How to maximize your return on local advertising.

Opened a new business recently?

scratch that!

It has been a while and the business is not picking up the pace it should have been? Survival is now a vital issue in your head and it is becoming hard for you to see the road ahead.

What seems to be the problem?

• Good Offerings. Check.
• Sell-able pricing. Check.
• Decent inventory. Check.
• Happy customers. Check.
• Marketing.... ?

Marketing can very well be the problem you are facing. Its not that small business owners don't have the time to focus on marketing and advertising activities, its more about the resources required to do so.

Let's face the facts. Marketing can require a huge chunk of money from your savings to begin with. There is a very good chance that at this point your business doesn’t even generate that kind of money.

The answer is Hyper-Local marketing.

Hyper local marketing targets the local audience. It is marketing at a much magnified scale on the map, usually targeting a neighborhood or a small community. The various channels to tap the hyper-local marketing are:

• Printed coupons – There are many methods to distribute printed coupons. You can give them out as free standing insert. A much unique and effective way that we found very impressive was Register tape marketing. 
• Online Coupons – There are various online venues which can go as low as $50 and specialize in reaching the right target audience. Sites like CouponEasy and Valpak . Here is an interesting read regarding the growth of online coupon industry.
• Local listings: Local listing can dramatically affect the local search engine optimization and can make a substantial impact on your business sales. Sites like yellowpages and review sites like yelp can help customers gain confidence in your business.

Hope I was able to give you a good insight on various methods and venues. Best of luck to take your business sky high.

What do you think? Over to you.