5. Tell the world:
Do people know about your services? Advertise online, talk to your local paper, email all your friends and acquaintances, distribute flyers in your local pub, write to your MP and walk around town with a billboard. Anything goes as long as your clients hear about you.
You’ve got a fabulous idea for a social enterprise and the next step is telling prospective customers all about it. What do you do? Advertise, right?
The answer is yes, but only if it’s cost effective. That means for every pound you spend you want to get a pound in return. You can lose a lot of money buying expensive ads or ads in the wrong places. You can also lose money by having ineffective or misleading ads.
A scattergun approach rarely works for small, niche businesses. You will have much more luck if you understand your market and identify who your customers are. This is the basic premise of marketing. Then you can use a whole range of tools – including advertising if it’s appropriate – to boost your business.
Consider this example:
Alex owns a corner shop in a busy suburb in London. There’s another corner shop not too far from his, plus a big Tesco a few streets over. What can he do to hold onto the business he has and win new customers?
Promotions. If Alex’s store has a good street front and lots of people walk by, he can use post a weekly special on the glass. Buy one, get one free and other promotions might get someone into the store, where they can be further impressed by range or product knowledge and so on.
Presentation. Once in the store, customers want you to exceed their expectations. Without breaking the budget, Alex should keep the store bright and attractive. If the customers have a good experience in the store, they will be encouraged to come back. This is known as repeat business, and is one of the most lucrative ways of growing your business.
Specialising. Beating big competitors is about being better at something than they are. If Alex knows his local community well, he will know what they are willing to pay a little more for. He could supply halal meat to the local Muslim community, or fruit, chocolate and other treats to homesick Caribbean, South African, New Zealand and Australian immigrants. These markets are not big enough to warrant attention from the big supermarkets, but could be a real money-spinner for a small grocer.
Add-ons. If his store is near to a bus or tube stop, Alex could become a Transport for London ticket agent. The initial cost to join the scheme may be thousands of pounds, but it is likely to be made back over the next year in extra sales. Ask your customers for other ideas.
Cross selling. There are lots of opportunities for retailers to work as a team to draw people into their area. Alex could sign a deal with the local video store, for example. Customers could get a voucher for a bag of crisps and bottle of fizzy drink at his store for each movie hired. The video store would then pay him an agreed amount for each voucher. Once in the store, customers might also be tempted to buy popcorn, sweets and so on…
Service. Its no use Alex fighting Tesco head on. He should concentrate on doing things they are just too big and clumsy to worry about. He could hire a scooter and driver to deliver fresh bread and milk, or organic produce to local resident’s homes. What about a Friday night or Saturday night delivery service for people who have forgotten a particular ingredient for dinner or who are too tired to go out? These kind of services are worth extra to customers, so they will pay more for them. The best way to get them to take part is to tell them about the service across the counter and offer a phone number to ring to place an order.
Advertising weekly specials in the local paper can be expensive and customers are unlikely a) notice the ad or b) remember that it was from Alex’s shop. It is also very hard for him to compete on price with the likes of Tesco.
Direct marketing. Dropping leaflets or coupon sheets through local letterboxes is a better idea, because it gets right into the hands of the customer. But what about using email or the internet? Alex could offer customers add their email to a list to receive his monthly email newsletter. This will go straight to their inbox and could include recipes and other thoughts from the local community. For example, he could include cake and cupcake recipes before the local school fare or pumpkin recipes in time for Halloween.
Public relations/communication. If at all possible, use PR, which is free. In this case, Alex could also contact the local community newspaper or council newsletter and see if they might be interested in interviewing him. The trick here is to get the business mentioned, even in a general article. Alex could offer tips on starting a small business, for example. At the bottom it could say something like “Alex Smith’s Neighbourhood Shop, 75 Jones St”. The more people who know his store’s location, the more that might be tempted to shop there.
Social enterprises often have an interesting and newsworthy story to share with editors about work in the community. Talk to the editors of magazines or newspapers in your area and tell them the things that normally make your friends say “wow, that’s an interesting job”. The key is choosing the quality magazines or newspapers. If you wouldn’t read it, it’s unlikely your customers will either.
Look at what competitors are doing well and that should give you an idea of the useful things to do. Try an ad in a paper or website if you’re not sure and you’ll know from the amount of enquiries you get whether it is worth it or not.
At all times, keep your perfect customer in mind:
- What are they interested in?
- What are they willing to pay for? And what are they willing to pay more for?
- What are the best ways to reach them?
If you’d like to learn more about how to instil and ‘live’ the mission in your organisation, or about how to measure your success against your mission, please email info@sparkchallenge.org.uk.
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