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Spent $800 on a local business ad and it was a total waste
I run a small landscaping service and paid for a full page ad in our town's paper last spring. It cost me about $800 and I was sure it would bring in new customers. I got exactly two calls from it, and neither one turned into a job. I think people just don't look at those papers for services anymore. What's a better way to get local clients that actually works?
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gibson.seth1mo ago
Ouch, $800 for two dead-end calls is rough. But is the paper ad itself the real problem here? Maybe the ad just wasn't any good. Was it a clear picture of your work with a big phone number, or just some text? People see ads all day, they need a reason to stop and look. A bad ad in a good place still fails. Next time, try a cheap Facebook ad targeted just to your town and see if the problem is the message or the medium.
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harper_smith1mo ago
My buddy's auto shop spent almost six hundred on a yellow pages ad last year and got one call about tire rotation. The problem was his ad looked like it was made in 1998, just plain text with a tiny logo. You gotta have a clean photo of your work, a clear offer, and a font size you can actually read from a distance. I'd test a simple flyer at the local hardware store before dumping more cash into papers. Sometimes the old ways work, but only if the ad itself doesn't look old.
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