Promoting your business

Marketing Monday – Kids and Letter Box Drops

September 5, 2011 By Melissa Leave a Comment

Depending on your business, letter box drops are a good way to get the word out about your business to your local community. They are also a great way to get some exercise and spend some quality time with your kids.

Babies enjoy being outside and having a walk in their pram. Many babies also enjoy sleeping in their pram. When doing a letter box drop, a pram is a wonderful way to carry all your fliers.

Toddlers enjoy helping Mummy. While doing your letterbox drop, let them put the fliers in the letter boxes. It may take a bit longer to do a block than if you didn’t have a helper, especially if you have to lift your toddler to help them put the flier in the letterbox, but it will help your toddler to feel important. Reward your little helper with a play in the park and a snack halfway through.

As your children get older, you will be able to give them more responsibilities. You may be able to do one side of the street while your child does the other. Be sure to explain that “No Junk Mail” signs mean not to put fliers in them!

Teenagers may enjoy earning a bit of extra pocket money by doing the letter box drop by themselves, or with friends.

Remember, in order to get the best results, you need to to a letterbox drop consistently over a period of time, rather than just as a once off promotional activity.

Filed Under: Kids & Business, Promoting your business

Marketing Monday – Ask for referrals to grow your newsletter list

August 29, 2011 By Melissa Leave a Comment

One way you can use to get more subscribers to your email list is to invite your current subscribers to recommend you to their friends. There are a number of ways you can do this:

Set up a referral form where your subscribers enter their email along with the emails of up to 5 friends. Send these friends an introductory email about your busines and newsletter and invite them to sign up. Make sure in the email you say their friend has recommended them, and reassure then that they have not been added to your list, until they go to a form and sign up themselves. There are “refer a friend” programs you can use to set this up.
With your newsletter, include a “forward to a friend” link. Some email programs have code you can enter to track this for you, including whether or not the friend signs up.

You may want to run this as a referral drive and offer a gift or free postage to any current subscriber who gets 5 friends (or more) to sign up.

With both of these ideas, don’t automatically add these people to your list. They have not given you permission to add them as their friends are referring them. It would also be a good idea to include a note explaining to your subscribers what you will send their friends, maybe include a copy of the email you will send them. Reassure your current subscribers that you will not automatically add their friends to your email list.

When a friend of a subscriber signs up, be sure to send your subscriber a thank you note for recommending you to their friends.

Do you have any other ideas to encourage people to refer your newsletter to their friends?

Filed Under: e-Newsletters, Growing your business, Promoting your business

Do you put all your eggs in one basket?

August 23, 2011 By Melissa Leave a Comment

Are all your eggs in the one basket?

The Internet is giving business mums many new opportunities to start a business, ones that didn’t exist even a year or two ago. With these, it can also be tempting to put all your eggs in the one basket.

For example, I have seen Mums start a business that is 100% on a Facebook page. They don’t have a website or even an eBay or Etsy shop.

I have also seen Mums who have a website, but do nothing to encourage their Facebook followers to join their email lists.

This can also be a danger for sales. I have seen many Mums who have an online shop they rely on for their sales, then something will happen to their website and they haven’t attended any markets or have any alternative method to reach their customers.

So, are you putting all your promotional and sales eggs in the one basket?

For sales, there are many different places you can sell: your own website, handmade products can be sold on sites like Made It and Etsy, and there are sites such as Ethikl and Blue Caravan. Then add offline sales at markets and fairs and you may also want to stock your products in bricks and mortar stores. Another option is to offer in-home parties, like party plan. If you are looking for a market, visit Market Angel for a fantastic list of markets around Australia.

For promotion, there are many, many different things you can do, both online and offline. For some ideas, check out our Promoting Your Business category.

To grow your business, and give you a contingency in case your sole means of sales or promotion stops for some reason, don’t put all your eggs in the one basket.

Filed Under: Growing your business, Promoting your business, Slider, Starting Out

Marketing Monday – Competition Prizes – be specific

August 22, 2011 By Melissa Leave a Comment

Competitions are a great way to promote your business and grow your database. Offering prizes to other businesses for their competitions is a great way to get the word out there about your business.

One thing I’ve learned from running competitions is to be specific with the prize details. Let people know the colour, size, fragrance or any other details. This can help them decide whether they want the prize or not and may encourage more people to join.

One example I saw recently was a business offering a “hamper of children’s toys”. There were no details of the sex or ages of the toys. As I have 2 boys in primary school, I didn’t enter in case the hamper was full of baby toys or items only suitable for girls.

This business would have been better served to write a list of what was in the hamper. including whether or not they were appropriate for boys or girls and what age the toys were aimed at. Even if the business didn’t want to include a full list, a list of the main items would help people choose what is included.

So, when you are listing a prize for a competition, be specific with the prize details. You may find you get more people entering, and more people entering who really want the prize you are offering.

Filed Under: Competitions, Growing your business, Promoting your business

Friday Five – Do more than Like a page

August 19, 2011 By Melissa Leave a Comment

Most business mums I know have a Facebook page, and like many, many other pages. Especially with the various marches and silent tagging that go on.

Facebook are also constantly changing their rules and enforcing them, resulting in many pages being removed without notice.

So, this week I have five ways to do more than simply like a Facebook page to support your favourite business mum businesses. As word gets around, some of the business mums who like your page will do the same, helping you all grow your businesses.

Subscribe to their newsletter – even if you receive regular updates by looking at your wall and their page, keep up to date by subscribing to their newsletter. This will also give them a way to contact you should anything happen to their page.
Buy something – this may seem obvious, but the best way to keep a business going is to support them financially. So, buy something from your favourite business, and do so through their website rather than through their Facebook page.
Link to them – there are many different ways you can link to your favourite business mums businesses, and not to their Facebook page (though you can do this too). This could be a links page, referring to them in a blog post, recommending them in your newsletter. By spreading the word about them, it will help keep them open, and you never know, they may link back to you.
Add a comment – if the business has a blog, or their business IS their blog, add comments as you read a post. Bloggers love comments and this is a great way to show them that you are reading and value their posts.
Encourage them – being a business mum can be lonely, and it can be easy to wonder if we are doing the right thing. Encouragement could be as easy as sending them an email or a card in the mail to say that you love what they are doing and to keep up the great work, as well as the above ideas.

It is important to support fellow small businesses. You can also encourage your Facebook likers to do the same to you.

Filed Under: Facebook, Friday Five, Growing your business, Promoting your business

Changing Face of Samples

August 18, 2011 By Melissa Leave a Comment

Samples - things are changing

I have written before about samples in your business, though when I looked at the last posts I’d done, they were about a year ago. It’s amazing how things change in the space of twelve short months.

Blogging has really taken of in the last few months, especially with the relationship between bloggers and brands. As a result, the way businesses is giving out samples is changing, and this is something to think about in your business.

A while ago I read a blog post about samples and about how a tiny sample will not a blog post make. I wish I had bookmarked the post as I couldn’t find it when I came to write this post.

Tiny samples, such as sachets of hand cream, may be fine when doing mass marketing, such as giving away samples at an expo, however if you are promoting your business at an event, small samples may not cut it any more.

If you are expecting bloggers to attend the event, then consider carefully what you are including in the bags.

While a full size product is better, this can be expensive, especially for a small business. You may look at producing a half size product or some other way that will show off your business in a positive light and encourage extra promotion with bloggers and social media.

With a bit of creativity, you can come up with something that will showcase your business and give people the encouragement to not only buy from you but blog about your business too.

Filed Under: Blogging, Branding, Promoting your business

Random.org – an easy way to draw your competition winner

August 10, 2011 By Melissa Leave a Comment

Random number generator

An easy way to grow your email list is with a lucky prize draw. Inviting people to enter their details via a form or writing them down in a table, then choosing a winner is the easiest way to get entries, however drawing them can be hard.

You could write down all the details on pieces of paper, or write numbers on pieces of paper, then draw them out of a hat (children have fun doing this), however if you have hundreds of entries, this is not practical.

A cool tool to use is the random number generator from Random.org. You enter the end number, and it will give you a random number in the range you have specified. All you need to do next is find the entrant with that number and you have a winner.

You may want to do a screen shot and create an image of the result to show people, however this may not be necessary.

Remember, with a random drawing competition, you may have to get a permit. Check with the gaming commission in your state.

Note: This is not a sponsored post.

Filed Under: Competitions, Growing your business, Promoting your business

Marketing Monday – How much to spend on advertising

August 8, 2011 By Melissa Leave a Comment

There is a question I often see being asked around the place.

How much money should I spend on advertising?

There is no easy answer to this question, or simple formula to work it out.

Some businesses do all their promotion through word of mouth and other free marketing techniques, and there are others who may many thousands of dollars of their advertising.

When looking at your advertising, there are a number of things you should look at:

Your budget – can you afford to pay for the advertising?
Your target market – how well does the website, publication, radio station or TV show reach your target market?
Promote your ad – is your ad going to be on a page with a lot of others, or are they part of a limited run? Are they going to be one of 6 in an ad break or one of 2?
Other opportunities – are there any additional opportunities available to promote your business as part of the package?
Return on investment – remember with any advertising to track any sales to make sure you have a return in your advertising investment.

With any form of advertising, you will need to do it more than once, so make sure it’s in your budget. You are less likely to get a return for one ad in a magazine, for example, than if your customers see it over three or more issues.

Filed Under: Promoting your business

Friday Five – Making the most of a march

August 5, 2011 By Melissa Leave a Comment

On Monday, I talked about growing your Facebook fan base through Marches. Today I have a few tips to make the most of the marches.

Participate Fully – one of the comments I made on Monday was they only work if everyone participates fully. Well, make sure you are one of those people. If for some reason you can’t sit for the whole time and like pages, let the organisers know and be sure to come back later to finish the march.
Welcome people who post on your wall – A lot of people just like the posts on the wall. I’ve found that it’s a lot friendlier and you get a better response if your reply to each person to welcome them to your page. Some people may post a comment as well, be sure to reply to their comment, even if it’s simply to thank them for their comment.
Make your posts different – it may be tempting to post the same thing on each persons wall. This is likely to be seen as spam by Facebook and your posts will be hidden. Change your posts slightly each time and this can reduce the chance of your post being hidden.
Make a comment – when you are posting on walls of new pages, take some time to comment on the business. It could simply be that you like their products or photos. It doesn’t have to be long or detailed, just something to show you are taking an interest in their business & not just posting because it’s part of the march.
Post something on your page – With marches, there is the danger that your wall will be taken up with lots of posts by others, and your own posts will be pushed down. Take a couple of minutes to add some posts of your own. One of the easiest ways is to re-post a relevant blog post via Networked Blogs. For example, last Friday I was in a hug with Mums Who Make and re-posted the blog post about finding your hidden fans, especially as it was relevant to others on the hug.

I hope these tips will help you to make the most of any marches, hugs, tours, or any other similar program to help you grow your fans on Facebook.

Filed Under: Facebook, Friday Five, Growing your business, Promoting your business

Friday Five – Reasons to move to your own hosting

July 29, 2011 By Melissa Leave a Comment

Last week I talked about having your own domain name. This week is all about having your website in your own hosting space. Here are 5 reasons for moving your website to your own hosting space.

Flexibility of design. Many free websites are limited to using their templates. You may not be able to upload your own design to reflect your business and branding. Having your site hosted will give you much more flexibility in your design.
Flexibility of features. Many free websites are limited to what you can do, even a blog hosted on WordPress has its limitations. With your own hosting you can do much more with your webspace.
Support from your host. In most cases, a web host has great technical support to help you get your website online, and give ongoing support when needed. They will also keep an eye on things to keep your site online.
No Redirection. If you have your domain pointing to your free web space, there is a redirection. This may not hide the fact you are using free web space, so customers may notice and this can affect your credibility as a business. Having your site hosted will mean you don’t have to worry about this.
Pay by the month & flexible plans. Many websites will let you pay by the month and offer flexible options so you can upgrade your account as needed – as the size of your website increases as well as the traffic you get. This means that hosting is not as expensive as you think.

I hope this helps you decide to move your site from a free website package to your own host.

Filed Under: Friday Five, Growing your business, Promoting your business, Starting Out, Technology