Sewing Business Blog » advertising

5 Ways to Promote Your Sewing Business

S. Denise Hoyle — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 13:54:36 +0000

Promoting your business is the key to its success! If you don’t promote your business, how will you find new customers and help the business to grow? Here are some easy steps to help you promote your sewing business.

1) Create Some Marketing Tools

Every business should have business cards and flyers. It doesn’t matter if you run your business from home or from a studio or retail space somewhere, you need to have some cards handy to give people whenever the opportunity arises to talk about your business. Keep plenty on hand in case you’re able to post some on community bulletin boards in local grocery stores, or perhaps your favorite fabric store will allow you to leave a few near the register or cutting table. You can print some yourself on pre-scored business card paper from the office supply store, or you can have some printed for free at Vista Print.

While you’re at it, be sure to create some flyers that give more information about your products and/or services, as well as any specials you may be running. Give them to current customers and ask them to help spread the word.

2) Place Local Ads

Check out the advertising prices in your local newspaper(s). You may not be able to afford a display ad right away, but try running a classified ad in the “services” section. This is an inexpensive way to reach your local market, but you could also place some free listings under your local area at CraigsList.org.

3) Start A Website

If you don’t already have a web presence, then there is no time like now to get one started. Reliable hosting can be found for as little as $4.95 per month at GoDaddy or LunarPages, and both services can even help you to get a site designed and online in less than 24 hours if you’d like. With the relatively low cost, and ease of getting a site setup, there really is no excuse NOT to have one. You might think that a website doesn’t apply to a local business, but most people get online these days, and even if you only acquire one customer a month from the site it will pay for itself.

4) Market Your Website

Look for sewing forums and other online communities where you can contribute your expertise. By making relevant posts at other websites, you will establish yourself as an authority, and you can provide links back to your website with each post or comment that you make. There are also niche pay-per-click engines, like SewVillage.com, where you can list your site and bid for higher placement in the search results pages if you want. You can even get started for free because they give you $20 in your account just for signing up! How can you beat a deal like that?

5) Get Involved In Your Community

The best kind of advertising out there is word of mouth since most people tend to take the advice of their friends and loved one’s first, before they seek out other alternatives. Join a local sewing club, volunteer to make costumes for a play at your child’s school, or offer to teach some neighborhood kids to sew. Getting involved helps you to put your business out there in a positive way and can help you get some buzz started!

How Important Is Your Headline?

Sarah J. Doyle — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 14:49:00 +0000

Just how important is the headling of your sales material, your blog post, your website? Considering how much stuff you’ll be covering within the body of the sales flyer or the website page, and the fact that you have to consider key words as part of your sales literature and reading material for the customers, it is very easy just to “throw together” a title of sorts and concentrate on the body of the page.

WRONG ATTITUDE! Do you know that the experts say that when a customer lands on your page or post, it takes 8 seconds or less for them to decide if they want to read further or move on to something else. EIGHT SECONDS — how much can they read in 8 seconds? The ONLY thing they’ll be reading is your headline.

Your headine must reach out and GRAB the attention of the potential customer.

Yes, you must have a good (great) product or informational item for them. Yes, you need to have a site that is well designed and easy to navigate. Yes, you need to do all you can with key words to get yourself placed as high in the search engine rankings as possible. However, after all the hard work is done, and your headline leaves a lot to be desired, you might still be wondering where the visitors are and why you’re not making any money.

Once you’ve spent some time thinking about possible headlines – write up half a dozen or so different headlines that you could use. Check out the keywords you have within the headline. Be sure you are focusing your headline on “benefits” to the reader, or how your information could present a “solution” to a problem or situation. Some of the best “grabbing” words are “how to”, “discover”, “how” — see if you can include those or similar words into your heading.

Check out the headlines that you’ve made by testing them. You could test one of what you consider the best headlines by using it for a few weeks, then “tweak” it a little and run the same body with the new headline and see what the difference is.

The purpose of any headline is to get the visitor to STOP, read, get excited enough to want to read further, and you can then watch the sales grow.

Spread The Word With A Press Release

S. Denise Hoyle — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 18:15:00 +0000

Do you have a new product to announce? Have you moved your shop location? Re-designed your web site? Spreading the word is easy through press releases and there are a number of free and low cost resources available online to help you write your own press release and get it distributed.

Bill Stoller’s Publicity Insider is an excellent resource on how to write a great press release. This is a wonderful place to start to learn what to put into your press release, what format to use and how to create a catchy headline.

PRWeb boasts clientele ranging from small startups to Fortune 500 companies and claims to be “trusted by more than 40,000 companies worldwide.” With no annual contracts and no subscription fees, PRWeb charges around $80 per press release for standard visibility.

1888PressRelease distributes press releases online and directly to media agencies and professionals. The process of submitting your press release is user friendly and takes only a few minutes. Prices range from $10 to $50.

MarketWire also provides online news monitoring so you get up-to-date information on where your press release is posted around the Web, how many times your release is accessed and who is accessing the release. Costs vary for different levels of service.

SBWire is an affordable solution for small and mid-sized businesses, and even provides its services at no cost to non-profits. Press release distribution services start at $24.95.

Get free and low-cost press release distribution services at PR.com. Their free service distributes releases online through emails to journalists, search engines and Google News.

PR Newswire allows you to submit press releases and search for article queries. Distribution costs vary based on the service and there is an annual membership fee of $150.

Ideas To Make 2009 The Best Year Ever!

Sarah J. Doyle — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 16:51:00 +0000

The New Year is upon us, and sometimes we start to visualize, or dream, about how great this new year will be. The facts are that we have to do more than just dream and wish – we must take ACTION! Action requires us to think about things, write some things down and begin to work on the list we’ve written.

Here are a few ideas to help you get started on your list for the year and help to move your business at a pace that will definitely make it the “best year ever”!

** Update your planner for the entire year. Put in all birthdays, anniversaries, craft show dates, conferences you want to attend, etc. If you don’t have major items on your calendar, you’ll get so busy you’ll forget important items, or worse than that, you may be trying to schedule two craft shows for the same weekend, if you don’t already have something on your calendar.

** Set up 2-3 major goals that you’d like your business to accomplish this year, such as getting started in that new area of sewing for big and tall men, locating two additional craft shows that you can attend or setting up your customer area so you’ll be able to show off and sell some of the crafts that you make from those downloadable patterns. Write these goals into a book so you can cross them off when you’ve accomplished them.

** Plan your time off. If there’s a reunion coming up over Memorial Day or you think you’d like to head into the mountains or to the beach over the 4th of July, mark it down in your planner, and add that to your list. By doing this you know well in advance of the upcoming days that you won’t be in the office / workroom, so you can get your work done accordingly.

** Educate yourself. In every business, there are new things coming along constantly, and you need to keep abreast of any changes. You could even decide to educate yourself a little and learn how to do your own sewing machine repair, instead of having to take your machine to the shop for maintenance and repairs. Figure out how many times you had your machines at the repair shop last year – add up the total spent, and this will probably be the savings you’ll have THIS year, once you learn how to take care of your own machines.

** Organize your office. The biggest problem in any office, at least in mine, are the mounds of paper! Things I want to look at in a few days, magazines I want to browse through again, ideas for projects that get out of control – you name it and it’s all in my office. I’ve decided that I WASTE entirely too much time shuffling these things around to make room for more papers. January 1st I made the decision to clear out the “junk”, get theoffice organized, get a filing system set up and categorized (project ideas in one file folder, future article ideas in another folder, patterns organized in my new clear view pattern holders,) and go through the huge stack of magazines to tear out and file what I want to keep and recycle the rest of the magazine. I’ve made a big headway already and feel so much better about the office – I know I won’t be wasting as much time this year as in past years shuffling and re-shuffling. And guess what – time WASTED means less productive time, therefore dollars wasted!

** Last but not least, after making your list of goals and “to do’s”, plan how and when you will get them accomplished. You don’t have to do everything in January! Spread out the items according to what you’d really like to accomplish first, second and so on; this way you can get a time-table set up that you can easily follow. If you see that you’re nearly finished with your entire list by the middle of the year you can easily set up another set of goals for the last half of the year.

I’m planning on making 2009 the BEST YEAR EVER for my sewing and craft business. How about you?

Advertising Opportunities and Strategies on the Internet

Sarah J. Doyle — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 17:14:00 +0000

Today’s consumers are much more informed about new products than ever before. Whenever a new product “hits the marketplace”, there seems to be a buzz about it throughout the internet. Whether the product is being talked about in the social networks (My Space, FaceBook, Squidoo, etc), or written about in the various blogs, you can be assured that it IS being talked about, whether in a positive or negative manner.

If you are considering introducing a new product, we would highly recommend that you start by searching the internet for blogs or forums related to the type of product that you want to sell. You can be reading the blogs and forums to see what people are saying about related products. You might even want to do some posts about what you have that you’re wanting to introduce. The readers of the blogs and forums will be quick to give you some of their opinions on your topic —- some may want to jump on whatever it is that you’re going to offer, while others may be a little more leary about it. Get some feedback, answer any questions that they may ask, etc.

By “testing the waters”, so to speak, you might get some great ideas on how to advertise your item so that the advertising itself will answer the questions that have been asked.

When you are ready to do the official launch of your product, be sure to present solid facts about it, give a very positive image of your product, and try to implement some of the opinions that were expressed in your internet research.

If you don’t already have a blog, we would recommend that you do set up your company blog — invite reader comments and make regular posts to it. Let others in the social networks know about your blog and invite them to check it out.

By using blogs, forums, and the social network systems, you’re basically introducing your product to a large audience with minimal effort and at no charge to you for the advertising.

Holiday Marketing Materials

Sarah J. Doyle — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:16:00 +0000

If your business is one that is out of your home or if it is a brick and mortar store you’ll need to be thinking about doing some Holiday advertising.

You could do some newspaper advertising, which will require that you investigate the prices on the various sizes of ads, or you could do some direct mail campaigns to your good customers. Either way you go, there are a few main items to think about while doing the ads.

** Don’t use too many fonts within the advertising. This is very distracting to the viewer and can even play “games” with their vision while trying to read your ad.

** Don’t make your logo the focal point of the advertising space or letter, and don’t place it in the center of the page. Always keep your advertising pieces consistent — logo in the same place each time, same type style each time, etc so the viewers will recognize your advertisement and will be able to read it for content.

** Don’t try to cover the entire page or newspaper space with words. Make sure there is enough “white space” within the ad – between paragraphs, along the sides, around the logo, etc so that the whole thing doesn’t become a blurr to the reader. Check out some of the other ads in the paper – might be good to check some of your competitor’s ads and see what they’re up to. I wouldn’t try to copy the competitor – you still want to be unique in your own advertising methods.

** If you’re going to try to do some Holiday specials — focus on what the benefits would be to your readers. Details and information are fine, however people always want to know what the benefits are for them.

Keep in mind that just about every type of business does extra advertising of some sort to help pick up sales during the Holiday Season, so those of us in any type of sewing / alteration / craft busines certainly need to be thinking along those lines also.

Finding Your Niche Market by Accident

Sarah J. Doyle — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 16:18:00 +0000

How can you possibly find a niche market by accident, you ask?

Think about it. When was the last time you needed or wanted something and couldn’t find it? I can guarantee that if YOU are looking for something and can’t find it, there are many others looking for a similar item as well!

There is a quote that is definitely worth thinking about: “Find a need and fill it”. Looking back over the past few months or the past year, how many times has somebody asked if you know where to find a certain widget, or if it is even available. Or perhaps you were looking for something special to complete a project you were working on, couldn’t find what you needed, so you “improvised” and then were able to finish the project. What if you could make and market that item that you “improvised” and be able to make life much easier for hundreds or perhaps even thousands of others.

When my business partner gave birth to her first child she decided to breastfeed the baby. Breastfeeding is highly encouraged, so it was no surprise that of the twenty babies in the hospital newborn nursery, seventeen of the mothers were breastfeeding.

Then came the problem – she would need comfortable “nursing” garments to wear at home and when she went back to work.

The very few nursing garments available were extremely expensive and they all looked the same, plus she couldn’t find any patterns to make nursing garments.

As a pattern making instructor and author for over thirty years, she turned my attention to this area of pattern making. If my business partner couldn’t find clothing or patterns, what about the other seventeen nursing mothers in just the one hospital where her baby was born? And what about the prospective nursing mothers all around the country?

Our “accidental” stumbling into this niche market because of her need for nursing clothing brought i-nursing to life, which now offers a wide variety of nursing patterns, as well as a wealth of information for the nursing mother.

Again I ask, when was the last time you searched and researched for a particular item to no avail? Assess your own skills to see if you could fill that particular market with written information, a product that would fill the need, etc. Perhaps you could work with a friend and do some serious brain storming about the possibilities. The opportunities are endless!

Advertise for PENNIES ….. Make THOUSANDS

Sarah J. Doyle — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 16:55:00 +0000

It makes no difference if you have an internet site, brick and mortar store, or a work at home business, it is a fact that none will succeed if nobody knows you’re there.

Advertising IS the key to success; however advertising doesn’t have to cost a fortune! Of course, the big display ads cost advertisers many thousands of dollars, and “pay per click” advertising on search engines can add up to big dollars very quickly if you’re not carefully targeting proper key words and keeping track of the results of your advertising dollars.

There are many ways that we can promote our businesses literally for PENNIES, that can rake in THOUSANDS of dollars in sales. Listed below are just a few ideas that work well, and I’m sure you’ll be able to come up with additional ideas once you start working with these.

** FREE AD ON YOUR ENVELOPES. You can either use labels, or glue or tape one of your “mini-flyers” on the back or front of each envelope and package you mail out. There is no way of knowing how much “free” advertising these mini-flyers will generate – after all, you’re mailing the letters and packages anyway, so why not take advantage of that and give your advertisement a “free ride”.

** ENCLOSE SALES LITERATURE in all outgoing orders. If you already have a business where you send out orders, NEVER send out a “naked” package! If you simply enclose the customer’s order and receipt and mail the package, you are missing out on one of the very best sales tools available! Any additional sales literature you can enclose in the package (other items you offer for sale, information on another website to visit, etc) could bring you extra sales. It is a well known fact that if a customer buys from you one time, they’re more likely to buy again and again, if they are satisfied with your service and products that they bought in the beginning.

** BUSINESS CARDS are one of the cheapest methods of advertising that I know of. Many times, people will have 1,000 or more business cards made, then put them on a shelf and never use more than a dozen or so. If you have a business or website and don’t have business cards – GET THEM! Hand out the business cards to prospective customers, leave one on the table at the restaurant when you go out to eat. Many restaurants and other businesses have a location where you can put a small business card holder with several of your cards in it for future customers to see and pick up as they pay their bill.

** SCREEN PRINTED SHIRTS. This also is a “one time” purchase that will last for years, and will be read by people wherever you are walking – through stores, standing in line at a check out register, etc. These don’t have to be fancy, just “to the point” so people reading them will know what they represent. I saw one a few days ago that simply had a pair of glasses on it (the logo of the website) and the words “Specterweb.com” — everybody knows to put the http:// in front and in this case I wrote it down just so I could go there and see what it was (and this will work the same way for you). You can make enough of these shirts for you to wear, or perhaps some of your family might want a “free” shirt (they will be advertising your website when wearing it), or you always have the option of selling or giving them to customers as a free gift for placing an order.

As you think about these suggestions, I’m sure you’ll be coming up with additional ones that you can use. Remember, advertising is a MUST for any business, but it doesn’t have to cost a fortune!

Does Your Ad Contain AIDA????

Sarah J. Doyle — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 17:17:00 +0000

Advertising can be a small classified ad in a magazine, a full page display advertisement or a website consisting of several pages of “copy” and related material leading to the same end – the selling of your product or service.

A good ad, regardless of what type it is, must have four key elements, which we refer to as the AIDA principle: (A) get their ATTENTION, (I) hold their INTEREST, (D) arouse DESIRE in the potential customer to want your product, (A) make them take immediate ACTION to order from you.

(A) Get the customer’s attention. The first few words must get the attention of the reader. It must make the reader open his eyes and make him really want to know what you are offering. The most famous come-on attention getters are the words “GET RICH!” And you must admit, it does get your attention. I wouldn’t advise using those over-used words, but other words that work equally as well are words like, NEW, EASY, FAST, FREE, AMAZING, HOW TO, PROVEN, SAVE, MAKE MORE MONEY, GET, ONE OF A KIND. These are key words and phrases that will draw attention to your ad. Think about how these or similar type words can be worked into your ad or website.

(I) Hold the potential customer’s interest. A good sales pitch gets the prospect involved at once. A few persuasive words can motivate people to order from you, if used correctly in the course of your advertisement or web page. These words will arouse more desire and interest on the part of the prospective customer. Make your sales pitch so inviting and exciting that the customer can’t quit reading.

(D) Raise the desire level of the potential customer in a way that he/she simply can’t live without your product or service. A good premium incentive, such as something FREE, to go along with your product or service will certainly increase the desire to order your product. However the incentive must indeed be “free” or something useful, or it may backfire on you, causing the potential customer to think they are being tricked.

(A) Lead the prospective customer to ACTION! Right now, while the desire is the greatest, tell the customer how to order the product or service. Give an 800 number for them to call, or if this is an item on your website, make sure to have the “BUY NOW” button very visible! If the product is to be ordered, give the complete address, double checking BEFORE you place the ad that the address is written right. I have personally sent for information only to have my letter returned “no such address”. The individual I ordered from had a great sounding advertisement and a great sounding product, and the only problem was that the ordering address was WRONG! How much money was wasted on that advertisement??????

Six Creative Marketing Techniques

S. Denise Hoyle — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 00:27:00 +0000

Home sewing / crafting entrepreneurs are always on the look-out for new ways to promote their products or services. It makes no difference if your business is just a local one or an online venture, advertising is a MUST in order to keep our names in front of potential customers.

Some of the following ideas have been used by us for years, and I would hardly consider them “new”, but I’m amazed at the number of people who say “I would never have thought of that!” Whether you choose one or a combination of the following ways to promote your business, the most successful methods can be incorporated into your year-round promotional strategies.

1. MAKE “MINI-FLYERS” – One of my personal favorites are “mini-flyers” that contain advertising messages about your products or services. Mini-Flyers are made 6 or 10 to a page (depending on what size you want them) and contain basic information such as a catchy phrase about your product or service, followed by “FREE information” or “FREE catalog”, a website address if you have one, and your name and address. The “mini-flyers” can be made easily in Microsoft Publisher, or similar software, that can be saved and reprinted as needed, as in the following example:

We make our mini-flyers 10 to a page and use the Publisher format for Avery labels. The mini-flyers can then be made on the labels or printed on regular paper to be cut apart and used.

The first thing to do with your mini-flyers that have been printed on regular paper is to put one in every bill you pay (electric bill, gas bill, newspaper bill, telephone bill, credit card bills, etc). Remember that the clerks who open these envelopes must surely get bored with the job, and when they open your envelope and the mini-flyer falls out, you can be assured that it will be read. It will probably also be passed around to others working in the same area. The mini-flyers that are on labels can be stuck to every package you mail out – right next to the mailing label. These will catch the eye of some of the postal employees along the way who will make a mental note of the website address, etc and perhaps check it out later.

2. REBATES. Almost any business you can think of can benefit from giving rebates. Rebates are usually associated with large purchases such as automobiles, computers, etc, but can easily be adapted to smaller businesses. We’ve had great success with offering a “rebate” to customers who refer their friends to us. When one of the customer’s friends makes a “first time purchase” from us, the customer receives a rebate certificate that can be used as a discount on their next purchase.

3. GROUP RATES AND DISCOUNTS can be used by many businesses. For example, a seamstress can contract with a community theater to do all of the alterations for an entire season, and give a 10% or 15% discount on alll the work. School cheerleader alterations, repair work and sewing could be handled in the same way.

4. HOLD FREE SEMINARS, workshops or lectures for people interested in your type of product or service. If you’re in the crafts business, you could teach interested people how to make one or more of your craft items. After the “mini-class” you could have a table of crafts, projects and/or books for sale. Women’s clubs, sewing clubs or home extension clubs would be great places to start – they’re always looking for “program” ideas for their meetings.

5. SUBMIT A PRODUCT, PATTERN OR YOUR WEBSITE to individual websites, such as this one, for “review”. Naturally you’re not guaranteed that every site will do a review, but the ones that do will be putting your name and website name on the review, which will then be a permanent link to you, which could be read by potentially thousands or millions of people who may be interested in what you have to offer. Remember, if you don’t ask (or submit your item) your answer is already a “no” — so do yourself a favor and do some submitting.

6. MAGNETIC CAR SIGNS can be a wonderful way to increase your business. For “local” sewing / craft businesses, be sure to do the sign with a catchy phrase about your business – “Cathy’s Quick Turn Around Alteration Service” and your phone number. If you do the majority, or even a little, of your business online put your website address on the sign – http://PatternsThatFitYou.com – and you’ll be pleasantly surprised with the increased traffic to your site. Also, don’t forget – if you’re taking a vacation, be sure your magnetic sign is on the car. It’s amazing how many people along the travel route will see your sign and check out the website.

If you have additional ways to promote/advertise your products that readers would be interested in, we invite you to add your comments for us to pass along.