Canvasing Local Business Case Study

I have had a phone sales team for a while now and have been wanting to start expanding my empire. I have been thinking about getting material printed and hiring on canvassers to start hitting the streets and talking to local businesses and set up appointments. I have been doing very well with my sales team and the services that we offer so I have kind of been wrapped up with that and have procrastinated on the other ventures that I have been meaning to take.

I just recently had two girls come by my office that were passing out their resume's to all of the businesses around the area... Then it hit me I need to hire these girls on to canvas and set up appointments. I was going to hire men that might have some sales skills to do this before, but girls would be great. There were very social and most business owners are male so they are going to not have their guard up as they would with a male. So I hired them along with two other girls. I will let you guys know how it goes along the way and will post the whole experience here for suggestions and comments.


Here is a pic of the flyer I had made. I modified a flyer that I found here on BHW a while back. The flyers were a little pricey because I needed them made ASAP and had them printed at Office Depot. I had 250 color semi-thick paper, 100 color thick paper, and 200 black and white. I had two to a page printed and cut and it cost me $170.


Here is the flyer that I used. Now that I am looking at it I see a few things that I can change to hopefully increase conversion. For the most part I think it is good, I used some NLP techniques in it.



I am starting off by paying the girls $20 per appointment set and paying them 25% on the initial sale. Not bad for them and not bad for me. Myself and my best salesman are currently at 100% for face to face closings.

I'm going to start training for a day on Monday then I'll be having them hit streets on Tuesday. I am going to have the girls give a free offer to entice the business owners to set an appointment.

it was all good until you said you were getting the girls to give a free offer to the business owners ,lol

otherwise a great plan,

Awesome flyers I'm subscribing

Excellent idea... I'll be interested in your results. So, you must be in a "metro" area where there are a lot of businesses within walking distance? Are you located in the U.S.?

Best of luck, keep us posted!

so whats the pitch? SEO?

Been thinking of doing something similar. Hiring some interns at a local high school on the cheap.

Those stacks of flyers look like a big pile of money to me

Wow, the flyers look impressive, sign me up +rep

Can I ask what you are offering free?

Tight gameplan, excited to learn how it turns out. I have been considering a similiar strategy -- having women do the "bird dogging" is a great idea.

Giving something away for free is a great idea.The concept of "Free" is pretty interesting in the world we operate in. It instills trust in that it shows you want to educate and prove your value before asking for money, if it's high value it also demonstrates expertise and keeps us top of mind for the prospect amidst all the marketing messages they receive each day.

Thanks for sharing, sub'd

∞

That flyer is really well designed. But Questions if I may?

What's the mechanics of setting the appointment? Is the business owner supposed to call the number on the flyer, or she makes the appointment on the spot and notes it on a clipboard or something?

If there's no time to speak to anyone, she just leaves the flyer I guess, but then if the business owner calls the number later she won't get credit for that?

MagicMike said:

Excellent idea... I'll be interested in your results. So, you must be in a "metro" area where there are a lot of businesses within walking distance? Are you located in the U.S.?

Best of luck, keep us posted!

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Yes, I am located in a metro area in the U.S. The area has thousands of businesses.

Taktical said:

so whats the pitch? SEO?

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The pitch is mainly SEO but I do not discriminate, we will be aiming to handle any type of IM the business needs. Sort of custom tailored marketing campaigns. We offer SEO, SEM, GP SEO, Web Design, Rep. Management, Lead Generation, Lead Capture, and Social Media related marketing.

ViperVin said:

Been thinking of doing something similar. Hiring some interns at a local high school on the cheap.

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I have a couple of H.S interns working for me to learn the ropes. They work in the office with me for free, I don't think they would be up for canvassing for free though, but then again they are interns. lol

infinitehorizons said:

Can I ask what you are offering free?

Tight gameplan, excited to learn how it turns out. I have been considering a similiar strategy -- having women do the "bird dogging" is a great idea.

Giving something away for free is a great idea.The concept of "Free" is pretty interesting in the world we operate in. It instills trust in that it shows you want to educate and prove your value before asking for money, if it's high value it also demonstrates expertise and keeps us top of mind for the prospect amidst all the marketing messages they receive each day.

Thanks for sharing, sub'd

∞

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I had a couple of different ideas of free services we could offer. I wanted the offer to sound great but be really easy for me to do and not cost much. The first thing that I am going to try out is offering them one month of free advertising. What I would be doing is throwing up a Google Adwords ad for them for their niche' related keyword. I obviously would not be able to do this for them if they did not have a website, so then I would offer free claiming(if need be) and on-page optimization of their Google Place Profile, therefor setting me up for a website and/or Google Places Optimization.

Joeblack99 said:

That flyer is really well designed. But Questions if I may?

What's the mechanics of setting the appointment? Is the business owner supposed to call the number on the flyer, or she makes the appointment on the spot and notes it on a clipboard or something?

If there's no time to speak to anyone, she just leaves the flyer I guess, but then if the business owner calls the number later she won't get credit for that?

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You pretty much answered it there yourself. They will be setting appointments on the spot I am going to teach them how to use "fear of loss" to their advantage and play on the facts that the offer will expire(there is a spot on the flyer to write in an expiration date), we will only be working with one business exclusively for each niche' and maybe have the girls state that they had just spoken to a competitor and name that business to them. Also the girls will have a name code that is specific to them that they will put on the flyers and when someone calls in and gives the code they will in turn get credit for the appointment and sale.

Can I get a more clear version of it? I actually want to see the copy. You can PM me. I would really appreciate that. Thanks

One suggestion on an angle of the sales pitch: "free" removes the risk part of the equation but leaves a lingering question of the value of the service provided (someone unfamiliar or vaguely familiar with SEO will probably have thoughts about something that's free). Weave the concept into the conversation that your "services will more than pay for themselves." Or, "I know that SEO services should more than pay for themselves. I take my job serious to make sure that happens." Or, as I've found in a college town, if I'm talking to a business owner who is a sports enthusiast, I let them know when they hire me my job is to "annihilate the competition." Communicating any of those concepts have helped me gain potential paying clients see the value in addition to nothing to risk. I had to come up with something when I wasn't converting near as many free-to-start projects. I probably close twice as many sales after I added that piece.

I like your suggestion for hiring women to make initial contact giving out fliers. I'm going to try that. I think I'll do a quick search to see if I can find any free tips for pharmaceutical reps. Seems I could learn something from them since their job is to interrupt a doctor's work flow to offer free samples of what they sell as well as communicate the benefit of their product in a 2 minute pitch.

teflonbrain said:

One suggestion on an angle of the sales pitch: "free" removes the risk part of the equation but leaves a lingering question of the value of the service provided (someone unfamiliar or vaguely familiar with SEO will probably have thoughts about something that's free). Weave the concept into the conversation that your "services will more than pay for themselves." Or, "I know that SEO services should more than pay for themselves. I take my job serious to make sure that happens." Or, as I've found in a college town, if I'm talking to a business owner who is a sports enthusiast, I let them know when they hire me my job is to "annihilate the competition." Communicating any of those concepts have helped me gain potential paying clients see the value in addition to nothing to risk. I had to come up with something when I wasn't converting near as many free-to-start projects. I probably close twice as many sales after I added that piece.

I like your suggestion for hiring women to make initial contact giving out fliers. I'm going to try that. I think I'll do a quick search to see if I can find any free tips for pharmaceutical reps. Seems I could learn something from them since their job is to interrupt a doctor's work flow to offer free samples of what they sell as well as communicate the benefit of their product in a 2 minute pitch.

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Yea, I am not going to be doing free to start. I do offer every once in a while , what I call a "No Risk SEO" package and I usually sign up 12 month contracts and every once in a while 6 month contracts but I will never offer my services for free without a contract in place. I also make sure I educate my clients properly so that they know I am not selling them hopes and dreams and they are primed to realistic expectations. Then when you show them amazing results they are very impressed and you over delivered rather than setting too high of expectations. What I am offer for free is an Adwords ad and that is just to get my foot in the door. I have been in sales for year and all I need is for them to give me a chance and I'll close them. Pharmaceutical Reps could have some great tips, that's a good idea. Have you seen the movie "Love and Other Drugs" the guy on that movie talks about how you need to juice up the gatekeepers by complimenting them and giving them gifts.

Hi web oracle I sent you pm earlier today, please check, thanks

choson said:

Can I get a more clear version of it? I actually want to see the copy. You can PM me. I would really appreciate that. Thanks

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Spawn said:

Hi web oracle I sent you pm earlier today, please check, thanks

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Here is where I got the original .psd .ai and .png for the flyer then modified it to my liking, for the most part the layout is great. The WSO on the other hand was no so great the content was average, another guy with a pic of himself with a $10k stack in his hand telling you how you can get rich too! LOL

http://www.blackhatworld.com/blackhat-seo/member-downloads/326420-get-wso-offline-flyer-frenzy-16-628-one-month-flyers.html

ViperVin said:

Been thinking of doing something similar. Hiring some interns at a local high school on the cheap.

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You have the proper business requirements to hire minors who are still in school ?

Uro Chesia said:

You have the proper business requirements to hire minors who are still in school ?

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GO away

@OP, great looking flyers, keep us updated with the results please

teflonbrain said:

One suggestion on an angle of the sales pitch: "free" removes the risk part of the equation but leaves a lingering question of the value of the service provided (someone unfamiliar or vaguely familiar with SEO will probably have thoughts about something that's free). Weave the concept into the conversation that your "services will more than pay for themselves." Or, "I know that SEO services should more than pay for themselves. I take my job serious to make sure that happens." .

Click to expand...

If often helps to ask the following question:

What is the lifetime value of a newly acquired customer?


The premise of this question encourages the business owner to view the long term effects of proper marketing. Depending on the business, the lifetime value can be anywhere from $100 to $100,000. (doctor and lawyers more, locksmiths less) Even a pizzaria could theorize that one happy customer would eat there twice a month at $20 each for a total of $240 a year, plus they bring their friends.

Then you translate that into a value proposition:

"So if you make $500 per new customer, and I'm charging you $1000 per month, then if you get only two new customers every month than the service pays for itself. Do you agree with that?"

They'll be forced to agree. Then you show search statistics of lets say....500 searches a month, and say if you can get 100 of those people to see their site, and 10% convert, you've got 10 new customers a month.

This only works on some personality types who need cold hard numbers to make things work in their minds. Couple this with other sales techniques such as the emotional side and you've got a solid pitch.