Marketing ideas?

[Shawn1112]

As of Jan 1st I became 50% owner of the company I have worked for the last 16 years. Long story short, my boss who was 50% owner passed away a little over a year ago. So I have stepped in to his role for the last year. Tried to buy his partner out and he countered that I become 50% owner and can buy him out in a few years as he will be retiring. My partner is more of a silent partner who doesnt do much, very long story. Thats why I'm paid double what he makes.

So we have for the most part kept a good majority of our customers since my boss's passing. I have picked up a few new customers by word of mouth.
However I want the company to grow and continue to gather new customers.
What are some marketing ideas you guys can suggest? Friends have mentioned social media as its basically free. I'm not a fan at all of social media, but if its really going to help, then maybe I have my wife do that type of shit. I'm willing to spend some money on marketing if need be.

We are a office furniture installation company that does a lot more than just furniture installation. We install whse racking, med records shelving, re-furbish old furniture, decommission offices and recycle/dispose of those offices, we offer storage, delivery and pick ups.

Here is our website, but I cant access it as my boss that passed away, had all that info. His family cant find any of that info, good chance it was just something he had in his head.
https://workplaceinstallationnetwork.wordpress.com/

Click to read more...

 

[jason05gt]

I’ll write a few suggestions when I get in the office. Social is cheap, but you need compelling content. Optimizing your site for SEO is cheap too.

 

[Kaeghl]

okay, social media is your friend, its the guy you let marry your sister.

You need a social presence these days, reviews, samples of work, contact, its what everyone asks for. Hell my plumber can be reached through facebook and i can even click a link to schedule an appointment.

I checked your website. Nothing of value will be lost. A site with "wordpress" in the link says either scammer or amateur to me. Get a wix.com site, pay for it. Easy to maintain and update with a built in interface. Be sure to keep all of the copy (text, images etc) from your current site to carry it over, then retire that site. Also, your company has great initials "WIN" but that logo needs to be updated from 1992.

On facebook you can target advertisement to people that are either involved with or interested in your services.
My facebook ad campaigns are about 300% more effective than my super tweaked and massaged google ad words campaigns.

 

[boostedguy05]

This looks like BOA at 59 and irving

also congrats on partner, and hope you grow will in 2018!

 

[Shawn1112]

This looks like BOA at 59 and irving

also congrats on partner, and hope you grow will in 2018!

That was a customer of ours in Elmhurst, we did about 12 private offices like that. Believe it or not thats used furniture. Our wood guy cleaned it up and touched up where needed and the shit looked new.

 

[b00sted]

1. Build a new website on your own domain name. Invest time into putting great, thorough content on there. I'd also highly recommend doing a blog/etc that features lengthy, quality posts(2500+ words) on topics that are relevant to your company. Target good keywords that will generate traffic and backlinks.

This is a long-term play, but will pay off over time. I'd recommend finding a good SEO guy to hoelp with this, it gets complicated.

2. For the short term(after you at least get the website revamped), looking into Google Adwords. You can target the keywords that potential clients/buyers are searching for. This, too, is complicated, but will have excellent results if optimized properly. Facebook advertising is cheaper, but may be tougher to target your audience since it's a pretty niche B2B business. Not sure though, you may have luck. Maybe target higher-end individuals who will pay to have a nice home office done?

3. Social media presence. Moreso because it ties into the first point. Social cues are becoming a stronger and stronger indicator for Google when it comes to search engine ranking.

 

[bnr32]

first thing you need to figure out your marketing budget and it will help figure out what your goals are

 

[Blood on Blood]

I did a Google search via my iPhone on “office furniture installation Chicago” and “workplace furniture installation Chicago” and your site did not appear on the initial page, 2nd page, let alone Google reviews.

May be an opportunity to look at addressing.

 

[FESTER665]

Friends have mentioned social media as its basically free. I'm not a fan at all of social media, but if its really going to help, then maybe I have my wife do that type of shit.

I know it sounds like common sense, but make sure whoever you put in charge of the social media aspect is always professional about everything.

One company I know of had the main guy's wife in charge of their social media and someone complained about one of their items they bought and she took it as a direct shot at her husbands workmanship.

It eventually got so heated she was telling the guy to jump off a bridge and he was a moron.

While the guys complaint was cheesy, she handled it sooooo poorly that I'm betting it costs them many customers.

 

[Yaj Yak]

social media is "free" for a while... to an extent...

then it gets pricey.

 

[Mook]

I can put you in touch with someone who did some FB marketing for us. Shes EXTREMELY knowledgeable, very professional and knows her shit. We didnt have much luck with it (well, we actually got leads but converting them was difficult due to what I say next) but I feel thats mostly because when marketing on FB, a lot relies on hitting the eyes of people who are actively searching for your product or service. Most eyes on FB are passive...however, we worked on a national scale so it was a lot more ground to cover.

For a local campaign, she can probably do wonders. Shes not cheap though. PM me if you want her contact. She works out of Baltimore. She will do a phone consult and is really thorough and will give you a better understanding if FB marketing is right for you.

 

[Shawn1112]

I can put you in touch with someone who did some FB marketing for us. Shes EXTREMELY knowledgeable, very professional and knows her shit. We didnt have much luck with it (well, we actually got leads but converting them was difficult due to what I say next) but I feel thats mostly because when marketing on FB, a lot relies on hitting the eyes of people who are actively searching for your product or service. Most eyes on FB are passive...however, we worked on a national scale so it was a lot more ground to cover.

For a local campaign, she can probably do wonders. Shes not cheap though. PM me if you want her contact. She works out of Baltimore. She will do a phone consult and is really thorough and will give you a better understanding if FB marketing is right for you.

PM sent

 

[Shawn1112]

I did a Google search via my iPhone on “office furniture installation Chicago” and “workplace furniture installation Chicago” and your site did not appear on the initial page, 2nd page, let alone Google reviews.

May be an opportunity to look at addressing.

Thanks and I have been told to contact Google by a few friends. For a fee I can have our company pop up on 1st page the minute someone googles "furniture installation" or similar. Definitely going to look in to that.

 

[Shawn1112]

1. Build a new website on your own domain name. Invest time into putting great, thorough content on there. I'd also highly recommend doing a blog/etc that features lengthy, quality posts(2500+ words) on topics that are relevant to your company. Target good keywords that will generate traffic and backlinks.

This is a long-term play, but will pay off over time. I'd recommend finding a good SEO guy to hoelp with this, it gets complicated.

2. For the short term(after you at least get the website revamped), looking into Google Adwords. You can target the keywords that potential clients/buyers are searching for. This, too, is complicated, but will have excellent results if optimized properly. Facebook advertising is cheaper, but may be tougher to target your audience since it's a pretty niche B2B business. Not sure though, you may have luck. Maybe target higher-end individuals who will pay to have a nice home office done?

3. Social media presence. Moreso because it ties into the first point. Social cues are becoming a stronger and stronger indicator for Google when it comes to search engine ranking.

Thanks and noted everything you said. I probably dont have the skills to build a new website. But my kids or business partner's kids might be able to. If not I'm pretty sure I have a few friends who could help out.

 

[Gamble]

Friends have mentioned social media as its basically free. I'm not a fan at all of social media,

While you are not a fan of it the rest of the world is on it 24/7. Go where the crowd goes

My old boss didn't like social media or other outlets that people were always on....then other new companies did 5-7times his sales in a few years while he is sitting there 30 years in the business not getting much headway.

 

[Kaeghl]

play around with making a page on facebook, it i set up to be pretty simple and there are walk throughs for everything.
I am pretty shocked that anyone that ran an ad campaign on facebook would charge "pricey" amounts for their service, the campaigns are dead simple to target and manage.


After that, b2b and small business associations. Here in Schaumburg there is a small business association that puts on a wine tasting and mixer, they really help business help each other out.

 

[Mook]

PM sent

Replied

 

[MrCarreraGTO]

Gary Vaynerchuk. Look up as much of his stuff as you can. He's pretty much thee marketing guru right now, especially when it comes to social media.

 

[Yaj Yak]

....as long as you can drop countless expletives that is.

:wink:

 

[sickmint79]

who is your customer? are you going to find them on... facebook?

you can use SEO to rank higher in google for normal stuff, and google adwords to get sponsored ads - but adwords are a fantastic way for you to waste a lot of money.

what's the average value of a customer? what % of people that go to your site contact you? what % of the people that contact you result in a closed sale? you'll want to know both these numbers. then work backwards from there to even determine how much you would pay for a sponsored facebook or adwords ad.

the industry is full of people who will take your money and run ad campaigns for you. what it's not full of is people who are actually capable of running a successful ad campaign for you.

maybe wordpress can aid you in recovering or resetting credentials to take control of the website. it can't be the first time something like this has happened. if nothing else, it would be good to have control of the site so that you can redirect it to a new one.

imho i'd submit you do the following:

1. regain control of existing site
2. identify the person you want to reach
3. what's working for you already, how did you get the last 10 customers? do more of that. were 10% or 90% from the web? either way the web likely has opportunity.
4. website is not bad, but it's not good. wordpress is a fine platform but i wouldn't have wordpress themselves host it, i've heard it's a lot less flexible (??) not sure if you can get out of their own domain. i host sites, including a bunch of wordpresses fyi. remake the site to have more content and to target the type of person you're trying to reach and who is looking for you. before you even start, investigate your competitors sites in a major way.
5. aside from content, add as much surrounding SEO helpful stuff as possible. secure cert, social accounts, address based directory listings. ideally get past/current customers to leave reviews.
6. i'd make a new logo, the graphic part is rough for me.
7. don't spend a penny on google adwords until the new site is up and you're seeing how often a visitor converts to a lead, and a lead converts to a sale.
8. probably don't spend a penny on facebook ads ever.

 

[sickmint79]

Thanks and noted everything you said. I probably dont have the skills to build a new website. But my kids or business partner's kids might be able to. If not I'm pretty sure I have a few friends who could help out.

if it's a site for your wedding or your photo album or how cute your dog is then have anyone build it. if it's a site to grow your business and put money in your pocket then you want a site where every aspect imaginable has been thought out to the greatest extent with the express goal of every single minute detail contributing to the visitor turning into a warm sales lead for you to close.