Can Social Media Save a Local Business?

What are your customer’s “pain points”? Try to meet those.
I have 2
First, the 4:30 pm “what am I going to cook for dinner?” moment. How I’d love a daily email, twitter, or RSS feed with your “take home” dinner specials. I have read that this is a sector that is particularly growing; people who are too busy to plan home cooked meals, but want to still have dinner at home with the family.

Secondly, as someone suggested above, healthy. It’s January. Places like Weight Watchers have maximum enrollment numbers. They meet weekly, and what do they talk about at these meetings? Food! Where to eat out and stay on program, what to eat at home. Most restaurants have few if any healthy options that fit into the plan. If you can seed into that market, word of mouth will spread, both in person and online. You probably cannot use the official Weight Watchers ‘points’ system, but if you get hold of the parameters, you can post the required nutritional information so that members can figure it out for themselves. Make this available online as well — in fact, if I were on WW, I would love a “WW only” daily email, so I wouldn’t be tempted by the other offerings.

What are your customer’s “pain points”? Try to meet those.
I have 2
First, the 4:30 pm “what am I going to cook for dinner?” moment. How I’d love a daily email, twitter, or RSS feed with your “take home” dinner specials. I have read that this is a sector that is particularly growing; people who are too busy to plan home cooked meals, but want to still have dinner at home with the family.

Secondly, as someone suggested above, healthy. It’s January. Places like Weight Watchers have maximum enrollment numbers. They meet weekly, and what do they talk about at these meetings? Food! Where to eat out and stay on program, what to eat at home. Most restaurants have few if any healthy options that fit into the plan. If you can seed into that market, word of mouth will spread, both in person and online. You probably cannot use the official Weight Watchers ‘points’ system, but if you get hold of the parameters, you can post the required nutritional information so that members can figure it out for themselves. Make this available online as well — in fact, if I were on WW, I would love a “WW only” daily email, so I wouldn’t be tempted by the other offerings.

Six quick ideas:

1) LinkedIn and facebook as many customers as you can. Then ask them who handles booking lunch catering. Companies are looking to cut back so you may have to lowball, but it is great incremental business.

2) Email. Lots of great email ideas here, but think about weather based offers. There was a deli in California a few years ago that only emailed on rainy days. Her business died when the weather was bad…the email offset that. Forget about “newsletters”…focus on direct offers.

3) Blog. Blog early and often…as many times a day as possilble. Focus on the keywords that drive your business and use ShareThis to push your blog posts to your social networks like facebook and twitter. Your blogs posts can also be used for your emails

4) Drive time. What about a 4pm dinner idea email every day. I don’t know about your life, but at 4 people start thinking about the commute…the swim team, the parent teacher meeting and soccer. so dinner is either Mac & Cheese, fast food or a pizza again. this is a great time to hit people up with a take out alternative

5) Neighbors. Get the addresses of your customers. Forget valpack and use whitepages.com which has a great feature called “find neighbors”

enter in the name and address of your customer and it will give you the names and addresses of up to 10 neighbors. Use your PC and printer to make postcards and mail to them offers to try you out. Remember frequency works here. It may sound old fashioned but three or 4 of these home made postcards mailed to a prospect over a couple of weeks will cost you about $2.50 including postage and it really works.

6) Do what Zingermans does! This is the most successful deli in America and have been rock star relationship marketers forever.
http://www.zingermansdeli.com/content/pages/home.php

Bookmark them and do what they do!

Chris Baggott
CEO
Compendium Blogware
http://www.compendiumblogware.com

Six quick ideas:

1) LinkedIn and facebook as many customers as you can. Then ask them who handles booking lunch catering. Companies are looking to cut back so you may have to lowball, but it is great incremental business.

2) Email. Lots of great email ideas here, but think about weather based offers. There was a deli in California a few years ago that only emailed on rainy days. Her business died when the weather was bad…the email offset that. Forget about “newsletters”…focus on direct offers.

3) Blog. Blog early and often…as many times a day as possilble. Focus on the keywords that drive your business and use ShareThis to push your blog posts to your social networks like facebook and twitter. Your blogs posts can also be used for your emails

4) Drive time. What about a 4pm dinner idea email every day. I don’t know about your life, but at 4 people start thinking about the commute…the swim team, the parent teacher meeting and soccer. so dinner is either Mac & Cheese, fast food or a pizza again. this is a great time to hit people up with a take out alternative

5) Neighbors. Get the addresses of your customers. Forget valpack and use whitepages.com which has a great feature called “find neighbors”

enter in the name and address of your customer and it will give you the names and addresses of up to 10 neighbors. Use your PC and printer to make postcards and mail to them offers to try you out. Remember frequency works here. It may sound old fashioned but three or 4 of these home made postcards mailed to a prospect over a couple of weeks will cost you about $2.50 including postage and it really works.

6) Do what Zingermans does! This is the most successful deli in America and have been rock star relationship marketers forever.
http://www.zingermansdeli.com/content/pages/home.php

Bookmark them and do what they do!

Chris Baggott
CEO
Compendium Blogware
http://www.compendiumblogware.com

Mr. Brogan-

You definitely are the prime example of the KLT Factor! This was a super generous thing that you did for John in this post. I called John directly and here is his Twitter for the shop:

http://twitter.com/simplygourmet

Maybe everyone posting would like to follow him. John seems pretty saavy and will be posting his upcoming ideas. If anyone was involved in the Motrin Moms issue back in November the you know the power of a retweet! Follow @simplygourmet and help John out with RT’s.

Tweetups are a great idea especially if they are done around an already planned conference or event. John is 20 mins from Boston so if anyone is going to an event or conference in Boston, they may want to consider planning a Tweet Up or Meet Up at John’s shop.

John–very best of luck to you!
Tina
@bestreflections

I think adding a weekly TV show could help drive some business. Explain making different types of sandwiches, differences between breads, etc. You will slowly gain a following, show your human side as well as talents, and the name will get out there more.

I think adding a weekly TV show could help drive some business. Explain making different types of sandwiches, differences between breads, etc. You will slowly gain a following, show your human side as well as talents, and the name will get out there more.

I think adding a weekly TV show could help drive some business. Explain making different types of sandwiches, differences between breads, etc. You will slowly gain a following, show your human side as well as talents, and the name will get out there more.

I live in Massachusetts, so I’m going to go visit this place. I like a road trip and if I can give some business to people like this, all the better!

I live in Massachusetts, so I’m going to go visit this place. I like a road trip and if I can give some business to people like this, all the better!

Chris,

I love the way that you crowdsourced all of these great ideas. I’d been scratching my head on how to use social media to help one of my favorite restaurants (Joe Squared in Baltimore), and in addition to pointing him at all the gold in these comments, I’ve put a similar post on my blog (http://budurl.com/JoeSquared). Now if only I had your following!

All the best to John and the team at the Simply Gourmet Bistro and Groceria. I’ll definitely look in and see them, if I get up to that part of the world.

Chris,

I love the way that you crowdsourced all of these great ideas. I’d been scratching my head on how to use social media to help one of my favorite restaurants (Joe Squared in Baltimore), and in addition to pointing him at all the gold in these comments, I’ve put a similar post on my blog (http://budurl.com/JoeSquared). Now if only I had your following!

All the best to John and the team at the Simply Gourmet Bistro and Groceria. I’ll definitely look in and see them, if I get up to that part of the world.

This is so funny- this is my second time running across this wonderful & informational blog discussing how important social media is for businesses. I would suggest every business get onto twitter now and start tweeting and see what it does for their business! The power of social networking in action again- so great! Which is why i am creating a new division of my IT Consulting business in San Diego of providing social networking 101 to small business in San Diego. check our blog here http://perfectintegration.com/blogfeed.html for details or call 760-929-2319 for packages

This is so funny- this is my second time running across this wonderful & informational blog discussing how important social media is for businesses. I would suggest every business get onto twitter now and start tweeting and see what it does for their business! The power of social networking in action again- so great! Which is why i am creating a new division of my IT Consulting business in San Diego of providing social networking 101 to small business in San Diego. check our blog here http://perfectintegration.com/blogfeed.html for details or call 760-929-2319 for packages

I took at look at the Peabody CoC, and I see you are already running some deals there…. what about some cross pollination with other chamber businesses. Perhaps come up with a combined package deal… share advertising cost, or even co coupon with each other. Community is the solution to economic downturns, leverage the resources right next door, and who knows what can happen.

Lastly, do you have menu’s at local companies in town? Perhaps a specific menu tailored for noon lunch meetings, with a special business discount 1 day a week, or free delivery w a planned route? You could also use that menu to start to build a SM following in the business community, ie see twitter for deals etc. SM though is a longer term strategy, the local community is where you can leverage short and long term results.

I took at look at the Peabody CoC, and I see you are already running some deals there…. what about some cross pollination with other chamber businesses. Perhaps come up with a combined package deal… share advertising cost, or even co coupon with each other. Community is the solution to economic downturns, leverage the resources right next door, and who knows what can happen.

Lastly, do you have menu’s at local companies in town? Perhaps a specific menu tailored for noon lunch meetings, with a special business discount 1 day a week, or free delivery w a planned route? You could also use that menu to start to build a SM following in the business community, ie see twitter for deals etc. SM though is a longer term strategy, the local community is where you can leverage short and long term results.

I took at look at the Peabody CoC, and I see you are already running some deals there…. what about some cross pollination with other chamber businesses. Perhaps come up with a combined package deal… share advertising cost, or even co coupon with each other. Community is the solution to economic downturns, leverage the resources right next door, and who knows what can happen.

Lastly, do you have menu’s at local companies in town? Perhaps a specific menu tailored for noon lunch meetings, with a special business discount 1 day a week, or free delivery w a planned route? You could also use that menu to start to build a SM following in the business community, ie see twitter for deals etc. SM though is a longer term strategy, the local community is where you can leverage short and long term results.

Instead of trying to solve the problem WITH social media, I’d USE social media to solve the problem. Hosting a Twitter meetup might help, it might not, but John has an incredible opportunity to crowdsource for ideas with all of the marketing professionals reading this post that hail from all over the world. He should read through the comments, post his own comments & questions, and try to leverage the conversation to gather possible marketing solutions.

My idea – maybe he’d enjoy offering cooking classes that teach people how to use some of the delicious but uncommon ingredients he sells. The economy is definitely down, but people who used to order take-out 3 or 4 times a week can save money and eat better by cooking fine food at home. They just need help figuring out how.

Good luck to John and small business owners everywhere.

Engage with a local photographer to photograph some of the specialties of the place to and post results on the blog, twitpic, flickr, and Facebook fan page, the photographer’s blog, and everywhere else.

Engage with a local photographer to photograph some of the specialties of the place to and post results on the blog, twitpic, flickr, and Facebook fan page, the photographer’s blog, and everywhere else.

Engage with a local photographer to photograph some of the specialties of the place to and post results on the blog, twitpic, flickr, and Facebook fan page, the photographer’s blog, and everywhere else.

I think small businesses have a huge opportunity to use the web to succeed. So many of them miss the basics – have a website that lists your phone number and hours and an email address, reply to emails, make sure your listings are correct and on the web (google maps, yelp). I also would love it if my favorite local places would post their menu online or send me an email.

I think small businesses have a huge opportunity to use the web to succeed. So many of them miss the basics – have a website that lists your phone number and hours and an email address, reply to emails, make sure your listings are correct and on the web (google maps, yelp). I also would love it if my favorite local places would post their menu online or send me an email.

A shot story. I lived across the street from a little sandwich shop for a year, and never went it… I stuck to what I knew, or what was recommended. Then one day, on a whim, I went in… guess what, best sandwich in the city. A little social media would of helped his situation… well that and some new signage… and maybe getting rid of those tacky posters in the window :)

okay, he needed an makeover, but he had a great sandwich, for a great price, and sharing that 411 is what social media is all about.