Returning After an Abscence, Question About Community Site

Welcome back Marty - from someone who occasionally goes mia himself every now and then.

I think the idea of a local video site is great and it's something I've been toying with for forever - you've gotten some great tips from the others here already, but I'll add my thoughts and you're free to take what you like and leave what you dont.

For starters, I've never really liked those city america type sites 'cause I thought they had too much fluff and not enough real content. In my area there are no shortage of sites that list name, address and phone for everyone in town...but I've already got the yellow pages for that, why do the same thing while providing little else to stand out from your competition?

If I can get myself together here's the plan for what I want to do. Using wordpress you can get a great community site together. Offer local businesses a free webpage with a couple of photos and paragraphs. Everyone else will give 'em just a name, address and phone for free - here you can provide something of real value to them and your cost is next to nothing.

Offering a free detailed listing gives you a way to get a foot in the door and find out who the owner/manager of the place is, and it increases the odds they'll reciprocate and have more interest in what ever additional services you'ld like to sell them.

Now if you're going to offer video, please offer them real video - move still photos around and add music to it and you'll get a nice slideshow...but it's not a real video! Sure, you can do some creative things with sites like animoto...but that's still not real video in my book and it's something a business owner could easily do themselves.

If you're going to do video learn how to do it right, but you don't need to spend a fortune to get started. For $200 or less you can get a decent FLIP cam or a still digital cam that will also take video clips - and you can find free video editing software out there, or download a 30 day trial of something more powerful like Sony Vegas Platinum Pro. Make one sale and you've paid for the full version which goes for about $70 retail or less when they offer rebates. Spend $60 on a decent video tripod and for less than $300 total you'll have all the basics you need and you can upgrade as you go.

Just know that proper sound is important for great video and as soon as you can you might want to upgrade to a camera that'll let you plug in an external wired or wireless mike.

As far as pricing goes - my thoughts for a 1 minute video where I'm interviewing the owner while showing shots of their products services in the background - would be $30/month paid up front for the first year ($360) then continuing monthly after that. I think thats affordable enough that many people would want one just because they know their competitors have one, and if it results in just one or two new clients for them, it's paid for itself. I'ld also let them use the video on their website too in addition to listing it on their profile on the community site.

Take a look at some real professional video at www. bostonweb.tv - he charges $500 for a slightly longer commercial (2 - 5 min) but then they own it outright. I think you'll have to test and see what works best in your area, but when its so inexpensive to host video these days, I couldn't think of charging someone an arm and a leg to host it on my site...unless you can deliver them plenty of pageviews and new clients on a regular basis.

Oh, and for the $30/month i would think of charging someone, I'd also let them contribute informative articles to the website - the kind of thing that would really educate their clients and prospects and add value to my site while helping the search engines find it too.

Of course, once you've got that foot in the door with a free listing there are all kinds of other things you can sell them besides video. Email marketing help, web design for those that dont have one or want to redo their site, direct mail marketing - get your foot in the door as a trusted advisor and there's no shortage of ways you can profit from your relationship.

I'd also ask the businesses you signup for free to display or hand out flyers for your site where their customers can find them online - and you should also build two email lists of your own. One of the businesses you signup so you have an easy way of contacting all of them and can eventually sell advertising in it - and one of the locals that come to your site so you can provide them with info and special offers from the businesses on your site (and of course charge the businesses for advertising in it too!)

Sorry if I'm all over the place with all these ideas here, but hopefully you can find something of value in this.

Steve

Steve,

I just got in from my long shift at work and have glanced at what you've suggested. It looks really great; I'm going to go over it in detail shortly, after I eat.

Thanks!

Re: Town Directory

1) Start out with the "Video Slides with background music".
2) Offer 3 or 4 Free Samples to start
3) Get an "Ego-centered" domain, "HendersonsBest.com"
4) Send a PostCard, every month, to "New Movers" with URL on it
5) Get a local Pizza Co to offer a "Buy 1 Pizza, Get 1 Free". Have viewers sign in for it and...capture their emails for add'l followup and offers.

And....don't be concerened about any potential customers "doing it themselves"....they have too much keeping their biz going to "fool around" with doing something you offer.

Don Alm

Don,

I like the idea of the postcards to the new movers. It's in line with being a mini welcome service without putting too much strain in it for me. I think it would be a selling point with which I'd feel confident. However, let me ask you this:

Do you think I should use (or give my clients the option) of including printed gift certificates that also go to the new movers?

I'm not worried about people doing it themselves, as I know they don't have a lot of time.

I'm going to have to find a way to put this into action, balancing things with my present work load.

Yes! What REALLY keeps customers paying you...every month....is.... RESULTS!

If they see one of THEIR Special Offer Coupons come into their biz being held by someone who got it FROM YOU!.....YOU can bet yer bippy they will KEEP ON PAYING YOU! Month after month!

Now....besides the website you send a Giant Card, either 8 1/2 by 5 1/2 or even 8 1/2 by 11. On this Card are ALL Special Offers from your customers.

AND.....now here's the SECRET to PREVENTING your customers from saying or thinking, "Hey! Yer program ain't bringin' in many customers, we ONLY got 10 Coupons in last month!"

You place ALL your offers on ONE Card! There's a circle or box where your customers can check off....indicating the Special Offer has been used.

Now....when the Special Offer is checked....the New Mover TAKES THE CARD WITH THEM!....so your customers "has an idea" your program is working for him BUT....he does not know....exactly how many or how few people are coming in.....so...when your bill comes in for the next period....he PAYS IT!

Don Alm

Originally Posted by Adman

....so your customers "has an idea" your program is working for him BUT....he does not know....exactly how many or how few people are coming in.....so...when your bill comes in for the next period....he PAYS IT!

Don Alm

When you said a site with traffic wasn't needed, I gave some thought to accusing you of selling crap painted up like strawberries.

But then I thought...Nah, why bother. Idiots will buy anything that looks like a strawberry to them, who am I to try selling real strawberries?

Thanks for clearing the air.

Originally Posted by Bozo

When you said a site with traffic wasn't needed, I gave some thought to accusing you of selling crap painted up like strawberries.

But then I thought...Nah, why bother. Idiots will buy anything that looks like a strawberry to them, who am I to try selling real strawberries?

Thanks for clearing the air.

Hey Mr. BOZO,
The fact IZ....... you can only sell fake strawberries for so long before word gets out that its really crap.

Stay with the real strawberries if at all possible! When ever possible, dip them in chocolate to as to give the client a bit extra than they expect!!

Reporting from the field,
ggina

[Dien Rice]

Originally Posted by Adman

Now....when the Special Offer is checked....the New Mover TAKES THE CARD WITH THEM!....so your customers "has an idea" your program is working for him BUT....he does not know....exactly how many or how few people are coming in.....

Keep in mind that this approach will have the opposite effect too...

That is, if your program is working like gangbusters to bring people in, this approach obscures it... And the customer "has an idea" it's working, but can't be really sure that it is working very well, and so might be more likely to cancel your program as a result...

Just pointing it out. Even without considering the ethical side of it, it's a double-edged sword.

- Dien

Thought I'd Spin the subject line to make things more Applicable for Everyone on Google and SowPubs...

Marty,

Welcome back into the Entrepreneurial world...

As Ankesh suggested Make sure you Dig through those Golden SowPub archives...

Quick example... Some Great ideas in the following thread...
http://www.sowpub.com/forum/showthre...ht=LOCAL+VIDEO
http://www.sowpub.com/forum/search.php

But what I Highly recommend as so Many these days in Listening to and Studying everything from Gary Vaynerchuk...

Gotta love his Energy! ... Motivation... & Intriguing personality...

Gary Vaynerchuk's got his own Keyword database in Google well worth Digging into and Studying!

Quick link Sampling if you happen to be unfamiliar with Gary Vaynerchuk...
http://fora.tv/2009/10/23/CRUSH_IT_Gary_Vaynerchuk
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&t...G=Search&meta=
http://www.youtube.com/results?searc... ch_type=&aq=f
http://garyvaynerchuk.com/
http://tv.winelibrary.com/

On another note! ... Awesome Blog post and TED video full of Endless ideas & opportunities...

Click on the Free PDF at the end of the blog post!

VANKSEN’S MARKETING 2.0 TRENDS FOR 2010 - Social Networks, UGC, Mobile, Monitoring, Blogs, Influence: The Complete Panorama
http://www.culture-buzz.com/blog/Van...2010-2463.html

Phil

Great advice, Phil, I'm going to check out everything. I remember that you and Ankesh (and of course Don) were very helpful, even beyond the "call of duty" in the past.