For those clients that need to promote their businesses locally, here are some helpful links and networking ideas to help grow your business and increase sales. The majority of these items are of no cost.
- Join your local Chamber of Commerce – generally they have online links back to your site, have networking mixers and are a great source of referrals
- Craiglist – have an “image ad” not just text and be sure to link back to your site ALWAYS
- Yellow pages - just like the Yellow Pages only online so you can increase hits back to your site
- Yahoo Local
- Google Local Maps
- Merchant Circle - a great way to network locally. You can create ads, coupons and even post your blog online.
- Local.com - Add your listing to a well traveled site that displays local favories, reviews, maps, movie listings, and more.
- Kudzu - free listings on a growing site that lists categories of business, deals, ratings and more.
- Kijiji - free local listings on a site much like Craiglist.
- Switchboard - same idea as the Yellow Pages but another venue for people to locate you.
- Connect with your local Economic Development Corporation. Generally they will be able to help promote your business and even offer a link back to your site as well.
- Send enewsletters – Email marketing is a great way to grow your client base by encouraging people to forward the email to a friend. Include a coupon in the email to entice new clients even more.
- Create postcards – and use them like flyers! Lay them at coffee shops, post them on corkboards at diners, automotive places, etc. People are more likely to notice them rather than a business card because of their size and are more likely to not discard it due to the nice printing and paper stock.
- Blog - Start a Blog and post on other blogs related to your industry or locale.
- Start a Facebook ad and target your specific city, demographics, etc
- Post on forums specific to your city
- LocalSearch - same idea as the Yellow Pages but another venue for people to locate you.
- Yelp - same idea as the Yellow Pages but another local venue for people to locate you.
- Place ads in your local newspaper in the services column
- Get magnets for your car or vinyl lettering for your back window - keep the message simple with your business name, a couple of your services, phone number and website address.
- Outdoor Advertising or Billboards
- Leave business cards or tri-fold brochures at other local businesses.
