Suggestions For New Business Idea

Hi There

I set up a business like this 3 years ago in my local area except mine was a local magazine that was distributed free to homes and businesses.
I decided to start the business after reading about a similar local mag franchise available, on enquiring I was stunned at the franchise fee plus additional monthly fee and other very strict rules you had to stick to. I didn't have the franchise fee even if I wanted to buy in so I fancied a challenge and with no experience I set the business up from scratch with zero budget!
It was a reasonably easy business to get in to, I had a very good printer who helped with design etc and I also managed to negotiate payment for printing after distribution, if I hadn't done this I wouldn't have been able to start as I had no budget.
Anyway, I soon joined forces with a guy who was doing the same but on the web (he had actually bought in to a franchise) between us we could offer special advertising rates if businesses advertised with me in my magazine and on his website.

The main problems with this business:
You have to be very good at selling, local business have very tight advertising budgets (if any)!

You have to have very good local content on your website - this takes a lot of time and research businesses will not advertise with you if you have no content.

You also need to list local services - women's groups, business clubs, brownie/cubs etc, etc
You need to be prepared to lose money! - Businesses see advertising as a low priority bill so if they have had a bad month you are at the bottom of the pile to be paid, staff, rents, business rates etc, etc, come way before you on their list of priorities so you can end up waiting a long time for payment.

In the end my JV partner had to close his site due to the amount of outstanding invoices he had and I managed to sell my business for a profit 18 month after starting although I also had a stack of unpaid invoices that I never received payment for.

In my experience I enjoyed the journey, I got a thrill out of setting up from scratch with nothing except my PC, I loved the work but the income I got from the business was nothing some months for the amount of work that went in and after paying my costs.

In my opinion, don't do it!
If you are looking for an income it's not worth it especially in the present economy, businesses are struggling and can find plenty of free advertising and for what you will have to charge to make any money they could have a low budget website set up for them that will always be there.

On the other hand if you have spare time and don't need the income it gets you out and about and you get to meet loads of really interesting people in your area!

Hope this helps

I am looking to do something similar but for different reasons.

Currently setting up a SEM business in my local area and I thought a good way to get known by local business was to give them a free listing on a directory site I'm setting up.

Now directory sites are a dime a dozen these days and I know of several in my local area. So my point of difference will be video. Here's how I see this working for me:

1. Create simple directory site. Start by targeting one type of business, ie hairdressers

2. Go to local business's and say: "Hey I have a website that I created to promote local business and I want you to be a part of it. This will be totally free and take 10 minutes of your time"

3. Take my trusty little video camera and film an on the spot, 5 minute interview. Some owners will say no I don't want to be on camera, so in that case do the interview and then just film you talking about the place and the answers the owner gave. Doesn't have to look perfect, in fact I think guerilla style video will probably work better. Ask stuff like "what services do you offer?", "what's your point of difference?", "is there parking?". Just think of questions a potential customer would like the answer to.

4. Post video to site, along with address details, maps, contact info, little written bio, etc.

5. Promote the hell out of it, press releases, SEO, adwords, etc.

Could add local charities and community groups as well as business.

The reason I would be doing this is purely promotional. I get to meet a lot of local business owners, and talk about my business while giving them something of value. As lavenderbags said, don't do it if your prime motivation is to make money by selling spots, hard work!

If you want to monetise it you could partner with an ad network, get lots of local business listings for free and then also put the ads up from the network.

Or you could give the free listings but have premium spots that people pay for. Of course for any of these to really work you're gonna need lots of local traffic!

Have a look at gumtree (australian free classifieds site) for a really successful version of these models.

Anyway just my 2 cents, I haven't done it yet so what do I know I do have a friend who's a web developer, who has at least one person a week coming to him with the "brilliant idea" of a directory site and getting people to pay to be in it: hasn't seen one succeed yet in the last 3 years

Cheers,
Ben

Using Wordpress sounds like a good idea to me. Find yourself a theme that will give you all the things you're looking for in your own site, and put together something that looks impressive.

You can then use your own site as an example of what your customers would get if they used your services.