Opening new location soon

[ComputerCorner]

Hi guys,

I was just wondering what some of you have done in the past when opening your first, or second, store. We are finishing up the renovation of our second location and I am trying to put together as many ideas as possible to really help get the ball rolling.

I'm newish to the company, but when my father opened his first store, it started extremely slow. He was concentrating on his web development services until the walk-in business picked up. I'd rather have a huge showing right off the break, obviously.

So a few of the things that I was thinking about are

~1 week prior to opening, hit all of the businesses (Should we consider residential too?) within a mile or so with a friendly visit to simply let them know that we moved into the area, what we do, etc. Not selling anything.

~1 week prior to opening, USPS Every Door Direct Mail - Surrounding neighborhood and businesses.

Renting a "Sky Dancer" for our first week, setting it on the corner of our lot which is on a busy street in town.

Advertising heavy discounts for the first week which would hopefully encourage people to at least come check us out. Maybe ~50% off all services, or more.


That's pretty much what I have been considering so far. I feel as if we can at least have people come see our new shop, that would be satisfactory. My uncle opened a restaurant downtown a few years back and I remember that he sent out 100+ invitations to people for a free meal before they opened. It helped the employees get used to things, got their name out there, and easily attracted a bunch of people into the place to see how it was. Obviously it was an expensive tactic, but the point is that he went big at the start to make sure people knew he was there and that he had a great service / product.

So I would appreciate any comments or criticism regarding our new store opening. Thanks!

 

[Tony_Scarpelli]

yard signs like real estate brokers use are very good but they are usually illegal some towns tolerate them. If you see other companies use them you can probably use them too.

Put flyers on the cars in front of the closes super grocery store. Be fast as they might come out and run you off. Walmart security will kick you out within 10 minutes.

Direct mail using the 14 cents per address method just announced is great!!!!! but rather than 50% off everything just name a few services that are discounted. 50% off backup or Free backup with any tune up or re-installation. 50% off diagnoses fee with service(when they repair it). these sound just as good but the total bill the client pays will be large enough to make it worth your while. Another idea is list some really cheap items at cost such as a $2 USB mouse, $1 mouse pad, $2 keyboard.....

Another thing to offer at a newly opened store free no obligation checkup for any computer or notebook computer. Many people suspect something is wrong but don't know for sure. The idea of a free no commitment check could get you the traffic you want to have and many of those computers are going to be infected with virus, adware, need larger hard drives, more ram, thermal treatment to the cpu fan, new fan, power supply or what have you. You might also show every new customer some new computers just so they know that they don't have to get them from dell or Walmart.

Tell them about your services that Dell and Walmart can't offer such as backing up and moving their data, setting up their desktop just the way they like it (the older they are the more that they need this).

PS setup a table with self serve coffee and a couple of dozen glazed donuts when you open. Tell all your family and friends to tell their friends. Ask someone close to send you flowers to put on display or go buy some yourself. Probably worth $40 to order online a 10-12' Grand opening banner. If your store is buried in the croch of a mall then put some of those real estate signs with arrows to find you and a grand opening tape across those signs to get street traffic to you.

Call your local hot dog cart guy and ask him if he would like to have some $300-500 worth of service trade out with you for putting his cart at your store for the weekend and giving away free hot dogs. Get some color flag tape and run it from the parking lot to the top of your awning make-it it obvious that something is going on in there and people will stop and check you out.

 

[drpcfix]

yeah, as long as you are allowed - a nice big grand opening sign -

we spent about $1000 on facebook ads in our area just announcing we are new in town and offering free tune-ups to anyone that walks in the first week.

Have snacks/soda available, balloons, and lots of nice looking business cards. maybe magnets too..

we did get a nice bump, it didn't carry on for long - but helped, and I would do it again..

Of course organic google seems to carry the most weight, hopefully you already have your listing ready to go in google and other local engines, and have a page dedicated to the new location on the website..

 

[ComputerCorner]

Great ideas, guys. Thanks for your responses!

We have a MASSIVE sign that came with our building. I think it's something like 10' x 8'. Hopefully people will have a hard time missing it... We are considering a "Grand Opening" sign as well, like suggested above. We just want to make a bunch of commotion, but not in a negative way.

We were also kicking around the idea of giving away an iPad to a lucky customer that comes in via raffle tickets or something like that.

 

[Tony_Scarpelli]

Great ideas, guys. Thanks for your responses!

We have a MASSIVE sign that came with our building. I think it's something like 10' x 8'. Hopefully people will have a hard time missing it... We are considering a "Grand Opening" sign as well, like suggested above. We just want to make a bunch of commotion, but not in a negative way.

We were also kicking around the idea of giving away an iPad to a lucky customer that comes in via raffle tickets or something like that.

If you do that you need to really let people know by radio, newspaper or TV. You can probably do each for $500 or so in a small market. But I think I would note that we will give it away after giving out 3000 tickets so it is possible it could run a couple of weekends or even every weekend for a month. Then announce the winner on same media.