Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Tuner-Technicians Forum Advertising?

I agree with pianotune2 too. I hate for any signature to be visible. I do sign pianos, my whole family does, most tuners around here do but, anyone with any valor, signs it some place where only the next tuner sees it. That way, I can see, oh, so, I filed hammers and regulated the piano on this date. I'd forgotten about that or something else...

I LOVE seeing the service records of my grandfather John Groot whom I never met dating back from the 1920's! And my dad, who is no longer living... Sometimes he would write, "HI JER!" In them, that brings back memories.

I don't ever recall putting a signature on any grand piano, and hardly ever run across one with a signature. I will sign most uprights on the keys (behind the fall board, of course)...starting with key #1. I can usually fit 3 signatures on one key. I have signed a couple of old upright plates, but only because the owners saw the 20 other signatures from over the past century, and wanted me to continue the tradition.

I went ahead and signed up for Google Maps. There is a postcard verification thing to wait on. Now I'm having second thoughts. Has anybody signed up for Google Maps and then got deluged with phone and mail solicitations?

I've been on Google Maps for a long time and can say it works great. I did have a problem with having 2 websites one time. One was for the band and both sites were signed up with the same mailing address. Google didn't like this and both sites were not showing up. Google thinks this is spam.

So I changed the band site mailing address to one of the band members. I guess you can't have more than one business with the same address. Anyways everything works fine now.

Does anyone use car door magnets for advertising, if you do how well do they work? Also if you do where did you get it made?

That Guy replied to your post :

They work great! There are times when I'm filling my tank at the gas station when someone will come up and either get my card or schedule an appointment right there.

edit: I get mine through Vistaprint. Good prices, good service, they'll match them to your cards, etc.

I got a set from Vistaprint.One fell off the car the second day which they replaced. within a year the image was coming off and I never had anyone take notice. Last year I had vinyl lettering done to the back hatch and keyboards the the rear side windows of my car.This has generated business and it cost about $150

I'm conflicted ... do I tell my competitors how to get more market share, and thereby sabotage my own success?

I'll tell you what doesn't work:

1 - Yellow Pages.
2 - Welcome Wagons.
3 - Newspaper advertising.

What does work:

1 - Reminder cards in the mail
2 - Followup phone calls
3 - Teacher referrals
4 - Dealer work in exchange for a pittance, and new customers.
5 - Website with google adwords.

I have other secrets that will remain secret for now. But, I will reveal that I'm going to look into social network marketing next.

Does anyone here have experience with Angie's List?

[quote=Randy Karasik]I'm conflicted ... do I tell my competitors how to get more market share, and thereby sabotage my own success?

I tell you what I will stay east of you in Kansas Randy

I am on Angie's list, haven't seen any benefit from it. Still I figure it can't hurt anything being on it, as long as I don't get bad reviews

A couple of years ago, I had a local sign shop make me up some yard signs. I gave my customers (located in high traffic areas) a small discount if they were willing to display my sign in their yard for a couple of weeks, or until I was back around that way to pick it up. Everyone was very happy to do it for me. I only had four signs made up, but would strategically place them in the different towns that I service. I had people tell me, "I see your signs all over town." I never told them that I only have four and just move them around. LOL! Here's a picture of one...



Also, we have a couple of very large basketball tournaments in our area. I made up this ad to run on the tournament program. I have learned that it's always good to be able to track your marketing to see how successful it is, so this year I will be adding a coupon so I can track the ad's success. There is a lot of down time between games, and the only thing people have to do is sit and look at the ads in the program. I even reserve the space below the basket team at the school where I teach.



It also helps to have a professional looking website and facebook presence. Here is the cover photo I created for my facebook fan page...



as well as having a cool logo...



I designed all of these in Microsoft Word. I also have a yellow pages ad. When I set the ad up, the customer service agent asked me if he could call me back after researching how I could set my ad apart from my competitors. (I really don't have any in my area.) I humored him and said sure. In a few days, he called me back said "Well, Mr. Hassell, you really don't have a whole lot of competitors, your ad is probably fine as it is." He recommended a website called www.getlisted.com It is a way to be sure your website and company are found when people do a search online.

I found out last week that Vistaprint does t-shirts and polo shirts. I was able to design what I wanted on my computer and upload it directly to their site. I just ordered one for now to see how I like it. I'm thinking about doing some t-shirts to give to my students at school to help advertise.

Here's what I designed. It will be embroidered on a black polo shirt.

Great work, Ryan. I really like the signs.

My problem with vistaprint is its way to easy, I end up buying all kinds of stuff I really don't need. I have gotten window decals for the car, car magnets, fridge magnets, pens, 4 different kinds of postcards, business cards, poster adds etc.. I have my eye on some shirts now also.

I had a thought the other day...

I always leave my business card on the piano, with the date the piano was tuned. Taking a cue from the oil change people, the next time I get business cards printed, I think I'm going to make a place for "Next service due on__ __ ___" with a place to put the date.

What do you think?

I'd forget without those oil change reminders, so this seems like a great idea!

I loved this post. What a great feeling to start the day.

Forrest

A friend with whom I teach, made me a few of these shirts in exchange for a piano tuning. Pretty good trade off!