How to promote your business

Well, there's the toughie. £Cost wise, they are negligible. Time wise, they can be quite consuming - but they are critical. 

So, if I start a business, and I spend one whole day doing all the things I mentioned, and then never visited them again, there's going to be no real benefit.

If I dedicated a day a week, for weeks, then an hour a day for 6 months, things would start to develop.

I personally spend every minute of every day focused on work - and in my experience (and opinion) that is how to make a business successful. In the time between my last post and this one, I've altered my website, added content, added details to 3 directories I've found, and posted stuff on LinkedIn, Youtube, Facebook and Twitter. Its all been done after 5PM.

The point Im trying to make really is that it's all vital, and I can't prioritise one over the other. When we own our own business, we own our own destiny, and we are at the wheel, so must steer in the right direction always.

You mean we can't be 9 - 5'ers 

Originally Posted by Steve Richardson

“You mean we can't be 9 - 5'ers ”

Nope... that's reserved for 'The Staff'  

Hi there 

ref your leadwork on your chimney 

it would either be through a leak in your roof near or around your chimney or if you could visibly see that your lead was falling out or if you had a tiler doing work on your roof and noticed a problem then you'd contact a company such as myself 

hope this helps you 

Dave 

Think you meant to post that here ;-) 
http://www.mylocalservices.co.uk/forum/8827-how-promote-your-business.html#50007

Sorry, you did post it here... urgh... the joys of early mornings...

I would advise you get a .co.uk for the website's main domain name and then if you want to get the .com, point the .com to the .co.uk (and not the other way around).

Don't do your own website if it means making a pigs ear of it. DIY sites - Keep it simple and clean, one font style and colour, neat paragraphs of content, spell-checked, and with only relevant and good quality images even if they are stock ones to start with. Most DOY sites get overcooked in an effort to make it look good and end up making a mess of it then it looks home spun.

Would you turn up to a customers house with a t-shirt with gravy down it? No. Make an effort to present your business as a business that is not cutting corners as psychologically that IS the message you send when you use cheap tat like a badly designed website.

"If he's cutting corners in his own business, what is he gonna cut corners on with my roof?" is what the customer may think. Don't give them the chance to think that.

I spent my first year at college learning how to bash lead and wiping joints as it use to form part of becoming a plumber apprenticeships. It is very skilled work and I take my hat off to anyone who can do it. I can't and have never done it since I left college 30+ years ago, it is also one of our oldest artisan trades and can be dated back to the Roman era. 

As to promotion, I would avoid at all costs a diy website, they look rubbish and are rubbish. Plenty of people on here (regulars) who can help you out and not run off with your money and deliver rubbish. I would try adwords express which is easy to use, just set your daily budget and your done. I personally would avoid doing free work if your just starting out, after all you need an income to come in to pay your bills. I'm not a fan of email spam or marketing as others prefer to call it, but because yours is a specialised trade, I'd be inclined to email local builders do a short introduction of yourself with maybe a couple of photos of your work, after all emails cost nothing. My main point would be is don't waste your time trying to build your own website if you don't know what your doing as you'll end up regretting it. And if you want proof of the pudding take a look here

I've used pay per click recently and I'm actually very impressed with the results. I run an airport transfer business in bath and I have an advert with yell.com as well. I've worked out that every click I get from my yell ad actually cost well over £2 and hardly ever leads to a job at the end of it. Where as pay per click is costing just over £1 per click and has generated a lot more sales with good chances of repeat business with some of the jobs.