You own a Web Design biz, how would you advertise?

December 16, 2009 5:02 PM

You own a Web Design biz, how would you advertise? Until now it has been entirely word-of-mouth.

Hey, I do Web Design and until now all business has come from word of mouth. Never did advertising for it.
What would you suggest doing to attract more clients.

Thanks for your time and input :)

posted by livin4u to work & money (10 answers total)

Local businesses could be an idea, but if you're only offering web design ( and not additional marketing help) that might be a stretch.

I would go directly to the customers looking for help. That usually entails Elance or other like reverse auction site.

You could also try gaining traffic to your portfolio website by writing daily on a blog section of your site.

Think if you were a client, what's the first thing you would do if you needed a website and you didn't have any friends that had websites?

Yellow pages?
Google?
posted by John-Michael at 5:07 PM on December 16, 2009

What size clientele are you targeting? Are they mostly/all local? If so, what kind of region or market are you in? How big is your portfolio?

I think you need to provide more specifics before you get a quality answer.
posted by csimpkins at 5:08 PM on December 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

Join a local organization for new business owners in your area. They'll be needing web site design.
posted by Elsie at 5:11 PM on December 16, 2009

Haystack is a good place to start. And it is free.
posted by spilon at 5:19 PM on December 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

What kind of clients do you want? Please don't say "any kind."

Money spent on advertising without a clear idea of who you want to reach and what they care about is money you might as well flush down the toilet.
posted by ottereroticist at 5:34 PM on December 16, 2009

Blog, Google AdWords*, real life networking, open coffee, barcamps. Works for me.

*Well, they work for clients - I do not use them to advertise my own business.
posted by DarlingBri at 5:37 PM on December 16, 2009 [1 favorite]

Actually, in this area, someone (or more?) have been advertising with signs like the ones advertising real estate. Small (1.5'x2') signs on the grass strips of street corners selling "Affordable Websites"
posted by Drasher at 6:16 AM on December 17, 2009

Friend's co. recently purchased a premium listing on Haystack and got zero leads, FWIW.

For the same price, a locally targeted AdWords campaign (plus some landing pages encouraging people to get in touch, sign up for a newsletter, follow you on Twitter, or whatnot) would be a better bang for the buck in my opinion, especially if you are not in a major metropolitan area.
posted by ejoey at 6:24 AM on December 17, 2009

"What size clientele are you targeting? Are they mostly/all local? If so, what kind of region or market are you in? How big is your portfolio?

I think you need to provide more specifics before you get a quality answer.
posted by csimpkins"

Many local since word of mouth, (I am based in California). However have close to half the clients on the east coast in NY. That cluster in NY also spread through word of mouth.

Obviously with local clients we can meet face-to-face, and a larger chance that we have more mutual friends/relationships, etc.

Targeting new and existing businesses. Portfolio is good and the quality of work is good, so I am not too concerned with the possibility of someone saying it looks cheesy (hope this doesn't sound like I have a large ego!)

Thanks again.
posted by livin4u at 9:41 AM on December 17, 2009

ADDED: WE'RE IN LOS ANGELES!
posted by livin4u at 9:43 AM on December 17, 2009