Help me succeed with my 1st marketing campaign please

How about you offer them something that (hopefully) they can't resist.. a free website - this is to those that you have identified do not have one - either do this via your list or better, personally by phone or go to the business itself.

As part of the email ask them what they do when they need a product or service themselves? and then of course tell them the answer, most of them go to their phone or pc and they "google it".. explain that a website does not need to be all "bells and whistles" in some cases a business just need a presence on the web so that their business is found when people in their local area search for what they offer - rather than their competitor (if you can name a competitor here all the better) - so all they need is the online version of a business card or perhaps sales flyer - so a small website with what they do and contact details.

Then hit them with your free offer..

You will build a website for them for free (they will need to get hosting unless you want to offer to host it for them for say a year, get a reseller account in this case - hostgator $24 per month).

Build the site in WordPress if you are familiar with it because you can then explain that further down the road if they want to put more into the site then they can as it is very user friendly (or they can get you to do it).

Tell them you will include some free helpful information on what to do with the site once it is built e.g:

Explain about getting the website link on all stationary
Explain how to enter the website on to Google places
Add their site to local directories
Anything else you can think of here

And all you ask for in return for this is:

If they are happy with the site and your services a Testimonial for your own site and that they refer you to any of their colleagues who might be able to use your services.

So you could either email on an individual basis OR send one email out and offer the Free website to the first say 5 responders by a certain date.

Didn't have time to put the above in any kind of neat order but I hope you get the idea - this is what we did to start getting a portfolio together and testimonials - which of course will help you to get more work in the future - there is still nothing more powerful than a recommendation from a real person/business.

Hope that helps a bit
Sue

I'd avoid handing out or even offering free websites/services. I knew someone who went about offering free websites to local businesses (He was going to make money on affiliate hosting through Hostgator) and go no 'sales' what so ever.

He then went on to offering actual website design which he charged $500 for a basic kit and got a load of business.

A lot of people tend to go by the saying "If it's too good to be true, then it is" and a "FREE" website sounds too good to be true, so they ignore it.

Yo Stephen, You might want to contact businesses that actually already HAVE websites but offer them a critique of their websites using simple software. Then you could have a free consultation with them and "dazzle" them with whatever you want to offer them.

Actually if you see yourself as helping a friend or as a "teacher" showing them how to get more biz, you'll start getting more clients.

JIM

Does it have to be local to your area -- try free advertisement on sites like Skidoo. Also, I see companies that sell services like yours on Ebay. Check out some of those listings for a good price point as well as verbiage they use to capture their audience. I commend you for going through the yellow pages. Best of luck and hope this was helpful.

You need adwords mate, make an ad like "website for $X only", then target the ads for the specific city or town only(its possible in adwords), this way you will get more queries , and all this assuming you have an attractive web site, i am sure that will bring you more clients then any thing else..

You have a good goal. I advice you will stay focus and dedicated in what you do. Study also all the new strategies in internet marketing nowadays.

lead generation and tele marketing

Few things that worked for me (I wasted time with
emails and money with direct mail which got me zero response)

1. Spread the word to your immediate network of friends, family, neighbors, coworkers. I got 3 small biz clients that way. I offered cheap web site and upsold them marketing consulting.

2. Search craigslist, there are small biz owners looking for seo and web design services. I got a website client and upsold them other services.

3. Make your clients happy and get referrals from
them.

4. Put ads on craigslist and hire telemarketers with b2b cold calling experience. Those are called appointment setters. Pay them $10 per appointment (or whatever is fair for where you live) plus 10% monthly commission.

5. Tap into LinkedIn. Advertise your service to your connections. Join job and employment related groups, post your telemarketer hiring ads as group messages. This is free (posting jobs costs money but posting group messages and status updates is free). It's also better quality than craigslist, you get real responses instead of spam. But what really works there is targeted networking.

6. Go to your local chamber of commerce and offer free workshops for small biz. Give impressive presentations on social media, local directories, email marketing etc. Tease them and presell your services while giving valuable info. No time or skills to make pretty presentations- no problem. Download from slideshare, add some info, cut out irrelevant stuff. Or make some bullet points and talk about them.
Also look at chamber of commerce calendar and go to the networking events open to non-members. Impress people with valuable info and hand out your business card. That's where business owners are! My friends make a killing from that stuff. They give all kinds of workshops and line up clients. They charge hefty fees for the initial consults, too (while everyone else does it free)

7. Sign up an meetup and start a small biz workshop group. You can target interests (keywords) very precisely. Meetup has huge mailing list, and they send new meetup alerts to the people interested in specific topic. I got quite a few members in my 2nd day of launching! As a group admin, you can broadcast emails to your group members. Meetup is very powerful!

8. I should have made this a Wso (just kidding)