Home Based Business Marketing

Learn How To Advertise Your Business Offline

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Home based business marketing doesn't have to be different to any other kind of marketing, whether your a small business owner or a large organisation.  It's all done more-or-less the same, just on a different scale.

If you haven't already done so, please read the section what is marketing to give you an overview of exactly what marketing is.

In this section we'll discuss different ways to advertise your small business offline.  
If you want to learn how to advertise your business online, then read the online advertising corner.

 

Yellow Pages

Everybody's heard of the Yellow Pages, so I thought I would start with this one first.

If you have no money at all, then a simple free lineage ad should suffice to help get your business off the ground.

If your budget allows, start with the smallest ad, then work your way up to bigger ads and even ads with colour when your advertising budget allows it.

The YP should be one of your main sources of advertising because this and one other form of advertising are the best methods of advertising for the small home based business person.

Thompson Directory

The Thompson Directory is not half as popular as the Yellow Pages, but it is still worth putting in a free lineage ad.

They will try and sell you more advertising space, but decline nicely and don't be persuaded otherwise.

Leaflets

Leaflet dropping through letter-boxes is the second half of the equation for the top advertising methods along with the Yellow Pages.

I know this from first hand experience when running my house cleaning business.  

Leaflet dropping was my #1 advertising method, Yellow Pages being the second.

Why?  Because statistics proved it was.  The highest percentage of my enquiries came from the leaflet drops, and the second highest percentage came from YP.

Now, having said all that, this will not be the priority for all businesses.  For example, when I ran my word processing business it would not have been wise for me to do leaflet drops at private homes.

There aren't many normal people who need any typing done.

In this case it is a 'business-to-business" service, so therefore I advertised at business parks and the like.  So if your business is a 'business-to-business provider, then leaflet drops to private homes will probably not be in your favour.

Business Cards

Business cards cannot be a bad thing.  They are so easy to carry around with you.

Leave them at the doctors, the dentist, the chip shop - anywhere where you think someone will pick them up (the same goes for leaflets too)

Adverts

If your budget allows you could place an advertisement in your local newspaper.

However, I think your money could be used more wisely elsewhere.  This is where you have to get into the head of your customer.  If you were looking for your product/service where would you look?  Probably the YP or online.

I wouldn't think of looking first in a free or paid paper to find a plumber.  I would look in the YP or go online.

Vehicle

If your business includes the use of a company vehicle, then get some advertising on it.

You can get this done for a reasonable price through signage companies

Media

If you are a good writer, you could write press releases and send them to all your local newspapers.

Be warned though, that it is very hard to get a press release in the papers. You should research into this idea first.

Joint Venturing

A joint venture is when two similar, but non-competing businesses share customers.

For example, when I was running my house cleaning business, a man rang me who had one of my leaflets put through his door.  He was a carpet cleaner.

He said that many of his clients asked if he also done domestic cleaning. He had to say no.

So he suggested that he would offer my services to his customers for house cleaning if I would offered his carpet cleaning services to my customers.  It's a win-win situation.

This is free and is a great way to do business.

Referral

Word of mouth, is there much more to say?  Be professional, courteous and have good customer care.  The word-of-mouth will follow.
 

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Summary

There are many other ways to advertise your home business, but these are the main ones.

Write down your home based business marketing and advertising campaign, you need to know what you did, when and how much it cost.

The Yellow Pages and the leaflet drops were the best ones for my house cleaning business, and probably will be for many other small businesses too.

However, I cannot really say what are the best advertising methods for you as it depends on what kind of business you are running.

All I can say is get into the mind of your customer and think where they will be looking for your product or service.  Do some research and find out where your competitors are advertising.

I hate this phrase but I am going to say it anyway "think outside the box".


Return from Home Based Business Marketing page to Starting A Home Business home

 

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