Marketing to a community

[edshuck]

For online folks this is kind of "smoke like". Hard to describe, harder still to get your hands around.

So here are the areas:

Community definition:
50 to 80 thousand people.
70% of the *****s have POST graduate papers.
Artists have included Ann Rice (authopr)(now moved to New Orleans), Huey Lewis (of Huey Lewis and the news), Sculptors, painters, poets, etc.
Professionals include bank execs (the IT director for a major bank lives across the street).
The library and coffee shops are the hot visiting places.
We are in a baby boom. Strollers abound.
Two neighborhood public schools, one elementary (the PTA raised 80K to bring in art and music last year and over a 100 K this year), one middle school that can't get more than 20 parents in a room for a meeting).
There are about 450 merchants in the area (inc. shops, dining and professionals)

I have been unable to penetrate the market. Also, there is a near complete disdain for my site by the merchants. I have ask for suggestions and they refuse to even look.

Web things.

One neighborhood org will illustrate the problem. I offer to provide a part of the my forum for their private use. "We will check it out" was the reply to numerous calls. Then they had a site built. That is OK. They could have told me what they wanted and I would have put it on mine.

Same for the middle school and the elementary school.

I do not think I am alone in this frustration.

So, question::

How to get the neighborhood to look at the site and tell me what they want. I have never made a change. They have never made a suggestion.

I do have competition. The local newspaper (a monthly). I maintain that the use of the forum is a faster turn around and still there is distrust, I think that is the word. And I have never done anything to create an environment of distrust.

peace

[Lord Brar]

Talking of your site, would it be possible for you to tell us its URL so that we could take a look at it and tell us if it is actually designed to convert people?

From your post it looks as if you are targeting people who are not used to the concept of online communities. This means that you are trying to build a new market for them.

Most offline 'conventional' businesses are skeptical of going online. You would get better response once you have proved that your system works!

Originally Posted by edshuck

How to get the neighborhood to look at the site and tell me what they want. I have never made a change. They have never made a suggestion.

Most of times people will NOT tell you what they want themselves. You would have to go out and ask them to tell you about it. And also, you would need to do some hit and trial to find the best thing that your market wants!

However, I would keep the rest of opinions to myself till I have actually seen the site

[edshuck]

I am wrong is saying I have never made a change. The current configuration is new.

Marketing shops, dining and biz services using the concept of a simple set of information and then letting the company pick and choose categories, and the items listed in "special". They (the companies) have full access to all backend elements.

The location is www.noevalley.com. The photos are just fillers that the merchants are encouraged to submit fill for.

Thanks

ed

[phoenixdown]

In regards to the design of the site, people are petty and like pretty things.

I think you have a lot of good information on the businesses in your area and its easy to find. I know I personally would love something like that simply because even with search services like google you can get too many irrelevant choices and its hard to find exactly what I want. I the design of your front page could use a little work.

(out of curiousity, did you get those listings from somewhere or did you just spend an afternoon with the yellow pages?)

Have you thought about adding reviews and possibly local news? You need something to draw visitors to your site. When you get that, local advertisers will deffinitely follow.

Heres a url to a promiting firm here in NY. http://sheckys.com/

They do a lot with the bar / club scene and arrainge some events but I'm sure you may see some ideas from there site that youc ould use. Another good url might be sidewalk.com ...

[edshuck]

(out of curiousity, did you get those listings from somewhere or did you just spend an afternoon with the yellow pages?)

I got the url from a previous owner. He had about 70 listings. Then I joined the merchants association and that opened up most of the others. Then the balance have reciprocal links.

No blind listings. ie. If the merchant don't know, I do not post.

But that is also a part of the problem. I have to have them or the info is sought elsewhere. There is easily only 30% of this on other dirs.

What I would like most is two levels of listing.

The first is a simple name, address, tel, fax, tdd (this is hot for the deaf/hi - many merchants do not include one but it helps), cell, url, email. The second has a 400 by 400 space for photos that can be any combo of 200 by 200 or 200 by 400 (eight predefined layouts that are selected by radio button.) The text areas are ready for all the things in "special". The items can be worked on in the back room and will not post prior to a check box being checkec.

The there are 330 categories visable to the merchant. These feed into about a dozen super cats that I can add to in about 5 seconds and link with using a many to many.

Planned is a calendar. This is to provide each merchant with a calendar that will display with their listing, just as the profile, coupons, etc did.

It also will feed a neighborhood calendar that will cume all the inputs from the merchants. I am planning for it to display 7 upcoming days and then cut off. So a merchant could load months in advance.

I have a meeting with one of the local bar owners tommorow (I do not drink but when I did, I ruled this 8 ball table. Glocomma fixed that!)

It has been fun writing the site. The look is just skin deep. The feel is that the thing is php, mysql, a bit of css, some xhtml.

Oh, and I want to add wml. I have been planning that all along.

I really thank you for taking the time to respond with such insight and with such consideration.

[phoenixdown]

You have some good stuff, I wish you continued success.

[edshuck]

what i need is to get just a little traction.

also it is set up for the merchant to do their own maintenance of their listing. but they do not yet.

[Lord Brar]

Ok I am being a bit blunt here but - Your site needs to have a better structure - It is a bit confusing and did not tell me anything about your site in the first 10 secs I was there.

Second, like I suggested earlier, you will have to prove to people that your system works! For this, you will need to show them some activity.

Reduce the number of forums you have to increase the cumulative post count in them (you can always split them when you have more activity).

Rather than having fillers in your directory - do some blind listings and actually go and tell those people that you've listed them on your site. Tell them the ways they can modify their listings. Get them involved!

Give some local press releases! I know that there is one publication which is in competition with you. However, you don't know if they also won't mind mentioning you in their publication.

Get associated with some charities and causes so as to get some publicity and get people hooked to your site.

I hope that helps.

[edshuck]

Your site needs to have a better structure - It is a bit confusing and did not tell me anything about your site in the first 10 secs I was there.

Good point! That I will correct as soon as I have some photos. One dining, one shopping, one general business and one relaxing. Then I will cycle them through where the bridge is now. Finishing with 4 200 by 200 repeats.

More later ... got to run ... but hey good remarks.

Odd how things work, somtimes. I walk my grandaughter to her Middle School and today we took a different route. It took us past a local computer store that was centrally located.

The owner happened to be out front and I reintroduced myself and mentioned that I wanted to speak with him about expanding his listing on the site. When would be an appropriate time. He had an appointment but his partner (also sister) was available.

Turns out she is presenting the case to her brother (when he returns) to partner. She loves the site and rather than see the blanks, she sees the potential.

So, what good is it?

1. Location. They are within 100 feet of the main intersection in the neighborhood.
2. They are one of two main computer stores in the area.
3. Same for service.
4. They are the main home networking / wiring biz in the area.

The exciting thing for her was the twist of having all the shops, that would, post a window sticker to the effect, "Listed on [logo here]" Small, unobtrusive.

I am about a foot off the floor, just gliding through the day.

I am a bit shy to start and without your mentioning it, I probably would have passed them by.

[Lord Brar]

Glad to know that we were of some help to you!