Online marketing is too fragmented

DanielSon

DanielSon

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Online marketing is too fragmented


I had a lady call me today wanting to put me onto YellowPages.com.

I have to say that it was a rather depressing phone call.

Back in the day I could own a half a page or full-page ad and dominate the market. With a commitment of $2500-$4000 a month it would bring in between 20 and 50 calls a day in the summertime.

When the Internet first came out, I think there was a lot of excitement, but I have to say that I'm not all that excited about it anymore.

Back in the day there was one Yellow Pages. Now there are about 15 in my local market.

The Internet makes it so much easier to publish an online directory of local businesses.

This makes it harder for anyone business stand out and dominate any market with a hefty marketing budget. They are just too many websites that you would have to pay $200-$300 a month to have the top spot. (Heck, in some cases it would be $2000 a month still).

Anyway, it's very interesting where this market is going.

There is an unbelievable amount of competition here in Atlanta.

The lady was trying to tell me that I needed more calls, I needed more leads.

I thought to myself, actually, I told her that I don't want any more leads. Leads suck.

I'm so tired of going out and bidding on jobs, only to get beaten out by a guy with a year of experience.

I bid a $2200 job, then get undercut by $1200, and then later talked to the guy and he says "gosh, I really didn't make much money on that job".

The problem with this scenario is that there are just so many guys out there doing this, that I don't think they're going away anytime soon (actually, I don't think they're ever going to go away).

Our industry has such a low barrier of entry, that even when the current guys go away, there will be more to follow.

With the amount of directories diluting potential treat customers, it is really flipping the whole marketing scene on its ear.
 
You have realistic viewpoint about this.

Currently, the yellow pages book is as vital as a zombie. Newspaper ads that used to work great, don't seem worth a darn. Tried that last year. Maybe not one call in 10 months. 20 years ago, got a dozen calls a month.

And the internet, which is fine place to search for businesses, is unprectable, and fragmented, just like you say.

The search results are scattered among yellow pages, top ranking webisites, sponsored ads like GoogleAds, Angies List, and other directories.

Its an odd transition, and where things are headed is unknown.

One thing is certain, older website (older url addresses) are known to be given more weight on the internet by search engines like Google. And if a new site and old site fine-tune pages with identical technique, the new site generally cannot overcome the older site.

Maybe that's one reason why someone should buy and older URL if one is available for a resonable cost.
 
There is a lot of free advertising opportunities created by the internet. I think the best one now would be a company fan page on facebook. As good as a website. I think they're free anyway.
 
To optimize your search engine position you really need to know how each one functions. Some will rank you higher in the results based on the number of links to your site. This is where older sites have an advantage. Others by keyword hits. Thus the more keywords the better. Like the evolution of anything, one needs to become more sophisticated in understanding how to take advantage of the 'net and other advertising media. On top of this you need to be able to define your true target market to improve the quality of the hits you get and the leads generated.

What one must get their heads around is the fact that they are business people first and tree guys second. Develop your sales and marketing skills to better run your company. Signage on your truck and crew is going to go further than just relying on advertising but it is crucial that you are doing that general advertising as well to create brand awareness. The more your name is seen and heard the better people will feel about dealing with you despite being able to get better prices elsewhere. Shoppers are shoppers, and if you are not the best price in town then you need to forego them in favor of the quality buyer. Fewer of them and harder to find.

We are not unusual in the business world. The same rules apply to us as any other service. Get yourself some good web developer who understands the marketing strategies but also can dovetail this with an overall marketing plan.
 
[ QUOTE ]
Who is using Facebook for advertising?

What are the FB strategies that are applicable to tree work?

[/ QUOTE ]

Its kind of like word of mouth on steroids. Instant access to the friends of everyone you know.

Don't forget that you can pay Google for prime search result position.

I'm glad that you have to do more than buy a big pretty ad to be top dog nowadays. I feel like success is based more on merit and less on how much capital you start out with.

Good work begets work.
 
Oh boy ... Facebook.

Go ahead and put your Facebook ad on a business card and see how well that goes over in the broad scope of things.

Guess someone might get some work from it. Sure is a cheesy way to advertise though.
 
[ QUOTE ]
Oh boy ... Facebook.

Go ahead and put your Facebook ad on a business card and see how well that goes over in the broad scope of things.

Guess someone might get some work from it. Sure is a cheesy way to advertise though.

[/ QUOTE ]

I wasn't thinking about Fb on the business cards or truck or anything.

You never know. At one time, people poo-poo'ed the impacts of the internet, especially the status quo yellow pages.


I'm not FB savvy. I've resisted it. I spend enough time online at some tree sites.

I was thinking that if there was ways of sharing photos from the job directly to customer's FB pages, which I guess all of their FBFriends see, it could stimulate interest.
 
The big drawback of Facebook is that if a business is associated with a friend's page, the unknown viewer or potential customer can be exposed to an unknown myriad of friend's friends, and all the comments, images and postings by others. At least its not quite like Myspace, but its not that far removed.

I practically don't use FB anymore. Almost deleted my account 2 weeks ago. Have been slowly emailing or sending notes to friends that if they see my account vanish, they know where to email me.

I'm not sure whether or not Facebook is a "no follow" or not for backlinks. If its a do follow, then it could be worth at least one link like a vote.
 
Sure there are potential downsides to using Facebook but couldn't that be said about anything? You could give a bunch of business cards to a friend who gives a few to some scumbag who hands one to somebody else, does that mean you are automatically associated with that scumbag?

According to some, Facebook is in the top five most visited websites in the world. Facebook makes money because it is a ridiculously good advertising medium. Why not take advantage of a free advertising juggernaut?
 
southsoundtree said:
Who is using Facebook for advertising?

What are the FB strategies that are applicable to tree work?
Click to expand...

Things you could do would be to run ads targeted towards your demographics, such as say a stay-at-home mom. Probably the best thing about Facebook is how cheap it is compared to any other online marketing medium such as yelp advertising, google ads or bing ads. I would recommend running a small campaign and see if you can get a decent ROI from it.
 
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