Social Media for Sign Shops?

[mhyson]

I work at a very small sign shop in a growing suburb outside of Washington DC. I've taken on the task of being in charge of our various social media accounts (facebook, instagram, and twitter at the moment), and I've been trying to leverage these tools to bring in more and most importantly NEW business/customers. Do any of you have advice to offer? Any tips and tricks on how I can use social media to make more people aware of our business and what services we offer? Any advice you can offer would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Design it Graphics]

I actually use Facebook alot for advertising, but I DO NOT message customers first via facebook I cannot find an email from their website/profile. (unless they message me and even then I ask for their email, I feel that it is somewhat unprofessional and easy to lose track of orders etc).

I also have found "local communities" or groups where I now and then post some of my work. This shows that I am busy and some of the quality of work that goes with my name. This is what really has made the difference for me.

I've paid 0 dollars yet into adwords or any signage just strictly business to business, 2 months in I'm breaking even and then some to pay off the $$ for the equipment (we bought ours out right instead of leasing).

In other words, its a tool use it. Whether it brings you work or not who knows.

 

[Letterbox Mike]

Best advice is use social media, especially Facebook, to show the world your company's personality and culture. People get sick of the same old "look what we made today" post over and over. Mix it up. Definitely slide portfolio type posts in there, but use it to show fun behind the scenes things as well as showcase your clients (not work you do for them, but what they do) and local charities or events you support. On our facebook page, we get by far the most results from goofy non-business related posts.

Perfect example, last Thursday we had a duck wander in the front door, we took a picture of it and posted it to our wall. By the end of the day, we got a notification from Facebook saying that post got more attention than 95% of our other posts, and the viral rate was through the roof on it. And on Friday and today we've had 4 or 5 clients stop in the shop and ask about the duck... It may not be about signs, but it raises awareness of the company for sure.

 

[mhyson]

Thanks for the advice! I just signed up for a service called buffer app. It let's you kind of stockpile social media posts (photos, articles, etc.) and it posts them automatically throughout the day. It helps me keep working and not feel like I've got to constantly keep getting on Facebook! Our main issue right now is that our page only had 6 likes! What are some good ways to get people to like your facebook page?

 

[Marlene]

thank isignia for the good advice on the facebook page. we just found out we had one and have idea who set it up back in 2011. I had to claim the page and have been working on getting it to be something we can actually send people to look at. it was a hot mess when I found it.

 

[mhyson]

At what point though does the investment of time in social media pay off though? Does paying for Facebook ads to get more likes bring in business?

 

[Pat Whatley]

What Insignia said. There are a couple of ad/branding agencies I follow that very rarely post any of the work they do but they are pretty prolific at posting real life "day in the life" kind of posts. I've never met any of their employees but dammit, I want to. The concept is brilliant....they're selling themselves. They're making people want to work with the cool kids. The work itself is secondary.

 

[Letterbox Mike]

they're selling themselves. They're making people want to work with the cool kids. The work itself is secondary.

Exactly. To be frank, the product any of us offer in this industry, with very few exceptions, isn't rocket science, hard to find or hard to duplicate. Posting nothing but pictures of your work doesn't really give people a reason to jump out of their seat to work with you. People want an experience, they want to be part of something. Every company has something to offer clients aside from the tangible product they actually sell, and social media is the perfect platform to "market" that aspect.

That doesn't mean you should never put work pictures up, you absolutely should, you obviously don't want people to forget (or not know in the first place) what you do. But it has to be a healthy mix of "look what we did" and "look who we are" posts.

These guys are doing it right: https://www.facebook.com/wiedenkennedy