I need some advertising sugestions

[SignManiac]

I just printed 500 new color flyers, front and back, that I will send somebody out to drop off at all of the business's in town. Never tried it before so should be interesting to see what comes of it. Getting ready to go full retail again, now that I have the right employees in place.

 

[FireSprint.com]

We also got some nice jobs in town by being nice. I drive around and when I see a business starting to move in or get the place ready, I bring a simple coroplast sign that says Opening Soon. Tell them there is no charge and to call me once they are open and I will come back and pick up the sign. So far, everytime I get the job for their main sign and more. Being nice goes a long way.

That's a fantastic idea!

 

[royster13]

Go to every show possible and bring samples of your work. Couple months ago, we went to a horse show with nothing but samples of canvas prints. These people love their horses. We made some very good money there. We also got some nice jobs in town by being nice. I drive around and when I see a business starting to move in or get the place ready, I bring a simple coroplast sign that says Opening Soon. Tell them there is no charge and to call me once they are open and I will come back and pick up the sign. So far, everytime I get the job for their main sign and more. Being nice goes a long way.

A similar idea is to give a landlord a "For Rent" sign.....Put your info on the back so when a space is rented the new tenant sees your name.....

 

[CanuckSigns]

A similar idea is to give a landlord a "For Rent" sign.....Put your info on the back so when a space is rented the new tenant sees your name.....

Usually the landloard takes the for rent sign down before the new tenant moves in.

 

[DSC]

Nothing beats knocking on doors.......

I second that - I know guys that drive around and look for lights that are out, signs that need replacing or refurb etc..

HIT THE PAVEMENT!! Good Luck!

 

[premiercolour]

We believe it is completely normal to have slow business in month of nov and december. People go out for vacation, family gatherings. Most signs are done perhaps Oct or early Nov? I would find a few buddies in the same business or have wider view angles of business owners( we are doing the same thing), talk about your business structure, reconstruct if needed, go for the 2013. Price too low to not making enough profit, Price too high to not making enough sales. Making just fine is never enough for human being. Greedy always is there. Being satisfied at current is the hard part.

 

[Happyprinter]

One resource you might look at utilizing is the Post Offices new EDDM mailing program. Target market only those areas you want to reach. Postage averages about .145 each to mail a 8.5x11" flyer. A lot of room on both sides to advertise specials etc... I also own a printing company and a lot of my customers are using the program and having great success. Good luck

 

[FireSprint.com]

Donate your time or signs to charity. (We can help with this...)

Make sure you tag the sign with your company name and phone number so others know what you're doing for your community. Also, make sure your shirt and truck have your company name when you're dropping it off.

Not a quick way to new business, but it will make a difference in the long run and it's the right thing to do.

Sure beats sitting around.

 

[FireSprint.com]

Another thing we did from time to time was charity event banners with corporate/community sponsorship. We would do the banners at cost or for free, and then need to contact all the businesses that sponsored the event to get their logos. Of course we would prominently display our logo on the banner as well.

It's a good reason to call on a business and talk about signs & branding.

 

[FireSprint.com]

I guess you could go even one step further and offer to re-create logo/artwork (for a fee of course) for those companies that love to send a 50kb thumbnail of their logo and insist that this is all they have!

Ahhh isn't that the truth... That's why we went wholesale, I just couldn't handle squinting at the emails they sent...

 

[anotherdog]

Lots of great ideas here, one thing to add is in lean times diversify. Add products that your existing customers have to currently go elsewhere for; print, t-shirts branded giveaways like magnets etc. There is always something they need that you are in a good position to supply, especially if you have the logo on file.
All of these can be sourced wholesale and will add to the bottom like without bumping overhead.

 

[401Graphics]

Bumpin this back up so new members can see and maybe add to it.

 

[visual800]

Join.........

• PRE
• BNI
• Chamber of Commerce
• Advertise in the Sunday paper
• Advertise in the Merchandisers
• Letter your vehicle and park it at different locations throughout the week.
• Always be talking about business
• Look around town for places that have bad looking signs
• Look around town for places that have worn out signsCall old customers and remind them of your services

As far as making calls and beating the bushes and seeing bad signs that need to be redone these are great suggestions.

Also I can say to check your towns planning commision reports as they will give headway on who is building and whats going on and you can have the jump on it.

Also check some large real estate developers website as they will post who bought land or office buildings, thats a good one for me! I use the hell out of that one.

YARD SIGNS are the abolute best when you complete a job ask if you can throw a sign out in yard. Nobody does anything until someone else does it

Sign up as a vendor for universities in local area, city vendoer, county vendor....etc...

Now as far as joining the Chamber, save your money. The chamber only cares about taking money not investing back in you. Dont join or fall for any of those BBB, SBA bullcrap networking places. All they are is salesmen offering you what is nothing more than a waste of your money. Networking is also what I call the "kneepad drunk party". Waste of time. Standing around talking to people about pointless crap to make an impression. On the way home after the party everyone is trashing business cards.

Advertising done correctly may be effective. Newspapers worthless, no one reads those anymore. Mailouts are pointless cause when we go thru mail you go thru all junk and staright to the bills and trash the rest, dont fall for this.

 

[Locals Find!]

As far as making calls and beating the bushes and seeing bad signs that need to be redone these are great suggestions.

Also I can say to check your towns planning commision reports as they will give headway on who is building and whats going on and you can have the jump on it.

Also check some large real estate developers website as they will post who bought land or office buildings, thats a good one for me! I use the hell out of that one.

YARD SIGNS are the abolute best when you complete a job ask if you can throw a sign out in yard. Nobody does anything until someone else does it

Sign up as a vendor for universities in local area, city vendoer, county vendor....etc...

Now as far as joining the Chamber, save your money. The chamber only cares about taking money not investing back in you. Dont join or fall for any of those BBB, SBA bullcrap networking places. All they are is salesmen offering you what is nothing more than a waste of your money. Networking is also what I call the "kneepad drunk party". Waste of time. Standing around talking to people about pointless crap to make an impression. On the way home after the party everyone is trashing business cards.

Advertising done correctly may be effective. Newspapers worthless, no one reads those anymore. Mailouts are pointless cause when we go thru mail you go thru all junk and staright to the bills and trash the rest, dont fall for this.

I disagree on the mailouts. If done with skill they can be effective tools. You have to send out something interesting. That makes people desire your message. I mail out recipe of the month cards. Recipe on front my info on back. Usually they are simple things that can be done in 20 mins or less. They work great. Everyone eats so, use it to your advantage. I get lots of calls from those and people actually look forward to getting mail from me now.

 

[HDvinyl]

What site do you steal your recipes from?

 

[John Butto]

What site do you steal your recipes from?

this is the one I receive some time back....

 

[HDvinyl]

Sounds like a recipe for disaster!

 

[JgS]

Go pay your clients a visit. Bring donuts or something with you. Be nice, ask if they need anything, offer discounts.

I intend to embrace the slow season and only come into work the days the ski slopes are closed.

 

[premiercolour]

As far as making calls and beating the bushes and seeing bad signs that need to be redone these are great suggestions.

Also I can say to check your towns planning commision reports as they will give headway on who is building and whats going on and you can have the jump on it.

Also check some large real estate developers website as they will post who bought land or office buildings, thats a good one for me! I use the hell out of that one.

YARD SIGNS are the abolute best when you complete a job ask if you can throw a sign out in yard. Nobody does anything until someone else does it

Sign up as a vendor for universities in local area, city vendoer, county vendor....etc...

Now as far as joining the Chamber, save your money. The chamber only cares about taking money not investing back in you. Dont join or fall for any of those BBB, SBA bullcrap networking places. All they are is salesmen offering you what is nothing more than a waste of your money. Networking is also what I call the "kneepad drunk party". Waste of time. Standing around talking to people about pointless crap to make an impression. On the way home after the party everyone is trashing business cards.

Advertising done correctly may be effective. Newspapers worthless, no one reads those anymore. Mailouts are pointless cause when we go thru mail you go thru all junk and staright to the bills and trash the rest, dont fall for this.

lots of good info here.

 

[Hicalibersigns]

Well, someone mentioned SEO on the original thread a year ago, but I'll be darned if I can find a website for 401Graphics (and frankly, if I can't find it, then for all intents you don't have one). The internet has basically rendered newspapers, yellow pages and even a lot of Television (for small local businesses) null and void. If you don't have a decent website you are missing the advertising boat in a big way. We started our business 2 1/2 years ago, and for the first year 90% of our business came from our website. About 70% still does. I'm not saying that we don't have lulls, everyone does. It seems that during the time that school is out, our business is slow, and of course we experience the holiday slow down in November and December too. Believe me that the vast majority of folks looking for signage of any particular stripe start on Google. Lots of them end there too. They find a website that appeals to them and they call or fill out the contact form. Of course traditional methods are effective. Those cold calls and show contacts, etc. will yield results, but so does the internet when folks are looking there (and most are). It's called inbound marketing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inbound_marketing You owe it to yourself to find out about it.

 

[toucan_graphics]

What I have done in the past, and plan to do again now that the slow times are upon us, is to take a photo of crappy run down signage at local businesses and Photoshop a mock-up of my vision of that company's new signage. Then I print the original photo and the mock-up together on photo paper with my logo and contact information. I try to deliver this in person to the business but have also mailed them to the potential client. If I don't get any work on the spot, my phone will ring within a few days about 60% of the time without any further effort....80% if I do follow-ups. I don't always get the big jobs, but I get enough work to keep me busy and pay the bills.

This method has also gotten me calls months after I gave up on a prospect.