[jcooper]

WHAT WORKS FOR YOU GUYS?NEWSPAPER,PHONEBOOK,INTERNET
FLYERS???IM STARTING OUT NEEDS TO BE CHEAP!!!!!!!!!!!1

[darrenlee]

hi jcooper
myself i like word of mouth,
but you cant beat a little ad in your local paper.
all depends on what market you are aiming for.

having hard time, trying to tell my little brother at the
moement. as he as just left army .
bought a machine and thinks he can go clean.

takes time and like a lot of industrys in this country
theres a lot of people trying the samething.

my ad in local paper as now become my buisness card
but thats took years.

a lot of guys on here say leaflets, look in frequently asked questions, or search advertising

darren

[MCRS]

internet has been great for me so far been up 2 weeks and had ten jobs from it no a bad return

[Don Atkinson]

WHAT WORKS FOR YOU GUYS?NEWSPAPER,PHONEBOOK,INTERNET
FLYERS???IM STARTING OUT NEEDS TO BE CHEAP!!!!!!!!!!!1

Hi J Cooper,

15 Years of persistent advertising using the methods you mention above should work well, remember that advertising in publications/Directorys should just about pay for themselves, but ALWAYS monitor long term not short term.
Remember to monitor your adverts over 5 year periods in order to weed out the ones that arnt effective.

If you are planing on starting your business just by adverts, Leaflets, Sales letters etc. , bare in mind that you will be a 'Hobbyist' for the first 8 years, after this period you should be making a modest living for yourself (£20.000-35.000).

If on the other hand you choose to go against your nerves and fears and go out and meet domestic and commercial customers and form business relationships, you should quite easily be turning over £000.000+ per year, after the first year, multi fleet with employees if you wanted to.

I would put money on you choosing the first method
Good Look Anyway!!!!
don

[Mike Halliday]

I hate to criticise Don

 but;

after 8yrs if your not earning £50,000 pack it in

yes monitor your adverts but You should know in 6mths if they are effective

advertising is about making money not paying for themselves, when an advert just pays for its self it means you worked for nothing!


best advise I can give is don't spread yourself too thin, there's more than enough customers within 3miles of your home ( unless you live in middle of nowhere) to keep you busy for a lifetime, only advertise to them.

Mike

[Don Atkinson]

I hate to criticise Don

 but;

after 8yrs if your not earning £50,000 pack it in

yes monitor your adverts but You should know in 6mths if they are effective

advertising is about making money not paying for themselves, when an advert just pays for its self it means you worked for nothing!


best advise I can give is don't spread yourself too thin, there's more than enough customers within 3miles of your home ( unless you live in middle of nowhere) to keep you busy for a lifetime, only advertise to them.

Mike

Mike, cheers for that, not criticised at all.
You probably have an established business so your name is recognised by people in all the ads and leaflet drops you do, You also seem to be a good sales person so work shouldn't be that hard to come by, most people are shy so don't make good sales people.
As for monitoring ads, 6mths.. come on!, maybe in 1970 you would monitor for this period of time. Theirs so much more competition your up against, the person who's ad appears in front of the same customers year in year out usually wins, and yes adverts in the 21st century should only be used for building databases, and for not pulling immediate profit.
If new starters are NOT interested in walking the streets and talking prospects into having their Carpets or Upholstery cleaned, they should seek advice from there bank manager regarding a long term plan (15 Year+) in order to start a business.

Remember that in business, you don't think in Days and Months, you think in Decades.

PS... Im currently monitoring my yellow pages ad over 15 years, with slight yearly alterations, I will then decide whether it works out viable.

don

[Karl Wildey]

Mike,

Pack it in after 8 years and do what, work a 40 hour week for someone else, with no thanks, and probably a little extra above the minimum wage. I would rather be my own boss and scrape a living than work for someone else.

The reason most, if not, all of us run our own businesses is for the freedom, not the money. Money is not my first choice for being in business, or I would never have bothered.

[ABLECLEAN]

 I am with Mike on this one, You should easily be turning over 50K within 8 years. I have been building my business up slowly and steadily over 4 years and I am well up on that target figure. I know that yellow pages works because I monitor every call I get, that is why I am spending £4500 in this years book. Incidently, if you guys out there that have not tried Yellow pages are put off by the price just look at this: 1 x quarter page black on yellow = £1250 Split into 10 interest-free monthly payments = £125 per month = £31.25 per week!!! Not even one job per week!! If you think that is expensive you are in the wrong business. Just do it.

[Don Atkinson]

I am with Mike on this one, You should easily be turning over 50K within 8 years. I have been building my business up slowly and steadily over 4 years and I am well up on that target figure. I know that yellow pages works because I monitor every call I get, that is why I am spending £4500 in this years book. Incidently, if you guys out there that have not tried Yellow pages are put off by the price just look at this: 1 x quarter page black on yellow = £1250 Split into 10 interest-free monthly payments = £125 per month = £31.25 per week!!! Not even one job per week!! If you think that is expensive you are in the wrong business. Just do it.

Yes its definitely worth doing.
Let me work out the return for something like the ad you mention, I will post back in a few mins.
I'll confirm my figure with an old mate at Chem Dry.

don

[Don Atkinson]

1 x quarter page black on yellow = £1250 Split into 10 interest-free monthly payments = £125 per month = £31.25 per week!!! Not even one job per week!! If you think that is expensive you are in the wrong business. Just do it.

My figure and Chem Dry ****** were a little out, so I have averaged the two figures. The above ad if well worded should expect a return of..

£1870 Per year return.
So in your pocket £620 for the year or £12.91 every week staight profit.
Not too bad for the initial outlay.

don

[David_Annable]

You must have deeeeeep pockets

Dave

[Mike Halliday]

Don things like the yellow pages are hard to monitor over a short period, but things like newspaper adverts, lealfets sales letters etc can be.

if I had a weekly advert in the local paper, so in 6 months potential clients would  hopefully have seen it 24 times, after appearing 24 times I'm sure i would know if that advert was paying for its self , the same goes for leaflets.

its a mistake not to test & monitor advertising,  but just as its bad to make a quick decision on a marketing campaign it's just as bad to allow a bad campaign to continue too long.

its good to keep a check on how much return you get on each item of marketing so you can spend your money where it is most effective. if I spent £2000 on a yellow pages advert and got £6000 return you might think that was good

but

If I spent £2000 on a leaflet drop and got £10,000 in return this makes the Yellow pages look not so good.

I've found that leaflets make 3 time as much return as Y/P, but then my advert might have been crap

Mike

[ABLECLEAN]

Guys, guys, guys My return from yellow pages on a £2500 ad was over £12000!!

[Don Atkinson]

Guys, guys, guys My return from yellow pages on a £2500 ad was over £12000!!

  Good one Ableclean, like that one.

This ones better..

A couple on their honeymoon ask for a suite in the local hotel. The clerk asks them if they want the the bridal.
"No, thats alright," replys the groom. "I'll hold onto her ears until she gets the hang of it."

don

[ABLECLEAN]

Don you can scoff if you like, but for the return you are talking about I would not waste my time. I get on average three jobs a week from yellow pages. My average job price for 2004/2005 was £92 x 3 x 48 (allowing for hols etc.)
= £13800 and this is just the new business!!

[eco freindly. peoples champion ron .sherlock]

thats a good return, but you can return better . start thinking about something that an editorial will want to hear about. such as for every clean i do we donate to  whatever get involved in a charity event and get loads of free press. read my article on the word free. yell is ok but you are firing against unown quantity go for the less expensive options and fire on your own terms

[ABLECLEAN]

Words of wisdom Sherlock. I will keep it in mind.

[ABLECLEAN]

Don Atkinson

What area of the country are you and your Chemdry mate in?

[Ian Gourlay]

I am an Agent for a Major company that has been advertising Nationally for 30 years.

When I ask people what they know about ............. the answer is little.

Just that their Leaflet is in your letter box on a regular basis.

People do not look for ........... until they need ,,,,,,,,,,therfore in my opinion I do not think  it matters if you are new to advertsing in your local paper.

I believe it is the offer that is important. Despite a Half page advert very few leads come from Yellow Pages.
Which is why i have never had the confidence to run a half page for Carpet Cleaning.
Acording to Dons Figures from Yellow Pages he might aswell have given away a Free Room to attract customers and sold add ons


Don areyou suggesting that the best  form of Advertising is Door Knocking.

When you switched from Chem Dry How did you reestablish yourself.

Dont ask me to fill in dots as I realised I was giving away to much info and would have been in breach of my contract