Advertising

[tunakiller]

Hello Fellow 'Geekers!

my question is how did you break into the business in regards to advertising?

how did you get your companys name out there?

how much did you spend "roughly" on advertising, ads, business cards, flyers etc...

looking forward to your replies.

thanks

rob

[Evan.J]

Word of mouth is my biggest way of advertising and its free!

I have business cards that I pass out as well but nothing more. You can go to vista print and get cards very cheap.

[hernandez.art13]

I've found that YouTube is free too. I do this as a hobby that I love btw.

[CarolinasFinestDetailing]

I'll let you in on a way that I have gotten business in the past. I like to visit the small car repair shops locally and ask to speak to owner or manager. I introduce myself and services, ask to leave cards at front counter and for recommendations. Now how do you get recommendations? Quick wash, spray detail, and interior detail that owner or managers vehicle for free. Now, does every shop work out well? No. But the ones that do know your work and will have no issue sending business your way. Oh, give them a kickback. If you get a few good details. Give them a free wash. Goes a long way.

[antti@561detailing]

Get some business cards from vistaprint and make some tshirts...dont spend on advertising because that can eat up ton of money without results.

[Rmd]

Leaving cards at local businesses is a great idea, but that alone is passive. The free wash to the managers is a way to kick it up a notch and make it more active. Another way is to make it into a "drawing" where people put their business cards in for a chance to win something of value - coupon for full detail for discount price, free wax with a basic wash, etc, doesn't really matter as long as people drop their cards. The trick to the "contest" is to give away the prize to everyone who puts a card in. People love to be a "winner". The value to you, in exchange for what you give away, is a contact list of potentially interested customers that you can target market with emails (free) or postcards or whatever. Not everyone will end up ultimately wanting to use you for higher priced jobs, but the point is to get as many people as possible into your "customer funnel" and distill those names down to solid repeat customers who will value your services and be willing to pay for them.

You can also give additional discounts to customers when they refer other people. Everyone, and everyone they know, has a car that gets dirty.

Beware of any cold calls you get or advertising by SEO firms offering to get you on "the front page of google." Absolutely impossible for a brand new business, even if you spend big bucks. That said, google's local advertising is easy and inexpensive.

I know people who have had good luck with groupon. It probably only works if you are willing to offer a loss leader type deal that is not profitable for you, but you are building a customer funnel. You need as many contacts as possible in order to end up with with a solid base who will purchase profitable jobs.

[VP Mark]

1. Have a good website. Have it SEO optimized for your area.
2. Google Adwords.
3. Yellowbook, Yellowpages, Yelp, ect.. It doesn't cost money to get bold listings, you just pay for the bigger ads.
4. Have quality business cards, flyers to hand out to clients after you detail for them. If you have good stuff they will have something impressive to hand out to friends and family.
5. Facebook ads.
6. Free giveaways. Lots of local car clubs, boat clubs, rotary clubs, ect.. have monthly raffles and such as their get togethers. Agree to donate a detail in exchange for being able to share your marketing materials with the participants.

I could go on and on... advertising is just a part of an overall marketing strategy.

[antti@561detailing]

Word of caution on adwords...learn everything you can how to set it up...or google will make you really pay for your clicks...and clicks without conversion from your website wont get you business

[HateSwirls]

Show your co-workers some of your work.
Call a dealership and ask to make an appointment , don't just show up, again show them your work, if their interested offer them a sample of your work, like only doing the hood.
Get a large banner made of your business and go to a place like a mall and sit there and offer some business cards, make sure your car looks super nice, if you could find someone with a thrashed car correct half the hood only and show them your work and what it took to get it that way.
Offer them a free sealant application with a full paint correction , that way they feel their getting something of valve.

With all this said word of mouth is the best, most if not all of my jobs comes from a referring.
That's another thing you can do, if you do a car for a customer tell them if they refer someone to you that you'll give them 50% off on their next wash, doesn't take long these days to clean most cars using a waterless wash.

[L67James]

Most of my business I have found through my facebook page. Post on for sale groups in your area. In my area there is a few groups for "Buy and Sell Car Parts" type of things, so far I've found 5 customers through posting in that in 2 weeks. Best part, it's FREE

[A.P.A.D.]

1. Have a good website. Have it SEO optimized for your area.
2. Google Adwords.
3. Yellowbook, Yellowpages, Yelp, ect.. It doesn't cost money to get bold listings, you just pay for the bigger ads.
4. Have quality business cards, flyers to hand out to clients after you detail for them. If you have good stuff they will have something impressive to hand out to friends and family.
5. Facebook ads.
6. Free giveaways. Lots of local car clubs, boat clubs, rotary clubs, ect.. have monthly raffles and such as their get togethers. Agree to donate a detail in exchange for being able to share your marketing materials with the participants.

I could go on and on... advertising is just a part of an overall marketing strategy.


:iagree: +1 . not much more to add to that!

Check out GotPrint (http://gotprint.net/) for printing business cards. Cheap, fast turnaround time, and great quality.

Have a logo for your business, and build your brand!

[master detailer]

for free you cant beat craigslist for ads and pics.I give alot of washs to a guy next to my shop. He gets 20.00 each and is doing 10 to 12 a day.But there are 3 of them doing the work.My up side is they give me all the full details and boats/rvs that come there way.I also have taken them under my wing and show them better ways do there washes and they now are getting to up sell what they are doing.It makes me fell good to help others.God has helped me now I what to help others.God will help you.You just need to ask him.

[AutowerxDetailing]

Beware of any cold calls you get or advertising by SEO firms offering to get you on "the front page of google."

This. ^^^

Having worked for one of those "cold calling SEO firms" I can tell you with 100% confidence if you spend money with a company like this you might as well flush your cash down the toilet. I can go into great deal about why it is a ridiculously stupid proposition to be on "the first page of Google" and how specifically they scam you but just suffice it to say it is NEVER going to be a profitable advertising campaign for you.

You are FAR BETTER OFF doing your own Google, Yahoo, Bing advertising yourself. It's not very difficult to setup and manage and you will have full control over your campaigns.

The main problem with paying someone else to "manage" your AdWords campaign (especially for a flat monthly fee) is that your interests and their interests are not aligned. You want to appear under search terms where people will click and go to your website and book a job. They (as in the "SEO" company) wants your website to appear under a given search term "on the 1st page of Google" and NEVER get clicked. Any click eats into their profits. And I have seen first hand an ad getting clicked on "too much" and in turn get driven down to the bottom of the page, yet still be on "the 1st page" therefor fulfilling the contract promise (where it has a 1% chance of getting seen, let alone clicked).