ForumsAdvertising, Sales and Marketing

Because you are in the self defense field, you probably handle a lot of personal safety questions. We offer free digital ID kits that allow you to put your logo, coupons links, documents and safety tips right on the CD ID itself. So, basically when your customer puts the CD in their computer to complete it, they will see a webpage with links, contact info, safety tips, etc....

This has been a very succesful tool for police departments, nonprofits and other karate schools. They are very affordable and you will be providing a great community service to boot!

Feel free to contact me with any questions, we can customize the kits to fit any program.

I don't know if you have already thought of this but it is a very simple idea. I have large colorful magnet signs on each side of my car and I also wear my personally designed T-shirts EVERYWHERE! These forms of advertisment I found have been very effective because people can't help but look at my business name whether at a stop light, in a parking lot, in line at the bank/starbucks/post office. If you are wearing the shirt with the business name of driving the car with the sign, people feel free to ask questions about your business and this personalized commercial is one people are unlikely to forget.

You think about getting a website built for your company and do some online advertising. If you need any help with this feel free to reply back. Me and my business partner just started a web design and online marketing company.

Whitebrow,

1. You need to define exactly who you most likely target customer is, so you don't waste hard earned bucks promoting to people who are unlikely to become customers.

2. Create an offer that is as generous as you can make it. (remember you are buying the life time value of a customer)

3. Create a way a potential customer can test your service before they have to commit. (you are looking for ways to breakdown the initiall decision making process)

4. Distribute Flyers with your offer to businesses in your area that are already serving your target market.
Now this is important!!! The flyer should be what is known as a "Host Beneficiary Offer"
This means it should be a personal note from the owner of the other business to his/her customer,
thanking the customer for shopping at their business and offering them (the customer)
a special deal at your business.

(WHEW!!) thats a lot of stuff I know.
But, its a very low cost powerful method of growing any business.

I have got bucket loads of fully illustrated low cost ideas like this on my sites at:
http://stuff4business.com
http://stuff4restaurants.com/blog2

Where you are most welcome... Kindest regards Lindsay Polson

You definitely want to promote your center locally, however many of the search engines like Google have local listings. These local listings are becoming more and more popular these days. Just do a search for "martial arts+your city" and you'll see who your competition is in your area.

Now you could spend hundreds of dollars for a professional website with a high level of SEO (search engine optimization) imbedded so you can compete, but there's an easier way.

If you go to places like http://rticlz.com and sign up for a free blog, title the blog something like "Martial Arts Center" and start writing teaching articles, you'll be surprised how quickly you'll start rising in the search engine rankings. In the sidebar you can list your place of business and location. Tag your articles with the main key phrase plus your city,state and phone number.

Once you have three or four articles written, submit each story to some social bookmarking sites like Digg, StumbleUpon and Propeller.

This way you'll be able to test market your center on the web and it won't cost you a cent.

Now on the concept of writing articles . . .

People come to the Internet to find information and appreciate it immensely when they can find good quality info on the subject they search for. If you present yourself as an expert in the field of martial arts (or any field for that matter), people will begin to take notice.

Being considered an expert could very well bring in business that you might not normally bring in promoting locally. I'm sure your field, like many others, have phoney centers that have very little to offer their clients. But if you can "prep" them ahead of time with your knowledge on the subject, then they will trust you and be willing to travel just to be taught by you.

So yes, promote locally, but also use the web to bring in clients from other parts.