your accounts, I went on one called Wirral Biz, could have got up to £500 grant which I wouldn't have had to pay back either, I'm sure it will be available to you too.
 
Just want to add that if you did go to Wirral Biz, the grant would not be available to you unless you live in Wirral, but they will still let you on the course and see business advisors etc..
 
In your own Self Employed experience what forms of advertising work and are value for money ?
.

A well signwritten van is a must.

an ad in your local paper will be your best bet to establish your name in your locality.

yellow pages and thomsons local can be quite expensive! i would get up and running first.

dealing with landlords and estate agents can be difficult as well
:confused:

good luck.
 
good luck with your new business, its a trying time out there but theres one thing for sure - without advertising you will get lost amongst the millions.

i value yell.com (dont bother with the book its rapidly losing users due to the internet revolution )

Yell.com weblinks are relatively inexpensive ( i recouped my entire years advertising in one month via yell.com )

next thing is a website - you dont need to go mad there is alot of free web design software and templates out there to help - or set aside some money for a webdesigner - alot of companies will let you pay over 12 months if you commit to a search engine promotion scheme too.

free / cheap advertising can come via "breakfast meetings" not everyones cup of tea and results arent instant, but could be worth it.

flyers -- spend a little extra and get them designed as well as printed - this can go along way - how many black and white naff ones do you throw without even reading??

look into marketing colours -- sounds silly but certain colours are subconciously better than others for advertising - google it!!

be professional when quoting and dress smartly - no-one likes a tradesman covered in crap turning up and walking in their nice clean house - oh and always at least offer to take your shoes off, this shows that if you respect their house and them before you get the job you are likely to do the same when working on it.

good luck with it

mark
 
Between Jan last year (when I started up) and August I delivered 1500 leaflets through local letterboxes. Small leaflets are good because they can go on the fridge - or in the drawer with the takeaway menus - ready for when you're needed.
Since then I have been just about fully booked soley on repeats & recommendations based upon those leaflets.

I did try 3 months in the local paper, but didn't get a whole lot of joy. And I do have a free entry in the Yellow Pages & Thomson which picks up a few odds & sods.
 
That's great Johno.

That is the kind of rec I was after. I was also thinking alot about leaflets drops because I figured I would meet people at the same time.

How did you choose where to deliver the leaflets and what where your most productive drops ?
 
Webmarketing, simple but informative websites, email marketing and handing many options to contact us is what's working very well for us (and has been for the last years).
Paper ads: only in a monthly small publication (filled with news from the little villages it is delivered to, affluent areas) works well too for us.

Yellow Pages, Yell.com or BT online- waste of money.
 
To be honest I just leafletted the houses closest to mine, and worked outwards - Of the 1500 delivered the furthest I went was about a mile!

I steered clear of the less well off areas (especially the council estates). The newish estates (20 years old) have been good - the houses are close together so you get good coverage for your time, and they are usually owned by working families who are short on time.

Targetted the very exclusive estates may let you charge more, but it'll take considerably longer to deliver the leaflets due to the long drives!

Also get friends & family to have a few leaflets on their desk at work - as people drop by they can pick one up if needed.
 
is any1 looking for a apprentice in plumbing i've just done 1 year at collage if i dont get a apprenticeship ive just wasted a year. i dont no any1 who has found an apprenticship yet, its vertualy imposible
:(
 
Sponsored Links
Back
Top