http://localmarketer.co.uk no-nonsense advice, personal experiences and lessons learnt Tue, 24 Aug 2010 08:52:46 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en It is often said that many small businesses fail because they run out of cash.  Put simply, when your bills exceed your income, any cash you have put aside will be eaten away until there is none left.  If you have no cash to pay your employees and suppliers, it’s ... http://localmarketer.co.uk/?p=166 Restaurants, above most other types of local business, have the greatest opportunity to acquire new customers through online marketing.  It is not only that they are catered for by a number of online companies offering to bring them new diners.  It is also that people like to research online before ... http://localmarketer.co.uk/?p=164 There is still a great deal of confusion, particularly amongst business owners who consume little digital media or don’t participate in social networks, about the difference between traditional marketing and new media or social media marketing.  Hopefully, the following examples will help to ignite debate around the distinction. A traditional marketer will focus ... http://localmarketer.co.uk/?p=161 Everyone understands the power of word of mouth recommendation.  We want our customers to tell their friends how great we are so that they will become new customers.  For a local business owner, word of mouth is even more important because you can’t afford the marketing campaigns that bigger companies ... http://localmarketer.co.uk/?p=158 What does your business need in order to take off?  Most local business owners feel proud of their products or services.  They believe that their businesses iare great and that all they need is for more people to find out about them.  What they need, in order to grow, is ... http://localmarketer.co.uk/?p=156 The owner of a small restaurant group recently told me about a piece of research conducted in the UK, which estimates that one customer’s contact details adds, on average, £1.50 to the value of your business.  It follows that, if you have built a database of 10,000 customers, you would ... http://localmarketer.co.uk/?p=154 Everyone is talking about social media.  The discussion revolves around social networking websites such as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace amongst others, and whether these sites can be used to grow your business.  Is it something you should be looking into?  First of all, two questions: Do your existing customers use the ... http://localmarketer.co.uk/?p=149 1)     How did your customers find out about you? 2)     How old is your typical customer? 3)     Where does your typical customer come from?  How far?  Here’s a clue: Ask for their postcodes. 4)     What do your average customers do with their time?  Are they married with kids? What type of jobs do ... http://localmarketer.co.uk/?p=144 I recently found out about an interesting concept called ‘levy flight’ from the marketing genius, Seth Godin.  Levy flight is important for a small business owner because it describes a pattern in the way your customers behave towards your business. Levy flight has been observed in nature and is used by ... http://localmarketer.co.uk/?p=140 If you have a good product or a good service, isn’t that enough to ensure customers return?  To ensure that people buy from you again and become loyal fans of your business?  Can’t you rely on your product or service to generate loyal custom, without having to advertise, build customer ... http://localmarketer.co.uk/?p=138