A quick story about free advertising that works.  About two weeks ago I came across a free classified advertising site site called Gumtree , its a world wide site , with listings dedicated by capital city locations.

Liking the free idea I invested a few minutes and whacked up an ad with a link to the A3 Revolution Web Design . Then promptly forgot all about it. It cost me nothing so I expected nothing. How wrong I was.

Last Thursday Gavin contacted me off that little ad. He said he followed the link and was really impressed with our work. Turns out that Gavin is in Brisbane and has been searching for some time for a web design firm that he could partner with to build his concept e-commerce business site from scratch.

After a number of emails and phone conversations it is looking like Gavin is about to join the growing list of A3 Revolution clients. I’ll know for sure next week. If it happens our input into the project will be between 80-100 hours of work.

Now you’ll agree, that is an outstanding result off a free ad in just 2 weeks. Best of all the ad is still there, a silent salesman working 24/7 directing people to our site. The Free Gumtree ad works. The ad worked because it lead Gavin to our website. Once here the site did the rest.

The moral to the story is this:

If you have a professional business website there are literally dozens of ways to use it to have new clients and customers contacting you to do business. Best of all – they are free.

Free Business Tip

If you have a professional business web presence put your url www.yourbusiness.com on everything you can find. You just never know who will see it and from where, and then go to your site. I”d urge you to get creative about where you put your web address. Some ideas (I’d love to hear yours).

• Obviously on your business cards and stationary.
• On your sales dockets / Invoices , Statement.
• At the bottom of every email you send, business & private.
• On Signs, Banners, brochures, stickers.
• Obviously any free online classified sites you can find .. like gumtree.
• On all of your print media adverting (newspapers, magazines).
• Any sponsorship you do should carry your web address on all the promotional material.
• Radio.
• TV if that is in your budget.
• On your business vehicles.

One Caveat here thought:

If your business website is not a powerful sales and marketing tool, do not promote it. Why?

The old saying stands truer than ever when it comes to websites:

“You never get a second chance to make a first impression”

Say a new person is walking along the street and picks up your business card off the footpath that someone has dropped. It looks interesting to them and they visit your website but it’s less than professional. What you have done is created that unprofessional image of your business in that persons mind. After that happens it does not matter how much money you spend on advertising and promotion, research shows that first impression is almost impossible to change.

If you have not already joined the growing band of A3 Revolution Web Design and Digital Solutions clients we are here ready when you are, to partner with you to take your business to that next level with online marketing. If you’d like to know more send us a message or call and we can have a no hassles, no pressure chat about ramping up your business online marketing.

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