Flyers: do they work?

[iladelf]

Hello all,

With business at a severe downturn, I've thought about doing the flyer thing, but am sort of apprehensive about it. If I were to do it, I'd use it selectively, i.e. by placing them on cars at local malls, WalMart, large events going on in town, etc., and selectively place them on cars of people that look like they have money (i.e. no beaters!).

So, what's your take; do they work? I really don't want to post them on bulletin boards around town, because the only BBs I've seen are in low-income locations (laundromats, etc.), and having recently experienced a bounced check from such a person (and other previous run-ins with these folks), I'd rather not have them as customers.

[SandTech]

I believe they work, if you place them smartly, I believe you have the right idea.

At the same time, I went fixed this customer computer, beat up car, I wont buy the computer for more than $25, Customer doesn't want to buy new one, he preferred to spend the $230 to fix and reload the computer.

So don't judge by the look. In my retail experience, we had this lady that remodel houses. She owns about 10% off the houses in my city, come to shop with dirty clothes, we all know she's a millionaire, but its work she wont spend much on car or herself when she's at work. If we were going to judge her from the look, this retail would have lost millions a year.

[swany971]

Hi iladelf, I have had good luck with placing flyers in newspaper boxes, especially in the wealthy areas of town. I like flyers because they're cheap, so even if you get only a few calls, you're not out much. I had a guy call me last week from an area I had passed flyers almost 2 months ago. Sometimes I think people just keep flyers laying around until they need them. Wealthy communities are the ones I try to hit the most. Although usually I won't turn down a customer from a low-income community, even though I have had run-ins in the past with them also. Good luck.

[Blues]

You can't turn down the dead beats with out prior experience of them being dead beats and generally if you did finally collect its bad to reject them until its a clear pattern. I would say its not bad to try local market/grocery store, local gym, or any local shops that aren't competitors to ask if they would mind if you had flyers avialable to thier customers in thier location.

[Bryce W]

They worked for me, but dont expect them to work immediately. Ive gotten some back that I distributed a year before. The average return you can expect is 2%. Sometimes higher if dropped in richer areas.

[Holzster]

Fryers alway worked better for me if I had a coupon on it of some sorts.

Holzster

[nonchalant]

Yes they work.

Im in the yellow pages now however I did try flyers and they paid off very well paying for the cost of printing and delivery many many times over.

But dont try and predict the response. Ive had 3000 flyers dropped and not had one call. Ive had 2000 dropped and had 8-10 calls. When you take into account the cost of printing and delivery for 2000 flyers (approx $150 from memory) you really only need one big job and the cost is covered. After that its pure profit. And dont forget, you may get repeat business and word-of-mouth from only 1 or 2 jobs, paying for the expenditure many times over.

Not only that but Ive had calls from a flyer drop in an area many months later. Add to that repeat business and word-of-mouth and so on..