Advertising Your Services

Advertising Your Services

From Makeup Artist to Hairstylists and more - advertising is very important.

I feel as though online advertising works better than street advertising or flyering for services. I would say the best form of advertising though is "word of mouth" or recommendations to new clients from prior clients.

THEKNOT.COM

As far as online advertising goes, there are a lot of places that I think Makeup Artists feel that they have to advertise with. I recently signed up for the KNOT.com because of their reputation and they claim that 80 or 90% of brides visit theknot.com upon getting engaged to. The fee is $60 per month/ $150 per month some times more.I figured it was worth a try to keep my name out there in the wedding world - since I had pulled back from doing a lot of weddings due to other types of jobs I was taking.

The Knot.com gives you statistics on how many hits your profile gets etc. I was really surprised and disappointed with the statistics I saw after one month! I was able to get that many hits off of free advertising in ONE DAY! I was very disappointed with theknot.com and am really unsure of why other makeup artists would even want to advertise on it at all. It's kind of a big waste of money.

GOOGLE ADWORDS

Another big online advertising giant is Google Adwords. I've tried google adwords on several occasions and really wasnt happy with that either. It lets you budget out your hits per day. For example - if some one visits your website or clicks on the adword links - every click - you pay anywhere from 25 cents to $1.00. Unfortunately, if you have a small weekly budget - your clicks are used up quickly and you really don't get a lot of exposure at all. I also think that some of the clicks you receive aren't even potential clients - but rather other makeup artists and competition. You rarely get any calls from this form of advertising. Now, if you have a giant budget like huge corporations and companies do - then yes, google adwords make sense. You will get traffic to your website or page with a LARGE budget - but I still think theres better advertising methods out there.

YOU TUBE

YouTube, I've heard is an excellent way to gain exposure from a wide range of clients to fans. However, in my own experience with YouTube - it takes commitment. A lot of successful and dedicated youtube users have told me that you cant just put one video up whenever you feel like it. Apparently, you need to send out at least one video a day or once a week to keep people's interest. You also need to be consistent so that you don't lose your audience. I have talked to a few models during some catalog shoots that are also personal trainers. One model was well known on youtube for his AB videos and exercise videos. Apparently he's made thousands of dollars off youtube. BUT - it took a lot of dedication. If I was to fully commit to youtube advertising, marketing or for gaining exposure - I think I would create a hundred videos over the span of a few weeks and then upload them over the course of a year (every 3 days or so religiously). However, I personally fell that this youtube route can be very time consuming and slightly exhausting.

BLOGGING

Blogging is another form of self advertising or gaining a fan base/ hits to your website for whatever you're selling or talking about. However, just like youtube - blogging takes dedication, is time consuming, and you need to keep a schedule. I am one of the worst offenders when it comes to blogging. For some people - blogging, twitter, facebook etc - is their life - or has become a religious thing that they do everyday. Unfortunately for me.... again.... I have been unable to keep a consistent stream of blogs everytime I create a blog. However, the things that you blog about can come up in search engines which will bring traffic and exposure to your website or whatever you link your blog with. Blogs can take a lot of time and dedication as well.

TWITTER

There have been a lot of people and books written on how marketing yourself on twitter works for businesses. I personally, am not a fan of tweeting for my business. Occasionally I will put up announcements for things I am doing. However, I just find that twitter is spammed up with girls that sit there for hours saying everything that comes to mind... or they will have full conversations back and forth with some one on there. To me, this is very distracting. I also don't find that new clientele will interact with the business on there. It might just be the type of business! I think that there are better ways to get the word out!

FACEBOOK

I am a fan of facebook. I think that facebook is excellent for personal use and also for business - however - you must try to make two accounts for this! Some people have one account for everything and then you find yourself either avoiding your family members or telling your friends not to write certain things on your facebook because they're too personal. It's always good to have a separation of work and play ---- family and friends---- and family v.s. clients.

I like facebook because it is an informal way of connecting with people and new clients. It's also a more personal way for new clients to interact with you in a leisurely way and also get to know the other people on your page.  For my clients that take my workshops or book me for their events -- facebook has allowed them to verify my identity and even get reviews from other clients.

I am a huge fan of facebook and it is not as "spammy" as myspace. The only thing that I do not like about platforms like facebook is that they can some times collect TOO MUCH information - which is then out there in the internet for creepy websites to post everything about you - from collected data.

My best advice with facebook is to really think about the information you give up when signing up for accounts and just every day conversation - you never know who is watching!

Print Advertising:

Unless your being featured and they are doing an article on you - print advertising for makeup and hair services doesn't really work so great. Print advertising can be one of the most expensive forms of advertising. Back when I worked for a night club we would sign on to do all sorts of print advertising. Local magazines that were very small - would cost $2,000 for the backpage or for 1 page in the magazine. Print advertising should be left to the big companies and not small makeup service companies or independents.I personally, have advertised in the Village Voice - but - it rarely leads to any phone calls and can be costly!

FREE ONLINE ADVERTISING-- Keywords/Meta tags

Possibly the best thing ever--- free online advertising/classifieds websites! The best thing about free online advertising is the word FREE. When your advertising is free you can afford to do as much of it as possible!

A lot of free online classified sites have awesome visibility. For example- when some one searches out for some thing in a search engine - a lot of online classified sites will come up with words from your advertisement. These are known as "keywords". Keywords are awesome because they help find your advertisements online. In addition, keywords can even popup in your blog when you are writing about your services etc.

EXAMPLE:

I search out: New York City Bridal Makeup Artist

It then links me to your advertisement that says "New York City Bridal Makeup Artist"

Meta Tags are also awesome. They found in the admin section of your websites. They allow you to type a description into your website. When some searches out for some thing on a search engine it will then use your meta tags, keywords etc to pull up your website.