Why You Should Increase Your On-line Presence

I had an interesting conversation today with Rob, he is the Director of Franchise Development for Waves Coffee Shops ( www.wavescoffee.com )  about several types of marketing initiatives and comparing traditional print/flyer marketing to social media for small business.  Ultimately his objective is to help the franchisee drive more business to the stores.  I think traditional streams work and they are proven, but it's expensive.

In addition to your traditional marketing plan, the Store Owner should invest in improving his on-line presence, and here's why. 

89% of consumers use the internet to search for local restaurants

57% will visit a restaurant site to view menu's, photographs, directions, reviews and events.  This figure is growing rapidly due to the popularity and use of smart phones.

73% of all online activity is related to "Local Content"

Social media can seem overwhelming to most people, and is perceived as a lot of work, but here are some very simple steps to get the owner started.

Create a Facebook page for your business,  creating a page takes only minutes and there is plenty of on-line tutorials to walk you through the process.

Use Facebooks new look and format and post a great picture on your opening page, if there is no photo available try searching in google for some public domain pictures that tie into what you do.

There are many additional add ons and applications that are available but for now just the basics will do, once you start to get more followers you can get fancy.
When your facebook page is complete you need to get people following.

How to get more followers to your Facebook Page

Start by sending out invitations to follow with friends, employees, suppliers, head office staff, and anyone else you might know.

Next start following other local businesses on your Facebook page, businesses like to have followers and they may follow you in return.

For example:  Mandalay Steak House www.mandalaysteakhouse.com is a local restaurant with it's own facebook with 1315 followers.  Click on like, they may return, post comments if you have dined there.  The owner will most likely return the compliment.
Others include, The Steveston Farmers Market 291 followers on twitter, SOS Childrens Village 300 followers, Riverside Mortgage Brokers, Steveston Insider Magazine, Steveston Merchants Association and Steves Board Shop (313 followers) to name a few.

You can easily add a coupon application that allows users to redeem in-store for specials and giveaways.  Check out www.faceitpages.com they have over 20 applications to use on facebook, but we can talk about this later.
The followers will quickly start to grow.

Facebook For Small Business

Still not convinced about how effective Social Media for small business is?

Lets look at a couple of case studies.  The Tapenade Bistro www.tapenade.ca  on Bayview Street in Richmond has a facebook page ( 571 followers ).  Their Facebook page looks good, kinda cheesy on the self-promotion but I like the feedback section.  Great postings and excellent reviews would make me want to visit.

A better example is the Blue Canoe Waterfront Restaurant  www.bluecanoerestaurant.com  facebook page only has 371 followers but their friend list includes The B.C. Lions with 54,000 followers and the Vancouver Canucks with 747,000 followers.
As well as ........  The Mandalay Steak House, what a surprise they are riding on the wagon.

But have a look at the Blue Canoe Facebook page, this is a good example of the owner connecting in his community & engaging his customers with his post on April 11th, looking for local farmers to supply fresh produce.  In addition he uses
facebook to help find employees, April 6th posting.  People like to work at a place or person they like, as well as local.

They also engage their followers  with non-related content such as his January 19th posting of a Jon Stewart Video, this helps to keep your customers visiting your page and drive more followers.  I like the way he subtly injects some self-promotion with great photos of
products. 

Who Has Time For Facebook?

This is merely a small sample of local businesses using Facebook to enhance their overall social imprint and ultimately drive more business to their location.  Unfortunately or whichever way you look at it, many businesses in Steveston have a web page but thats it.
The good thing is Social Media has zero cost to entry, however it does take a commitment on the owners part to keep the Facebook site alive with continuous content.  Maintaining your Facebook page for business can be 5 minutes a day or hours if you wish.  If time or lack of technology is a concern, facebook offers admin permissions that allow a other people designated by you to post additional comments and contents.  For example the business owner may have an employee who knows their way around the internet and is very socially active, can take a few minutes each day to post to the site.  As well Head Office may already have someone dedicated to maintaining the Waves Facebook, they can also help to post relative content to keep the page looking fresh. 

You can also subscribe to local links such as Inside Vancouver with 28,518 followers, and share interesting stories and content that engage your customer.  Another example is Ocean Wise ( 2416 followers ) A non-profit organization dedicated to educating consumers
about sustainable seafood, a worth cause.

As you can see it really is quite easy, its cheap and it really does not take much effort.  The result is not as tangible as traditional marketing initiatives, meaning you may not see a return right away.  Social Networking for business is a long term engagement with a long term commitment to engaging your customers on a daily basis.  The alternative is you could go to this guys site in Steveston.   www.blackberrybistro.com

Oh and have fun

Trent Barnes
Small Business on the Web