Do you pay to advertise?

[Leely]

Hi Geeks,

Do any of you pay for advertisement with google or yell?

I had a advert with yell when I first started out. I paid nearly £200 for a years worth of advertisement and I don't think it helped at all.

I have today had a call from "google" saying currently my website is on page 5 and they can guarantee me that they will get it to page 1.

I am currently not mobile or working from my nail room at home as I had my son in November. When I spoke to the lady on the phone I said I would not be going back to nails for about 1-2 months. So I have asked her to call me back on Friday, so I will give her my answer as to if I want to place an ad with them.

My husband has just pointed out to me, that all my clients before where through gumtree, Facebook word of mouth.

So really I need another geeks advice.... Would you spend the money in the hope it helps your business or carry on with free promotion and hope it works?


Thank you geeks xx

 

[sarahlou09]

Hi
I am just starting my own business & using Facebook to promote it & word of mouth helps a lot to :green: Maybe get some flyers & hand them around!

 

[jojo@tranquil]

Is your website one you have created yourself, there are lots of ways you can tweak your website to make it come up higher on google, without you paying lots of money, I had an audit done on mine by a company called really simple SEO, they basically tell you how to do it yourself.
I paid Yell to supposedly get me a higher ranking it was a rip off.

 

[missreid]

Google will never ring you, so this is most likely someone trying to scam you. If you do want to advertise with google you need to use Adwords (which you do completely yourself). Don't use anyone claiming to be from google!x

 

[Male Waxing]

I doubt many women would Google something like “beauty salons Oxford” so it’s not really worth spending money doing SEO. If you offer something a bit more unusual e.g. “intimate male waxing Oxford” then it may be worth it. I would concentrate in getting your name out there with flyers and posters in your local community.
Get £30 of free Google Adwords if you sign up through Top Cashback
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[Bluerinse]

I doubt many women would Google something like “beauty salons Oxford” so it’s not really worth spending money doing SEO. If you offer something a bit more unusual e.g. “intimate male waxing Oxford” then it may be worth it. I would concentrate in getting your name out there with flyers and posters in your local community.
Get £30 of free Google Adwords if you sign up through Top Cashback
Top CashBack Official Site - The UK's #1 CashBack Site

Really? I thought that's quite a basic google search

 

[Tomme]

Really? I thought that's quite a basic google search

Me too, maybe its our boy bits talking. but I google everything, from why its windy to where I can get a customised bed and even (yes its there on my iPhone) where can I find blueprints of Buckingham palace.

Back to the op, its not google, they don't really give two hoots where you are on the list. The neighbour to my salon does Seo work (long boring and tedious are his words) and its the likes of them calling you up xoxo

 

[Jen889]

I doubt many women would Google something like “beauty salons Oxford” so it’s not really worth spending money doing SEO. If you offer something a bit more unusual e.g. “intimate male waxing Oxford” then it may be worth it. I would concentrate in getting your name out there with flyers and posters in your local community.
Get £30 of free Google Adwords if you sign up through Top Cashback
Top CashBack Official Site - The UK's #1 CashBack Site

You would be surprised how many clients would google exactly that. SEO is very important and should be done properly. I get tons of clients who google "spa west island" (this is where I'm located in Montreal,qc) and my page pops up in the top 10 out of hundreds of spas in my area.

 

[Leely]

My website is one I have made myself through 123 reg. I've had it for just over a year. When I was mobile and working from home I tried to update it once a week as well as updates on my fb page. But since having my son in November I've not been able to update it as much. Plus I've stopped working so I can bond with my son and help my other son bond with him too.
The woman I spoke to said I was currently on page 5. She said this was just by searching nail tech and the area I lived, I searched and was unable to find anything. But when I searched for mobile nail tech in the area I lived I was page 2.
My husband searched on his iPhone last night and it was complete different for him . I'm going to look in to google Ad words see if this helps xx

 

[Leely]

I doubt many women would Google something like “beauty salons Oxford” so it’s not really worth spending money doing SEO. If you offer something a bit more unusual e.g. “intimate male waxing Oxford” then it may be worth it. I would concentrate in getting your name out there with flyers and posters in your local community.
Get £30 of free Google Adwords if you sign up through Top Cashback
Top CashBack Official Site - The UK's #1 CashBack Site

When I first started out I did a google search for nail techs Oxford to look at pricelist etc. I have also done this for beauty room's etc, looking at prices for massage, as I am currently studying massage at college x

 

[facelashbrow]

I have searched beauty salon and my area, and also hairdressers my area before.

Agree with the others and also, I've been told that if you are searching a site you've already searched then you'll be higher in your own results anyway due to cookies. So for an accurate result get a friend who has never looked before. I am sure someone else will confirm if this is true!

Sent from my HTC Desire using Tapatalk 2

 

[Lynne Baker]

You might want to consider having a banner ad on a local site, like netmums. You can set these up in google Adwords and specify which site you want your ad to appear on.
This is what we do; we have only one banner ad and it appears only on salon geek. We also specify the time of the day we want it to appear. We know that the traffic here is much higher in the evenings which is why you'll see our ad only from 8pm onwards.

It is entirely possible to spend an effing fortune on google Adwords so it's important to ensure that you've set the budget carefully, and that the quality score is high enough so that your pay per click price is not too high.

 

[Leely]

You might want to consider having a banner ad on a local site, like netmums. You can set these up in google Adwords and specify which site you want your ad to appear on.
This is what we do; we have only one banner ad and it appears only on salon geek. We also specify the time of the day we want it to appear. We know that the traffic here is much higher in the evenings which is why you'll see our ad only from 8pm onwards.

It is entirely possible to spend an effing fortune on google Adwords so it's important to ensure that you've set the budget carefully, and that the quality score is high enough so that your pay per click price is not too high.

That's a brilliant bit of advice Lynne


I will look into this and see what I can come up with xx

 

[SilhouetteUK]

In all my years of working in marketing, I think it's safe to say that (as has been said above) the likes of Google & Facebook calling you is unlikely.

Also, Google algorithms change frequently (meaning the way pages rank can vary - sometimes dramatically). On this basis, the promise of guaranteeing someone will be on page one of Google (i'd say) is questionable.

Tracey

 

[squidgernetball]

I have just set up my own web page after years of saying 'Oh they know where I am/they know what I do'. I'm now eating my words. Weebly allows me to see who has accessed my site and where from (google/FB/etc), and what terms they've used - ie. beauty salon lutterworth etc. I have had a lot of traffic thru my site, and am now getting contact forms from it - and it's cost me about £14 per year for Weebly Pro. Yell wanted about £40 per month to do my website and at the end of a year, if I wanted to regain control, I would have to buy my domain name back from them - apparently this can cost around £350 which is shocking.. How it is now, I can pop in and add things - specials etc, and apparently all these help to get you up the rankings!

 

[Beauty_Geek]

Hiya Hun

It's not google. My boyfriend does this as his business. If you go with the right company it is money very well spent. However, like all markets, if you pick the wrong one, you will be scammed.

Google took my boyfriends business to court as they said only google themselves could guarantee page 1 results. An independent checker checked a cross section of their clients and 98% were on page 1. This was good enough for their company to guarantee page 1 and the courts and google agreed that they were the only company they would allow to guarantee this.

Google the company that rang you. Just out of interest, who is it? And see what reviews they have.

If you want pm me your details and I can get my OH to ring you with a quote I can guarantee will be better than there's.

Don't rush into anything lovely and check out everyone that rings you xxx

 

[ClaireL]

Does anyone know of any articles or blogs etc about google adwords?

 

[Leely]

Later on I'm going to search the Internet with the number that called me and see what it brings up.
The company I spoke to only gave me a quote for 3 months then said each month you can change the words they can search for you with. So month 1 I can have nail tech Oxford, month 2 Mobile nails Oxford and so on. As soon as I've looked them up I'll update you all xx

 

[millyspook]

I've use weebly and webs from my free websites and both rank on the first page when doing basic searches for my area.

It's all about using the right keywords and making sure your web pages use a lot of these words in your text on the pages. Seo is easy to teach yourself but you do have to work at it and keep tweaking. I'm always checking my pages rank highly .

 

[Leely]

Little update for you geeks

I spoke to person who was from "google" end of last week. She informed me she could guarantee me a place on page 1. I asked her how? As soon as I asked she then started to talk money. I asked for confirmation of everything to be sent via email or post before I paid anything. To which she advised she was unable to do so... To which I replied I was unable part with my money and the phone call ended.
So safe to say another scam x