Any Ideas on using MySpace for Local Businesses

I deal mostly with smaller local businesses. Ones that are trying to reach customers within a 100 mile or so radius.

I have very little experience in MySpace. Would it be worth the effort to set up a page when your not looking to be national?

Anyone gotten any good results from thier page?

 

Myspace is actually IDEAL for local businesses. My buddy owned a Hookah bar, and had hundreds of customers sign up to be friends with their myspace page. Worked well - he could bulletin & blog events as they came up.

Cheers,

 

Myspace is for teenagers and pervs looking for pictures. I wouldn't waste my time with building something serious on MySpace.

 

That's a pretty wide gap in opinions!

 

Maybe the consensus is that if your local business appeals to teens and pervs, then MySpace is great

 

you should definitely set up a myspace page for the business. A) it's free B) "friends" basically promote the site for you. Just have the business make up some flyers or business cards with the MySpace address on it.
There are lots of businesses on MySpace already.

 

Like godinu said, there are lots of businesses on Myspace (and no, it isn't all teenagers and pervs, at least I'm not either of those). Most bars and clubs in my area have pages, and they use bulletins to announce upcoming shows and special events. I think it could work for any local business - just target friends who are in your geographic area. You could offer special deals for just your "friends", which would be an incentive for them to friend you.

 

Hi, Adac,

actually, none of the sites in your signature is "must have a profile on myspace" if you know what I mean. Anyway, if you don´t give a try...

Go to BROWSE. In the main horizontal menu it is the second after HOME.
Set the browse criteria (even based the distance from the town with some postal code). You get your potential partners (I am not sure whether the browse is 100% reliable, I suppose sometimes I get results I do not trust absolutely, mainly the numbers), nevertheless, you get some overview, whether it´s worth or not.

If you find it is worth, create a profile, participate in groups or create your own group, all the usual stuff.

It is better for you to become known even on the international level (there´s lot of non-US users, you would be surprised), myspace is about exposure.

You can also start to chat based on the location you live in (or your clients operates in), just go to CHAT in that same horizontal menu.

 

I have a myspace profiles.... with thousands of friends... but the damn thing doesnt appeal to my kinda traffic.. wasted too much time on it without checking if its the people i need or not.. but they are perfect for you

 

For ballz.info, Furion (M.K., D., etc...)?

You are just doing it not as good as you could.
They like you (really), so they enlist you as their friend. But the key is to get the links from their profiles (or even better to get links from their blogs/sites). It just needs some targeted works from your side and, IMO, you will be successful with your type of content.

 

The three sites in my sig, could use more national traffic. I was more wondering about the more local sites I work with.

I have several used car dealers, a landscaping supply site and others that don't have a large need for anything beyond about 100 miles.

Sounds like you can target your efforts to certain areas. That might work out well.

 

Hmmm. You do have to think about the Myspace demographic and why people go there. Most of the members are on the young side - not teenagers necessarily - but probably mostly under the age of 30. The people I know who go to Myspace go there for fun and sharing things with friends. I'm not sure that landscaping supplies would be much of a hit - that mostly would appeal to home owners and an older demographic. Used cars might appeal to the 20-something crowd, but people wouldn't likely be repeat customers, so it's hard to imagine them wanting to be "friends" with such a business. I would think the most successful types of Myspace businesses appeal to the 20-something or even 30-something demographic, and offer goods or services that they would want to hear about in daily or weekly bulletins. They probably shouldn't be big ticket items ($1000s of dollars), since people aren't likely to look for that on Myspace.

I've seen T-shirt printers, tanning salons, bars and clubs, lingerie sales, car customization gew gaws and other similar profiles with lots of friends, so you might want to use that as a model. If you are serious about it, make a profile for yourself, add a bunch of businesses as friends and see how they do it.

 

Nonny, you´re quite right in everything what you said above, but I am sure at least the "used cars" are worth a try for adac.

Sure, those teens and post-teens will not make "friends" with a serious company selling used cars. It´s not funny, it´s not sexy, it´s not cool...

Adac has to find something that´s funny, sexy and cool, provide it free of cherge for the myspace users and exchange it for links to his supported businesses.

Most fo those people have their own blogs too (e.g. check what the www.blogthings.com do).

 

Actually, if the used car dealer is willing to use some light-hearted advertising, I can imagine creating a used car salesman "character" that people might like to friend. It's all about thinking outside the box.

 

I agree with the above. I have a sloppy site that gets almost entirely the myspace demographic with a page by a car sales place. (see http://www.tanmonkey.com/trunk-monkey.php )

 

That's great! I love the trunk Monkey... I want one.