How To Use Classified Ads To Build Your Business

Classified ads are a significant source of customers for many small businesses. Whether you seek local customers who read weekly shoppers or want to woo customers online with ads in search engines or social media, a good headline and a couple of lines of text can get customers to do business with you. Find out when and how to use them online and offline in your business.

Classified ads are a major source of customers for small businesses, even in today’s digital world. If you need to find someone to repair your computer, write a resume, fix your dishwasher, or take takedown a huge tree that looks like it’s splitting, what do you do?

Chances are you’ll look at classified ads in one form or another to find a service provider to get the work done. You may look at the ads in your weekly shopper-type publication or weekly town newspaper. And, you’ll probably search online. (The short, listings you see to the right of search results and often on the top and/or the bottom of results are pay-per-click [PPC] ads, which are really just another form of classified ad.).

No matter what media classified ads are viewed through, these small text ads are a significant source of customers for many home-based and small businesses. An inexpensive three-line ad placed in print, in an online yellow pages ad, or through search engines can deliver customers who need your product or service now. More importantly, if the ad is run regularly, it builds future business by making your name familiar and establishing your credibility.

Although classified ads are brief, getting good results from them takes some thought. A well-written ad placed in the wrong publication or displayed online to the entire country won’t bring in much business. A poor headline or a poorly written ad, no matter how carefully placed, is a waste of money.

To get the most mileage out of your classified advertising dollars, keep these suggestions in mind when you write and place Classified ads your ad.

Understand your customer
Many products and services can be sold to different types of customers. But each type may have different needs. Your ad should stress your ability to meet those specific needs. For instance, a job seeker may need your help not only writing their resume but also distributing it to online sites where it will get found. The owner of a small business may not know they want a “virtual assistant.” They may only know they need a freelancer to do their bookkeeping and/or help them build a social presence online. To work, your classified ads need to speak directly to what the customer is looking for.

Choose the right media outreach
An ad for pool maintenance services is likely to attract more responses in publications that circulate in upper-class communities than in a weekly shopper that gets distributed in a blue-collar neighborhood. Similarly, you’ll waste a lot of money on your ad for your landscaping service if you advertise on search engines and don’t geo-target the ad (I.e., have the search engines only show your ad to people from the geographic area you’re able to serve.)

Be aware that individuals often read the classified sections of several different publications, but read each with a different mindset. A business executive might look in the local newspaper for someone to paint her house but turn to a regional business publication to find a contractor to perform similar services for her business property.

Do some homework
Study ads that appear consistently week after week. Determine what makes such ads catch your attention. Do they mention a benefit? Are they set off in some way from other classified ads on the page? Are they easy to spot because they fall immediately under a category heading in the classified section or near the top of the ads on an online search?