What do you believe are the best ways to promote/market/advertise a company without using money?

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Permalink Reply by Matt Crowder on May 14, 2009 at 9:50pm

I own a web design and internet media marketing firm. I would gladly give you free advice, but to give you good advice, I would need an idea of what it is that you are marketing. Can I get a hint? :)

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Permalink Reply by Kevin Hood on May 15, 2009 at 3:12pm

Without knowing what the business is . . . website(s), email marketing, social media, networking events / groups, etc would all be worthwhile. I would buy a domain, get a web host (minimal investment) and get to work.

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Permalink Reply by Matt Crowder on May 15, 2009 at 3:44pm

However telling everyone here what it is would be one great step to getting the word out.

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Permalink Reply by Lauren Fiedler on May 15, 2009 at 4:00pm

It is a restaurant. . there is your clue :)

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Permalink Reply by Matt Crowder on May 15, 2009 at 5:23pm

By far the greatest marketing for a restaurant is word-of-mouth. Find a way to get a buzz going about the new place to eat in town. depending on your niche and your target demographic, whether you live in a small town or large town, nearby colleges. Get the word out with coupons for a free appetizer or something like that and then give people a reason to come back and tell others. Another way to spread the word, and once again it depends on your demographic, is social media, blogging, flyers etc. Free marketing is available and effective, you just have to be creative and it can be time consuming. Hope this helps.

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Permalink Reply by Doug Wilkins on May 15, 2009 at 4:13pm

Hope it is ok to join in this topic. I need advice on how to promote/market/advertise my new website too for free. Any ideas? It is a site that connects families with in home Daycare's.

Here is the web address if anyone would like to comment.
http://www.littledaycare.com/

Thanks,
Doug
_____________________________________________
Littledaycare.com

Connecting Families with In Home Daycare
_____________________________________________

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Permalink Reply by Matt Crowder on May 15, 2009 at 5:31pm

That's a great idea for a website by the way. I recommend some geo-targeted SEO and joining some local forums like http://indianapolis.momslikeme.com/ or http://www.indyschild.com/
I'm sure if you Google around you can find more places like that. Keep in mind that in forums, they don't like spammers so keep it lite i.e. " I have a web site for connecting families with in home Daycare's.
Would anyone like to check it out and offer any constructive criticism?" Once again be creative, lure people in with good content and questions and as I said before posting this great question here was a good start to getting the word out.

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Permalink Reply by Doug Wilkins on May 16, 2009 at 2:19pm

Thanks for the good advice. I just joined Smaller Indiana and wasn't sure what was the proper etiquette. I will look into the two sites you mentioned. I have already posted on Indy Moms, craig's list and backspace. Can you please explain what is geo-targeted SEO. I have never heard of that.

Thanks again.

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Permalink Reply by Arik Flanders on May 18, 2009 at 2:31pm

It's targeting your search engines results (i.e. Google, Yahoo, MSN, Live) to a specific region. You can do this by purchasing key words on the search engine (i.e. Daycare Indianapolis) by using services such as Google's AdWords. The better method though is to get your company name to come up in the organic search results. For example your business is one of the first to pop up when someone searches "Daycare Indianapolis". This is rather difficult to do and takes a great deal of time. However, you can begin by posting on similar blog/forums that are targeted in the Indy area. Be careful not to spam, as mentioned earlier. From there you would probably need to hire someone to change your meta tags and website content in order to make it more search engine friendly.

Best of luck,

Arik

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Permalink Reply by Brian Powers on June 2, 2009 at 1:29pm

Doug:

I have been researching this topic a great deal in setting up my solo law practice. I have had some decent success at driving traffic on my website with a blog, linkedin, twitter, and of course having good, relevant content on the site. I actually have a blog post about what I have been doing to here. Also, you might want to check out google adwords - you can find some cheap keywords to bid on and set a modest budget.

Best of luck,
Brian

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Permalink Reply by Brian Morgan on May 16, 2009 at 2:22pm

I would have to say, IMO, one of the best ways is to get 'content' from satisfied customers; either a recommendation letter, video, email, etc. And with this 'sales tool' in your portfolio you'll have a credible medium for showing to prospects and gaining some trust.

As for marketing, actually generating prospects/leads, our company does several things:
1. Buy prequalified leads from Insurance Firms
2. Buy leads from Lead Selling Companies/Marketing Firms

One Insurance Firm that I work for has a Marketing System in place for generating leads, so that representatives (like myself) only need to purchase those qualified leads. Makes our job much easier.

With another B2B insurance firm that I represent, we use 'Reference USA' to filter potential prospects and then add them to our prospect pipeline. Once in the pipeline - it's cold-calling that generates a first meeting.

The "NEW" thing that our business is implementing is live meetings from the web - whether it be B2C or B2B we have the ability to let the customer/prospect 'see us live in real time'. That alone can save us about 3 hours drive time to prospects that are out of town.

- Brian

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Permalink Reply by Brian Morgan on May 16, 2009 at 2:29pm

With the younger generation I believe the 'necessary' medium is the ability to speak live with a company representative: whether that is on AT&T, Earthlink (email support), or a professional services business website.

Kids today will conduct much more of their business (day to day things) over the internet. Instead of traveling to an insurance agent, real estate agent, bank (to open a new account) : businesses will 'have to' be able to "go live" once a prospect calls their firm, or once a prospect is using their website. "Go Live" in real time is the competitive advantage now, yet it will be the "norm" within 18 months (or so) I feel.

You might watch this trend in the "news" - yet I am telling you here, as hindsight is always too late.

- Brian

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