I've been in business for 4 yrs now , and have passed the supposed 3yr marker when most business go belly up.
I'm a Computer/Network engineer and when I started and I had almost zero cash, so advertising spend was limited to say the least.
I had my vehicle at the time signwritten (£90) and parked it outside the local Maplin's and PCWorld every weekend for a month. I got several profitable calls from that , several of whom I still service today. The cost was £5 per day for the parking + the initial signwriting.
A lineage ad in the Friday paper was next, which is by far the best form of advertising there is. I did box out my advert for a while and calls declined sharply. I am guessing that people think if he has a large prominent Ad he'll be expensive.
YP covers its costs, just! This is the least effective form of advertising that I have tried. As mentioned previously, when you complain you are told its your fault as you should have a larger Ad. Yeah right!
Yell.com is hellishly expensive, and to be honest I couldnt justify the cost- return.
YP are easy to negotiate with, as stated in a previous post they set the original price ridiculously high and they then negotiate down. No different to dodgy double glazing outfits. (applogies to any members who are dodgy double glazing salesmen
)
Havent used Thompson , so cant comment.
My next step is some email marketing to local businesses, and see how that goes. This is attractive as its as free (except your time).
The only other marketing i do is with exisiting clients. Each new customer gets a bundle of cards to hand out to friends and family (or bin), whether they ask for them or not.
My dear departed father used to say that making a successful business was easy these days as there are so many con artists / dodgepots and people giving dire customer service that it was easy to diferentiate yourself and get the clients. He wasnt wrong, customer refferals now account for over 60% of my business.
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