Business Ambush!

 

Are the “winter blahs” setting in?  Have you tapped out your customers, family and friends, so your calendar is looking bleak?  Winter events are few and far between, right?  Would you love some new leads?

Why not try a “business ambush“?  They are super easy and genius.  I got this tip from an AWESOME Senior Executive Director from Thirty One.

How does it work???

Step #1:  Who do I ask?  You start contacting local businesses. Think of places you frequent: dentist, Doctor, hair salon, nail salon, gym where you or your kids go, etc.  Make a list of all of the business places that you go to during a week (or month).  Then think of any work places your friends work at. Do they have a lunch room or a break room?  Better yet, step out of your comfort zone and get your ASK on at restaurants, hair salons, etc.

Step #2:  What do I need?  Everything you see in this picture. Mini catalogs, event/drawing/door prize slips, small giveaway (whatever fits into your budget), a decorated shoe box or something similar to put the slips in for the giveaway, a sign that entices and a hostess packet for all of the workers!  Okay, I see you cringing about the hostess packet. You are thinking about the cost, right?  Honestly, I do this based on the size of the company or the number of workers.  If it is a big staff, just 1 or 2 hostess packets to key people so they can share.

Step #3: What am I doing?  Basically, you are getting a business to allow you to display this stuff for one week.  Yes, just a week.  You could actually do 4 of these in a month, at 4 different locations an just re-stock brochures, etc.   And you are collecting new leads.  And with any luck you got a catalog party from the workers! A small giveaway is WAY cheaper than any event you will ever pay for.  Maybe give away the hostess benefits or at least some of them by doing a drawing from the people who ordered.  If you have one rockstar employee who pulled it all together, let her have the hostess benefits.

Extra tips:
1. You can up the fun and create some excitement by posting the catalogs and cookies or catalogs and donuts picture to see who is interested.
2. If any business is hesitant you can offer to purchase a $10 gift card from them and give that away as well. Win/win all around and still cheaper than a booth at an event!

Who is ready to do some business ambushes to get more leads!?  Share your best tips for getting new leads..

Have a ThirtyOne-derful day!

 

#Hashtags

Hashtag

Do you use hashtags on your social media posts?  I have to be honest, I don’t! Okay so maybe occasionally I would remember but not all of the time.  I especially never thought to use them in ALL of my social media posts.

My best friend, Steph Loder, kicked off her business by helping me this week.  She has years of experience in the newspaper industry and she is now putting that digital training to use by starting her own business coordinating social media for small businesses.  I’m her first customer.  Okay, so what does all of this have to do with hashtags, right?

Steph has been blowing my Twitter account up. I have lots of new followers, likes and retweets.  Sounds like I know what I am doing, right?  WRONG!  I was clueless when it came to Twitter but I am learning.  She asked me what I wanted my “unique” hashtag to be; you know the way that people would search for me on all social media sites.  Can you say clueless?  I said, my name.  WRONG!

See finding the right keywords to use – and those that are active enough to attract new people to you can be a challenge.  The key is to use 2-5 hashtags when appropriate, so that  people who are interested in various topics might find your post and interact with you and your business!  The key is to drive people to your website to increase business.

Using a hashtag gives your post exposure when people are searching words or hashtags. An example is if someone reads a post about makeup on a popular Instagram account that has the hashtag #makeup or #cosmetics, they can click on those hashtag words and find other posts (like yours!) where the user also included those hashtags.

Hashtags are a great way to get more exposure.  Some social media users use the search boxes when looking for information about certain topics and hashtags come up in the search results as they are considered popular, or trending, topics. So here are some ideas for those in direct sales:

Direct Sales in General

#dstips

#directsales

#partyplan

Business Opportunity

#bizopp

#incomeopportunity

#businessopportunity

Women/Moms in Business

#wahm (work at home mom)

#mompreneur

#sahm (stay at home mom)

#womenbiz

#mombiz

General Business/Home Business

#homebiz

#smallbiztips

#biztips

#bizitalk

#entrepreneur

Of course, you want to include your company hashtag (#thirtyone) or your team name (#raysofhope).  For my Thirty One business, I can also use #purses #totes #organization #gifts #jewelry #home or #accessories.  I found a fun tool called Hashtagify to discover hashtags about a specific topics.  When you type in a general keyword, you’ll get other related hashtags.  Remember, the objective is to attract interested leads, not others who are marketing their own businesses – or worse, spammers.

So, now as for a “unique” hashtag for my business, I was thinking #Hopes31Bags.  What do you think?  What other hashtags have you found to be helpful for you business?

Have a ThirtyOne-derful day!