I need advice

[Erinesque]

So my husband and I just started a business, and launched it yesterday officially by advertising our website and Facebook page on Craigslist and on Facebook itself. My husband got frustrated because he thought that our business would take off immediately, and we would start making money instantaneously.

I know that is not realistic, of course, but when it comes to advertising/marketing, I really have no clue what works. Does anybody here have experience in doing that who could just give me a few pointers of what would work in starting a new business?

[EricKei]

It does take time, and word of mouth on a local level is HUGE (in your actual area if you have a physical shop). You really just gotta keep plugging away at it. Advertising often takes up a huge chunk of profits for any company.

[mjr]

So my husband and I just started a business, and launched it yesterday officially by advertising our website and Facebook page on Craigslist and on Facebook itself. My husband got frustrated because he thought that our business would take off immediately, and we would start making money instantaneously.

I know that is not realistic, of course, but when it comes to advertising/marketing, I really have no clue what works. Does anybody here have experience in doing that who could just give me a few pointers of what would work in starting a new business?

Do some serious research into guerrilla and viral marketing. You can usually do a decent amount of advertising with very little money.

Google should have a lot of information on these. I'd check out the Small Business Administration, too.

[Sapphire Silk]

What kind of business are we talking about here? Is there a demand for your service? How much competition do you have?

It'll take awhile before the business starts making money. It can take a year before you can really start paying yourself; until then most of what you make has to be reinvested into the business. Running a business can be hard, especially if it is your sole source of income. Things may be tight for awhile until you build good will and a reputation in the community.

Remember to do your with holding for taxes. You have to with hold the full amount for Social Security. Budget on paying your taxes quarterly.

Keep meticulous records of what you make and what your costs are. If you take a loss for the year, you can write those costs off. You can write off costs for equipment. Talk to a tax expert about what you can legally deduct.

Unless you have another source of income, don't count on all your earnings being under the table and not reporting and paying taxes on them. The IRS takes a very dim view of that sort of thing.

[fireheart]

Regarding advertising, I can recommend one thing: DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT under any circumstances, use shows like Shark Tank/Dragon's Den to promote your business. While businesses do get a increase in website traffic, it's basically a waste of time for everyone otherwise. If you are going to go on those shows, do your homework

[Erinesque]

Re: advice

Thank you to all who have responded; just for clarification, we've started this business to provide automotive sales training. It's a class that we've written a full workbook for, and plan on renting boardrooms at hotels for the class to actually be held. We're starting with a few towns close to us, but plan on traveling as it expands, and hope to have about 30 people per class.

We've started advertising on LinkedIn and Facebook, as well as having our own website now. My husband thinks we should have Instagram and Pinterest too, but I'm not sure about those.

[Sheldonrs]

I'm definitely not experienced with this but would you bs able to advertise at any local trade schools, etc.?

[Erinesque]

Re: advice

We don't really have a lot of trade schools in this area, especially not for auto sales. Most dealerships, when they hire, adopt a sink or swim ideology, and are not usually fans of training companies, so we're left with word of mouth, mostly.
One thing that we are going to try is advertising at a few of the local festivals; we've got a strawberry festival, peach festival, etc., (we live in a sort-of rural area, fruit festivals are popular). Our church will host a carnival in May that we might be able to get some advertising there. So hopefully, this will start to take off soon, my husband thought that with our website, Facebook and LikedIn, that people would be pouring in, instantaneously.

[RootedPhoenix]

*offers cookies* I wish your husband was more realistic about this. I do think that festival advertisements would help.

Just have faith in your idea, and that will be the biggest thing, I think. Warm thoughts to you and your husband.

[Erinesque]

Thank you for the pretend cookies

I really think it will be a good business, but that it will take a while to get built up. My husband really wants to get out from the dealership where he's at now, and has found it frustrating that it's not moving at the pace he wants it to. And of course, for me, advertising, marketing, etc., are not my strong suit, and I have no clue what I'm doing, just learning as I go along.

Well, we're hosting a Q&A Seminar on Facebook tonight, and it's not going as well as we'd hoped. We've had to ask some of our friends to ask questions to get the ball started, and it's not working yet. So hopefully, it'll start up soon, my husband is really getting disillusioned with his current job and wants this business to be his way out. And I'd love to not have to go back to a call center position after my short term disability runs out. (I had knee surgery)

[AnaKhouri]

My dad has a DirecTV office and they set up booths at every fair, festival, flea market they can find (he said Mule Days was more interesting than he'd expected...).

I was also making Annie's mac&cheese the other night and idly reading the back of the box, and there was a little story on there about how when the company was just starting out they put their truck in a parade and handed out magnets and free samples.

I think local events are the way to go. You don't have a physical product per se you can hand out, but you can give out pens and magnets and such, just to get your name on people's radar.

Local libraries also usually have boards where people put up ads for various things. I wonder if you could set up an event with the library too? A Q&A session maybe? Most libraries let people use their conference spaces.

I don't have a business though, and I'm not a marketer, so take that as you will!

[NecessaryCatharsis]

Just curious, I've never heard of automotive sales training - who is your customer? Is this training for people who hope to make a living selling cars, or for people who own a car they want to sell?

[Erinesque]

AnaKhouri, I think that's a great idea to host it at libraries; we hadn't thought of that, and with just starting out, that may be the way to go. We just got some business cards made up, and I was looking at sites that offer logo printing on products, but they get very expensive, so we have to stick to our cards for now.

NecessaryCatharsis, our customer are people who are either already employed at car dealerships who are not hitting their quotas, not making enough commission, or feel like they need more training, as well as those who want a career change into the auto business.

My husband's been a car salesman for a long time, and I'm just learning this; I often have no idea what to say, how to say it, etc. Sales is just not my thing; I'd rather just do my art.

[NecessaryCatharsis]

Two local colleges nearish to here offer adult learning classes. They are basically classes that don't generally result in a degree or certificate, but are offered to people who are interested in either career advancement or life skills. Anyone can offer to teach one, you just apply to the school with your lesson plans, and course information, and they decide if they would like you to teach it there. If you are interested and can find something like that nearby it might be a good way for him to get his name out there. I taught classes on hobby woodworking for a few years, and also a few semesters of DIY home maintenance and repairs. I made about $200-$400/class, which sounds like nice money for 2-3 hours work, twice a week until you figure out how much prep goes into each lesson, that you are responsible for tax on it all, and that you have to earn so much money doing it per year to be allowed to write off as an expense supply purchases for the classes. It was definitely a hobby for me.

The advantages are you don't need to worry about things like liability insurance (except some special circumstances, for instance if your husband wants to take students on test drive for demonstration purposed he would probably still need additional insurance for that), you are getting advertisement in the seasonal college circular, and it gives you the opportunity for some satisfied customer testimonials with no real risk to the business. The biggest disadvantages are that even though you can suggest both your fees and payments the college has the final say in both and that it is probably too late to get in for the summer schedule, you probably couldn't be on the schedule until September, and it sounds like it might be a bit too long away based on your husbands plans for how the business will grow.

Also if there is not enough people sign up for a class it is cancelled, which may frustrate him if his business is already not growing quick enough for his liking.

[CloserToSane]

If you're looking at career changers, could you speak to recruitment agencies. I know you said you're rural-isn, so there might be more planning, but it never hurts to see if they'll have an resources.