“Listen, I don’t give a shit about the Facebooks and the goggles and the world internet services. I want real people walking in the door looking for power tools. How can all that stuff make that happen…?”
And there you have it. That sums up the sentiments of many baby boomers and even Gen X’ers who like to do things the way they’ve always been done. I believe part of the reason for that is a failure on the part of modern-day marketers. Too often we lose track of what we’re actually (supposed to be) trying to achieve. Facebook likes, Instagram followers and YouTube views are all part of drawing awareness and hopefully positive reputation to a brand, but at the end of the day, most brick and mortar businesses really just want people through the door.
I sat Tony down and explained to him how the world internet service can be a huge ally in drawing real people, with real money, through the door of his shop. I explained to him that my job as a marketer was to reach people where they actually are. As he made clear he was keenly aware, they are very often on their phones, looking at the Facebooks and the Goggles and the YouTubes. There is no point throwing up ads in newspapers and Yellow Pages when nobody is looking at them anymore. The people out there still want power tools, it’s just a matter of finding a way to let them know you sell them. It didn’t take long for Hudson Media to have a new client and it wasn’t long after that before Tony had new customers walking through his door.
Here’s the strategy we used for Tony’s business…
Website
There was no website for this business. Not an uncommon phenomenon for retailers who started up in 1977. Unfortunately, that’s not going to cut it in this day and age. There are 3 key reasons you need a website in 2018;
- Credibility: If you see a business card or a listing or some sort of advertisement for a business and you don’t see a website listed, there is an inevitable questioning of whether that business is actually legitimate. “Are they just offering these products temporarily?” “Is this an actual business or some dodgy vendor?” “Do they just not care?” “Are they still living in the 70s?” In Tony’s case, yes, but no longer.
- Searchability: For many businesses, it’s a long and expensive process to reach the top of Googles listings for any keywords. For an industrial equipment supplier in a medium sized Australian city? Not so much. Ask anybody how they find a business near them that sells what they want. 95% will inevitably say they search for it on Google. You’re missing out on a tremendous (and practically free) source of customer inquiries if you don’t have a website.
- Customer Experience: How does a customer know what you sell? You can send out a catalogue, they can make the journey to your store or you can direct them to the detailed product showcase on your website. Which one is easiest for them? Bingo.
WordPress makes websites ridiculous easy to build these days so there is absolutely no excuse, even if you decide to build it yourself.
Google Business Page
In the same way a website can easily reach top rankings of a google search in a low-density market, so too can a Google Business Page. We set Tony up with a listing so his business appeared on the map in Google searchings. Brief description, few pictures… now he gets thousands of views and dozens of calls monthly from local customers. Again, no excuses not to have one in your digital marketing repertoire.
The demographic Tony was selling were generally older, usually 35+ though there were a few younger tradies in there. We therefore focused on Facebook as our social media hub; the older generations have generally signed up for a Facebook account rather than an Instagram or Snapchat.
Even more so than the website and google business page, Facebook had the potential to really make Tony’s business stand out from the competition. And it didn’t take much.
A couple of sponsored product posts per week plus a regular ad targeting local handymen within a 20km radius and business was flowing. This whole online platform was his, none of the competitors in the city he was operating from had a functioning Facebook page. He essentially had a monopoly on the attention in this space.
Results
We charged Tony $600 per month for running ads on Facebook, Gumtree, maintaining his website and producing a bit of content. He was averaging around $3,000-$4,000 in monthly sales as a direct result of our marketing efforts and that’s when he actually made the effort to find out where customers had come from.
Results such as these are pretty standard and even at the lower end of the value we want to produce for our clients. If Tony had stuck to his traditional ways of doing things, he may have seen half these returns and would’ve had to spend a large swath of his valuable time to do so.
