Walking into your surf shop, the first thing you sense, right after your eyes start feasting on the sweet boards, board shorts, t-shirts and sunglasses, is the smell of lingering surf wax, mingled with a tinge of suntan lotion.
It’s summer wrapped in walls.
And you’d love to share that summer with as many customers as possible.
But are you getting enough sun lovers through your doors?
Are you missing out on clients?
Are you a lover of all things social media?
Perhaps you regularly post surf slogans to Facebook; you know, sayings like, “only a surfer knows the feeling,” overlaid on an image of a girl with a surfboard under her arm set against a gorgeous sunset.
Maybe you share new surf products to a Facebook business page.
And you call it brand building.,
And you get your likes and shares.
But have you ever considered if those likes and shares are worth anything?
Let’s think about it…
You’ve invited several people to like your page and one of them because he’s family, likes and shares all your posts.
You’ve got to ask whether uncle Fred, who sits on a farm in the middle of Iowa, will ever get onto a surfboard. Or can you imagine him and his wife in the latest Billabong swimwear?
So, their likes and shares don’t mean all that much, do they?
Or maybe you have a website.
But you’re not really using it. It just sits there like a dead seal floating in a tranquil sea. (Deep.)
Have you ever wondered if it would be possible to reach more people with the latest products you sell in your surf shop?
Have you ever given thought to other ways to get more people to see your surf promos?
How about getting a practical website that works well at advancing your cause, which is (hopefully) to sell more surf products to people who like surf products?
What can you do with a website?
The obvious info goes first, for those who visit your site to find out your contact details and location.
Because if you’re not an ecommerce surf shop, you want people to visit you, so they can open their wallets and part with their cash.
For that reason, you’ll add your phone number, email address and location to the website.
But you can use a website for some seriously powerful marketing.
You could start writing articles about surfing, skating, skimboarding, bodyboarding, SUPing and everything in-between, and attract attention from the right crowds.
If you categorize your website correctly, you’ll be building a powerful information structure people and search engines will love.
Say you’ve just received a few boxes of Oakley sunglasses. Why not post it to your website?
Or perhaps you’ve just received new stock of tie-dyed t-shirts harking back to the 60s. People will love it! Post it to your website!
Why not just post to your social media channels? You’ll find the answer further down below.
Read on to see how you can target three marketing channels from a single place.
Email marketing
Speak to people at one of the last sacred vestiges, their email inbox!
If someone likes and shares your posts on Facebook, it takes next to no effort from them. It’s like riding a motorized surfboard.
But if a person gives you their email address, they’re committing to paddle out with you to share a wave or two.
And you needn’t worry about creating newsletters yourself because that’s a lot of work.
You keep adding articles to your website, and those are shared with newsletter subscribers automagically.
Every time you add an article, it creates a beautiful newsletter with the image you used for the article. It also adds a link to the article so people who receive the newsletter can click through to see what you have to say.
To help you get subscribers, we set up a form on your website where visitors can add their email addresses, which automatically adds them to the system.
Search engine marketing
If you’re not targeting search engines, you’re missing out on serious traffic.
Think about it…
People might ask about surfboards, surf clothing and other surf related things on Facebook, but they also google these things.
These are some search queries related to surf shops…
- surf shop near me
- online surf shop california
- buy shades near me
- buy sunglasses near me
- sunglasses for men
- sunglasses online
- buy boardshort near me
- buy swimwear
- buy skateboard near me
- skateboards for sale
- surfboards for sale
Are you featuring in Google for any of those searches?
You could be.
But if you don’t have a website, it won’t be possible. And you’re missing out on quality traffic.
Emails
A surf shop with a Gmail address?
Come on, surely you can do better than that!
With our web design package, you can set up as many email addresses as you want, your hosting package size being the only limit.
But use POP to set up your emails with. That way, you’re saving big time on hosting space.
Analytics
Your surf shop’s website comes with Google Analytics and you can log in whenever you want to check what’s cutting.
You also get a weekly analytics report email that shares info like which keywords brought people to your website from where, and which pages they visited.
Your site also contains a search function that records what people search for, should they use it. This is seriously cool for sussing out what people want to see on your site.
Mobile friendly
Your surf site will look great on any size screen, whether desktop, tablet, or cellphone.
Cos pinching and zooming cause finger cramps. And that’s not cool.
Cost
What do you reckon a website with all of the above bells and whistles cost?
This marketing package comes loaded with everything you need to increase leads for a long time to come.
If you get a return, does it matter?
Conclusion
You could cruise down the line with some social media marketing, posting to your Facebook business page, convincing yourself the likes and shares are important and are good for “brand building”.
You could also continue to have a static website sit there like a hobo surfer without a surfboard, watching the sets pump at Mavericks. All the other blokes are getting the action and the best he can do is watch.
Or you could book a consultation and get a professional marketing package that lets you market to three channels from a single place, thereby getting more people buying your surf gear, more often.