Yellow Pages

i always thought and think about where do people market and advertise at. I don't follow the guys that dont make money. One's that stay at home and wish they did. Where do successful business's go to and advertise at?. If i want hamburgers i will go to mcdonald's or burger king. Same for anything i want really. However, if I see a big company for lawn care that is paying 50 bucks a month or week do they pay that just so people see there name? Are they wasting 50/week/month at this place? Or are they making money at this place? What if I was next to them? Would anybody know how big or how small my business is compared to their's?. I notice in the paper some of these bigger companies don't advertise in them but there on the internet???? what if i was next to them in the ad space? would i get the same calls? Nobody knows how much you make or how big you are in this game. I could say i have been doing this for 15 years and I have 80 people for the season, do you need a referral from some of my clients? I can give you 5 or 10 or 15. Nobody knows. So, you can say whatever you want to the people really. But if your advertising with the bigger companies in your area does that give you a better persona or does it give you a better jumpstart for competion? I don't know is what im saying. You can spend a million dollars and not get anywhere. Look at all these flyers people do and alot are saying they don't work. What works and nobody in there right mind will say what works to you why would they? So they can compete with you and get that area saturated?. People who are successful leave clues on what there doing. Thats all I know. If i am smart enough to figure it out then I'd be amazed..LOL

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Last edited by MikeO; 08-25-2009 at 11:49 PM. Reason: I love this city

[Steve]

Lawn care business tips

Ok I am understanding what you mean now. But if your advertising with the bigger companies in your area does that give you a better persona or does it give you a better jumpstart for competion? This is a very good question. It is fascinating. So if a large successful company puts and ad somewhere and you find it and you place your ad next to it, will you look big too? Will people think 'hey I know this one company and here is another company that is just as big so I can call them as well.' Will there be a jolt of business growth by close proximity in your ads. In marketing you never know what will work until you experiment but my initial thought is this. When companies get larger they aren't just larger with the amount of employees they have or equipment, but they are larger in an intangible way. They are larger in the network within the community. They have had more time to reach out to this person or that person and then word spreads from there. A smaller company can not see that intangible asset. They can see ads here or there but to simply be next to an ad of a larger company is missing the bigger picture of what you are competing against. To chase this as the trail of how to grow, won't lead you to where you want to be. The ads are not sign posts to simply follow and become them. This is part of the frustration of being a small business looking up at the larger ones. You sit there and think, I want to be that big. I can do it! I am ready! All I need is to just be bigger and I could compete against them. But the thing is, unless there is some revolutionary transformation in the industry that will allow you to change the rules of the game, which could happen, what you need to compete is time and money. You need time to build the contacts and the infrastructure and you need the money to scale up as you go. Now sure that is simplifying things but I think if you look around at some of the larger companies, ask yourself how long have they been in business? You most likely wont be able to find out their financial history. Like maybe the owner got a cash injection somewhere from a family member or friend and they were able to take that and grow because of it. Getting to know more people over time, providing them great service and scaling up is normally the way the growth happens. The marketing always helps but its a part of the bigger picture. You can spend a million dollars and not get anywhere. Look at all these flyers people do and alot are saying they don't work. This is all very true. Businesses tend to have a level they will be able to organically grow. You could theoretically chart it over time. At a certain point they simply will not grow any faster no matter how much money you throw at it. There are many factors that need to grow all together for the organism to survive. Think of a plant. You can only fertilize it so much. More is not always going to provide faster, better, stronger results. What works and nobody in there right mind will say what works to you why would they? So they can compete with you and get that area saturated?. People who are successful leave clues on what there doing. Thats all I know. If i am smart enough to figure it out then I'd be amazed Another thing that is fascinating about this is, there are many times something works and even the person who got it to work can't explain why. They can tell you what they did sure but there were elements involved that were not understood so they can't be replicated. Very very few entrepreneurs have been able to understand all the elements well enough to continue to recreate their success time and time again. There are many entrepreneurs who found success where it was fast and fleeting. Then when it is gone they cant figure out what happened and they desperately try so very hard to make the magic happen again by throwing in more money and more time and the next project just never lifts off the ground. Most of the time it's like studying the history of a person who won the lottery. They can tell us how they got to the point where they bought the ticket and won, but they can't reproduce the results again. So ultimately what do you do with all this? Maybe you put yourself into the mix. You get into the game. You look for opportunities as they present themselves and you jump on them. You let people know you can do something so when they need it done they know they can call you. As more opportunities arise, you take advantage of them and you grow. A lot of this tends to take time, money and knowledge. I hope this helps spark more thoughts in you

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