Where to advertise at a good price

D

dave29

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We are a new business, Just online. (2 of us)

We put our own money in to start up.

August
We spent about €1096 with Facebook on ads
We've made sales of €2330 (this is not taking into account payment processing fees)

If you factor in the cost of the product we are losing money.

Are there any cheaper ways to advertise?

At the moment it's costing us €1 to make €2 (roughly) .. but when you add in the cost of the product (which varies) it's costing us €1 to make €0.55.

Would flyers/radio ads work any better?
 
Without knowing what your product is (even roughly) I'm not sure you're going to get any meaningful advice. For instance is it something where you get repeat business or tends to spread by word of mouth, in whichcase spending €1 to make €0.55 on the first sale is OK if that person will come back weekly/monthly/annually or recommend you without needing to spend that €1 again. Is it an especially interesting product that you might get onto a radio show to discuss (which might be free) or will you need to pay for radio advertising (prohibitively expensive at the levels you're talking I'd think)?
 
Depends on the product as to whether flyers would work, and how/where/to whom you distribute them.

If you're spending money on online ads, maybe have a read up of different strategies to use. Have you considered a google ad campaign, instead or along with Facebook? Think about how you're positioning your product, how niche is it, how defined your audience is. Can you find a sweet spot segment that you could target online, and maybe avoid your competitors? Who are your competitors, how do they advertise? Online ads can be very expensive, really important you know what you are doing. I don't know it well at all, I just know that lots of people spend a lot of money for little impact, and then give up.

Have you tracking on your website? Do you know what people are doing, where they might be falling out of funnel?

You could also use radio - lots of local stations are delighted to have business startups from their community, and even national ones (Tubridy on RTE, Bobby Kerr on Newstalk) have segments for startups.
 
Who is your target market ?
Do you have an Instagram or TikTok account ?
Would your product be suitable for influencer marketing ?
Do you know how to use hashtags correctly on your social media platforms ?

If suitable for your product, social media can drive a lot of traffic and sales particularly influencer marketing.
 
dave29 said:
We are a new business, Just online. (2 of us)

We put our own money in to start up.

August
We spent about €1096 with Facebook on ads
We've made sales of €2330 (this is not taking into account payment processing fees)

If you factor in the cost of the product we are losing money.

Are there any cheaper ways to advertise?

At the moment it's costing us €1 to make €2 (roughly) .. but when you add in the cost of the product (which varies) it's costing us €1 to make €0.55.

Would flyers/radio ads work any better?
Click to expand...

Are you kidding me?!!!:eek:

Online marketing is the most laser focused form of advertising the world has ever seen. Think about it.

You take out a radio ad on FM104. You get all walks of life listening to it, from people who listen to the station religiously or people who have to because it's the station that's on in work. It can be anyone, lots of waste to people who aren't your target market.

Now look at Facebook/ Google ads. You can pick who you want to see your ad. You are a massage service. You want 30-45 year old single women in South Dublin who have had massages in the last 2 years. Facebook can filter that for you so only those people see your ads, Google too.

You can also look at growing your google ranking organically through SEO searches. Write lots of blogs about your product and what it does. Have key words on your site so Google will find them (don't overload). If you want to go that route, you're best hiring someone to do it. Everyone is competing for page 1 of google, if you're not as good as the professionals at it, you'll stay on page 10.

And lastly, relax. It takes time to build up a business and sales online. It's the same for everyone. We all have stories when the bank account was non existent so don't think you're the only one.

Online is where it is.


Steven
www.bluewaterfp.ie
 
it's a competitions websites offering many different products. So the target market is a bit of everything.

We have 2000+ Facebook followers / over 700 on Instagram and some twitter.

I've some experience with Marketing, i make all the ads/videos etc. We have run AB tests on certain products and it worked well, but others.. we've no idea where to start.. We don't really know who to target - We have power tools and that was easy.. we tested a few different keywords/interests and found where they sell.. same with the Hair products... but others we can't nail down.

We also have a mailing list with close to 300 people on it which we target as well.

We've added trust signals to the site and a phone number.
We have our business reg number there as well.

We do have tracking with google analytics and search console. We find 85% of the people land on the site and leave within 10 seconds. We think people click the ad's to see what it's all about and when they see it's something you need to buy a ticket for they leave.

We do have some repeat customers but not many.. and we find the repeat customers only buy the tickets they have bought before.

We have run free giveaways.. €50 voucher / €100 cash / Amazon Echo Dot coming up this week in an effort to 1) gain more followers.. and 2) show people we are real and giving away real prizes.. we do live draws and we've even give a TV away last week (not free)

We do know we'll get a lot of people hitting the site and leaving .. but paying Facebook for those is killing us.. we don't expect a sale each time a user comes from facebook.. but 1 in 15 or 20 would be nice.
 
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So your biggest competition is probably R Kings.

The distinct advantage they have is they were one of the first to the market and have a very loyal following and are in a position where they can offer extremely high value prizes. I have entered a number of their competitions over the last few months.

The appeal for me with them is that in most cases there is a 24 hour turnaround due to the competitions selling out so quickly, the draws are conducted live on Facebook and the list of entrants is available for all to see prior to the draw commencing. Also the prizes involved are more on the scale of something one would dream of winning rather than something thats readily attainable such as a Nintendo DS

One of the biggest problems for sites such as yourselves is establishing trust with the consumer, there are numerous examples of out there of rigged competitions and this casts a shadow over the whole industry.

Did you use an influencer with the initials C.R at one stage to promote your site ?
 
  • You need to build some detailed customer profiles so you know exactly who to target. For example:
1. People aged 18 - 24 who are interested in ..... living in .....and like these pages.....
2. People aged 50+ who.....
  • Look at your analytics and see who is converting the most and focus on them
  • Rather than just directing people to your website, you should be directing them to a funnel. For example "sign up and get one free entry to a competition". Then they're on your mailing list and email is the biggest converter
  • Around 50% of our revenue comes from email, 20% from FB and the rest organic. I'd suggest focusing on growing your email list. Based on this, you may have a higher cost per user signup (ie. 1 sale might cost you more than you make from it) but it may yield larger returns in the long run (what % of users turn into long term users?)
  • You should hire a FB ads expert. I regularly spent $100k a year on FB ads. Now I spent $10k a year on an expert and $10k on ads and have the same/better results on average. Look on upwork.com
  • Your website could be improved to look more professional and authorative - again look on upwork.com and find a landing page expert. I didn't see your phone number anywhere on initial glance. Make it clearer
  • Why not give users 2 extra entries if they refer a friend who purchases a ticket too?
 
I thought R Kings where UK based. Ooosch would be another big one.

We would love to be able to turn the competitions around in a day or even a week.. but we are not there yet.

We know the big issue is trust.. we do run our draw live ( you can see them on our facebook videos page ) We also are registered and do have real trust pilot reviews. We have a phone number for people to ring us as well.

We are doing our best on the trust thing.. but it will take time.

We've not used any influences, and i'm not sure what you mean by CR.
 
audioflaps said:
  • You need to build some detailed customer profiles so you know exactly who to target. For example:
1. People aged 18 - 24 who are interested in ..... living in .....and like these pages.....
2. People aged 50+ who.....
  • Look at your analytics and see who is converting the most and focus on them
  • Rather than just directing people to your website, you should be directing them to a funnel. For example "sign up and get one free entry to a competition". Then they're on your mailing list and email is the biggest converter
  • Around 50% of our revenue comes from email, 20% from FB and the rest organic. I'd suggest focusing on growing your email list. Based on this, you may have a higher cost per user signup (ie. 1 sale might cost you more than you make from it) but it may yield larger returns in the long run (what % of users turn into long term users?)
  • You should hire a FB ads expert. I regularly spent $100k a year on FB ads. Now I spent $10k a year on an expert and $10k on ads and have the same/better results on average. Look on upwork.com
  • Your website could be improved to look more professional and authorative - again look on upwork.com and find a landing page expert. I didn't see your phone number anywhere on initial glance. Make it clearer
  • Why not give users 2 extra entries if they refer a friend who purchases a ticket too?
Click to expand...


We've done this on some products. like the tool kit - we know it's Men / Ages 25-45 / not living in dublin (all sales outside of dublin) with interest in Dewalt and / or Power tools.

Same with the Dyson Airwrap - women aged 25-50 with an interest in salons where the main ones.

But trying to target €1000 cash prize or iPad is harder.. we find targeting iPad / Tablet users didn't work. Spent over 200 on different interests to get no sales.
 
I have no experience in this area in this whole area, however just from looking at the website, my immediate reaction is that it may be worth considering some additional investment in it, not necessarily from a content standpoint but more look and feel. A more quality or premium feel to it would also be in line with your branding as providing premium competitions. There are also a couple grammatical errors and minor miss-spellings which it might be good to rectify.

Best of luck with it.
 
dave29 said:
we find targeting iPad / Tablet users didn't work. Spent over 200 on different interests to get no sales.
Click to expand...
The site claims to be for "premium competitions" but the prizes aren't. Neither the iPad nor the iPhone 11 are premium products, in fact the iPad is the lowest spec iPad Apple sells. The site through the UI and UX constantly contradicts the "premium" billing.

The site itself fails to excite me as premium or even mildly attractive to revisit - there's no pzzazz about, no life, no fun. I echo the other comments about typos etc on a "premium competitions" site.

The quizzes need revisiting. A pet hate of mine is the misquoting of old sayings e.g. "the proof is in the pudding". It's not and never was and it's a meaningless string of words. The old saying is "The proof of the pudding is in the eating" meaning it can look great, smell great, be baked in the best oven by the best chef and be served on gold plates but if it doesn't taste good, it's all just been a huge waste. Like the "premium competitions" site that gives wrong answers to its own quizzes i.e. "Which of these is said to keep the Doctor away?" The correct answer is not an "apple", it's "an apple a day". And don't offer brand names free advertising - Mars won't pay for you mentioning their name on your site and they won't mention your site on theirs.

I think the website needs to be redone from scratch, much too amateurish and it needs a more animated UI (not just that pop-up window that prompted to to go back into my browser preferences, Opera for once, and disable pop-ups.

I don't know what thought or research went into the business idea but it seems to be working counter to expectations at the moment unfortunately.

You can of course dismiss all of my comments as simply cheap shots and as a rant, that's you're entitlement, but beware of throwing the baby out with the bath-water (another old saying).
 
mathepac said:
pet hate of mine is the misquoting of old sayings e.g. "the proof is in the pudding". It's not and never was and it's a meaningless string of words. The old saying is "The proof of the pudding is in the eating"
Click to expand...
That really gets to me as well.
"On Tender Hook" instead of "On Tenterhooks" also bothers me but not nearly as much.

Then again I shout at the radio when people say "Government" instead of "The Government", as in "That's a matter for Government" when they actually mean "That's a matter for the Government" which is a completely different thing.
People who are actually in the Government use the incorrect wording.

Back on topic; I agree completely with your post; no premium feel, no premium content. It just feels like bog standard clickbait. Sorry Dave29.
 
I entered a dozen or so times but have given up. The website has not improved and the prizes have gone downhill.
 
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