Need marketing advice

[Lightingbird]

Hello all,

I am new here and trying to market my business better. My business is pretty much a technical support business that covers anything. I have website, very small call center, toll free number, and some car banners.

This is the website.

www.spartansupport.com

Any ideas?

[nwscents]

Have you registered in your state as a certified minority-owned business? That might get you in the door with some of the state/city/county departments that have lists of small businesses that they turn to when they need something.

You can also put an ad in your local paper, leave business cards around town, or maybe join your local chamber of commerce for some contacts.

You might want to consider adding more products/services to your portfolio. There are several services and products that you can add at very little or no cost.
- web hosting
- domain name reselling
- refurbished computers
- web design
- etc.

That way you can be a one stop shop for people, and when they buy one of your products, they can learn about your technical support services too. There is a guy in my town who offers services for mac owners. But from what I have been told, he makes the bulk of his money refurbishing old macs and selling them on ebay.

O. Franklin
Northwest Scents

[Lightingbird]

I'll look into seeing if I can register for minority owned in Missouri. I'll have to look that up. No idea where to start on that. Well a basic ad. You know that never crossed my mind. I guess I can try that along with dropping off business cards. Although, we are pretty much set as a business. I don't see us adding any more services. We only provide high level technical service. Thanks for other ideas thus far.

[nwscents]

The website for the National Minority Supplier Development Council is at http://msdc.adaptone.com/nmsdc/

At the top of the page where it says "Locations" click on "regional councils" on the drop down menu. That will take you to the page with the regional councils. These are the ones that do the certifying. Then go the the council for your area.

O. Franklin
Northwest Scents

[Virtual GoTo Girl]

I have a few questions for you.

Before you read on, please understand that my intentions are purely professional and I am not here to criticize or judge. I add this disclaimer because we sometimes feel we are putting our best image forward and are sensitive to how other people perceive us (as well as previous posts where others felt I was harsh or overly critical of a business).

1. How did you come up with your business name? "Spartan" brings up a number of things that I would not relate to computer or technical services, and association is crucial to connecting what you do in the minds of your customers.
2. Who is your target audience? Who are your ideal customers and how are you reaching them?
3. What do people think about your website? I can see that you are using a blog. From initial browsing, I don't find it to be very visitor-friendly. I do not get the feeling that this is a legitimate technical support website. I also noticed a few grammatical errors, and the text in the pop-outs on your navigation bar are not proportioned to the boxes they fit in. A lot of the text is lost.

Those are my initial observations.

I spend a great deal of time online and am mostly self-taught when it comes to building a web presence, and am by no means an expert in web design, but I have been in it long enough to know what works and doesn't.

I look forward to continuing this exchange with you.

[Lightingbird]

Originally Posted by nwscents

The website for the National Minority Supplier Development Council is at http://msdc.adaptone.com/nmsdc/

At the top of the page where it says "Locations" click on "regional councils" on the drop down menu. That will take you to the page with the regional councils. These are the ones that do the certifying. Then go the the council for your area.

Thanks I'm going to list my business with them tomorrow. I actually got a call today from an employee that visited my website for a chain Hardees store's here in saint louis. They are considering free wireless for their customers and need support. My business meeting is on friday wish me luck. I'm also going to looking into pricing for radio ads.