The Social Media Marketer

Tips For Local Marketing With Social Media

Tweet

 

Some businesses are in place so long, it's hard to imagine a time that they weren't there.

Take, for example, the Downtown Bakery in Steubenville, Ohio. It's much like other bakeries in smaller towns, where residents have been buying their Italian bread, cookies and especially fresh doughnuts for about as long as anyone can remember. It's a typical small-town, family-owned bakery. If you don't get there by noon, you probably aren't going to get any glazed doughnuts that day.

And you'd think a place like that, a place that has become a part of the life of those in its hometown, wouldn't need to advertise much, right?

Wrong. The reason a place like the Downtown Bakery continues to succeed is that its owners haven't forgotten an important fact of life – never take your customers for granted.

Now a place like this could just rest on its reputation. They'll still get that morning crowd looking for its doughnut fix, and they'll probably do all right.

But lately, although the bakery's owners have been buying advertising in the local newspapers and doing okay, they are also facing a new challenge.  A coffee shop just opened down the street that offered coffee, tea and yes, some fresh baked goods of its very own.

Suddenly, the Downtown Bakery was facing some competition. So, to keep its fans happy and in hopes of bringing in local customers who haven't sampled their baklava yet, they did what a lot of other businesses are doing these days – the owners turned to marketing with social media, and established a fan page on Facebook.

These days, the bakery is doing even more business than ever, thanks to its fan page. It uses that page and the free advertising it provides to post its daily specials, and also to make sure to answer customers' questions and comments every day.

It's also a place for customers who have moved far away to learn that yes, the Downtown Bakery does deliver its cookies and other baked goods by mail. This is a great example of a local business that has learned that marketing with social media helps enhance its customer base, and how using modern technology helps even businesses that have been around for years.

So, will marketing with social media resources help your business? Here are some methods to try:

• First, establish a website that will allow you to showcase what you have to offer. If you don't have the time or expertise to start your site, find a reputable company to build your site and keep it populated with great content that will show up on Internet searches and bring you potential customers. It also helps to update your site frequently with content that will help those customers find what they need.
• Open a fan page on Facebook to give your customers a place to gather. Make sure you include mention of your Facebook page in your more traditional advertising, and consider incentives that apply to people who visit that page, such as free samples or coupons.
• Start a Twitter account. This can be used to tweet your daily specials, or even to point back to your Facebook page or website. And again, if you don't have the time to deal with your Twitter page, pay a person or company to take care of it for you. This person should work to build a follower base, and to keep updates current.
• Find other local businesses whose services complement yours, and work to be included in the ways they are marketing with social media.

For example, the owners of the above-mentioned bakery would do well to research wedding planners. A wedding planner's website would be a great place to include information about picking the perfect wedding cake. Once you find that website, ask if you can include a guest post on its blog, if it has one. Don't use it as a blatant advertisement, but as a place to share some knowledge and link back to your own site.

Now, all of this might just seem alien to many of you business owners. But really, you've been advertising for years, haven't you? Marketing with social media is just a modern way to get the word out about what you have to offer.

An investment made in marketing with social media use is an investment that will pay off with more word of mouth for your business, and most importantly, in sales.