Bring on the Customers

Engaging in retail and service businesses can be a daunting task. Long hours, the clamoring of customers, and waking up early and arriving home late are some of the possibilities. However, none of these match the customer who can come in all shapes and sizes. Demanding, slow-paying, loud, and obnoxious customers might make a mockery out of rush hour and the restaurant can reek of impatience. If you want to avoid bad customers, the secret is to get more customers. More customers come through a solid marketing and advertising campaign.

Launching a marketing campaign is all about results, results, and results. Track your results with the eyes of a hawk. If you compare sales during an extended promotion campaign to those during a plush doll giveaway, you’ll be able to tell which worked better. Better campaign tracking means making more cost-effective decisions by deciding whether to continue or to stop. By tracking, everybody knows its how much money you’ve made with that particular campaign.

A bona fide way of figuring out campaign effectiveness is through the phone. A simple phone call can work wonders for brand recognition. Ask those calling you how they heard about your business. If a majority of them sing the keychain giveaway’s praises, by all means prepare another similar campaign. Customers will be able to point out different elements, ads, and promotions that helped draw them to the store. In addition to their input, be sure to retrieve their name and phone number.

Different industries share different marketing strategies. What can work well for some may not work well for others. In general, some campaigns have more spark than others. One bona fide marketing tactic includes mailing to home lists. Home mailings’ influence spans across multiple industries and is a cost-effective, popular form of spreading the word out about any product and service. Begin by collecting the names and addresses of your current customers. Start a list if you haven’t already done so by encouraging customers to sign up for a free mailing list through sign-up cards available at the counter. Provide incentives to them, like private sales, a gift certificate, special deals, and discounts to preferred customers. Each sign-up card should provide space for the person’s name, address, telephone number, and email if applicable.

Learn the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns by asking customers how they heard on you on the sign-up card as well. Some might not remember, but others may point you out from newspaper ads or door signs. Next, prepare the actual material being sent. Flyers, pamphlets, brochures, or simple handouts can extend the life of your business and generate those customers. Don’t forget the simple postcard – they are extremely cheap to produce and cheap to send out. It saves more money than sending a pamphlet tucked into an envelope. You’ll avoid paying people to fold and insert paper into envelopes and be rest assured all it takes is a name and address on one side for it to hit the mail waves.