How To Market a Dry Cleaning Business Online
By Hibu |
Like all small businesses, finding the most effective way to market a dry cleaning business can be confusing. Whether you run a new or seasoned shop – how can your business beat local competitors? Plus, how do you make your dry cleaning marketing memorable, affordable, and most important of all – successful in generating new customers?
There’s good news and bad news… the dry cleaning industry is a $4.9 billion market that analysts expect to grow. That’s good. But, all that revenue is spread among about 36,000 U.S. businesses, so competition can be fierce.
Today, the primary way to market your dry cleaning business is with digital marketing. Whether you’re in a city, the suburbs, or out in the country, online dry cleaner marketing can target and engage the customers you want.
So, how do you get started? We’ve put together some basic dry cleaning marketing strategies that can show real results — especially when you use them together.
[Related: How Smart Marketing Can Help You Do More With Less Staff]
Make Sure Local Customers Can Find You Online
Hopefully, you already have a list of loyal customers, but constantly adding customers to that list is crucial to growing your business. That’s why ensuring local consumers can find you online is your top marketing goal.
At the core of your digital marketing presence are three things:
- Your business listing
- Your website
- Your social media profiles
Let’s take a closer look at those three and other key parts of your digital marketing.
Your Business Listings
Let’s say there’s a prospective customer who is new to town. She’s on her lunch break, and she’s just stepped in motor oil in her brand-new suede shoes. What’s her first move if she doesn’t have a go-to dry cleaner?
She’s probably going to search for local dry cleaners via her smartphone. You’re right down the road, she’s a great prospect… but will she find you in her search results?
This is where your business listings are crucial. You’re probably familiar with them — they pop up when you search for anything “near me.”
Your business listings need to be as thorough as possible, so customers will instantly know how to contact you, when you’re open, and where your business is. Photos of your building(s), equipment, handiwork, and staff (think team pics) are icing on the cake.
Of course, listings management is more than just getting the information online (although there’s a lot to just doing that), you also need to continually ensure that your information is accurate and up to date. Incorrect and outdated business listings can wallop your bottom line — customers turn elsewhere quickly if your information is wrong or inconsistent.
Note: Having business listings that you didn’t create is more common than you might imagine. Google and other search engines (and even social media platforms) may autogenerate business listings. See for yourself -- check your information right now, for free!
[Related: See How Your Online Business Listings Change Over Time]
Your Business Website
This part of the marketing strategy for your dry cleaning business may seem straightforward … but is it?
Websites are tricky, partly because so many people try creating a website themselves… only to find that the site doesn’t generate any results. A professional business website needs a user-friendly layout, mobile-friendly design, and voice search capabilities.
It’s pretty easy to picture that someone who sees your business listing, could then click the link to your website. And what they see on your site needs to be engaging, persuasive, and easy to navigate through. Making that happen is no easy feat when you’re already focused on the day to day of running your dry cleaning business.
More and more small businesses, including dry cleaning business owners, are choosing to partner with a professional digital marketing company. With your input, they’ll make sure your business website reflects who you are, clearly shows the services you provide, and continues to run smoothly behind the scenes. Plus, you should get real-time business insights and have the ability to request changes to your site anytime.
[Related: Today’s Website: A Free Guide for Small Businesses]
Your Social Media Profiles
More than anything else, social media gives you a chance to engage with customers. It’s the cornerstone of today’s online word-of-mouth marketing.
With that in mind, you want social media profiles for your dry cleaning business on the biggest social media platforms, like Facebook (aka Meta) and Instagram. But remember, the key steps on your social checklist are staying active and ensuring that any info you post matches your website and listing.
And yes, creativity and dry cleaning may not necessarily seem like a natural match at first. But you can have a lot of fun on social media! Dry cleaner marketing doesn’t have to be, well, dry.
When you convey your unique business personality, customers are far more likely to remember you — and to drop by your shop.
[Related: How To Make the Most of the Time You Spend Marketing Your Business]
Boost Visibility and Traffic With SEO
After establishing your online presence, the next step of your dry cleaning marketing strategy is utilizing SEO.
A whole lot goes into search engine optimization, or SEO (you can read all about it here). Suffice it to say that SEO involves influencing how highly your business ranks in search results. Needless to say, that’s a really big deal — especially when you’re going head to head against all the competitors in your local market (and probably some just outside your market).
Altogether, SEO requires research, skill, and a certain amount of art. It’s a balance that digital marketers spend years and years perfecting. And it’s what helps prospects and customers see your business before your competitors when they search for dry cleaning services!
In the end, professional, targeted SEO can have a huge impact on your business and the number of customers you attract online. It’s that powerful, and it’s a critical marketing strategy for your dry cleaning business.
Partner with a digital marketing company and specialists will work skillfully crafted SEO services into your business listing, website, social media profiles, and more.
[Related: 10 Stats To Consider Before Investing Another Dollar Into Digital Marketing]
Search, Display, and Social Ads
Last, but not least, your dry cleaning marketing strategies should include online ads.
Online advertising isn’t just banners and pop-ups, although they’re part of it. A digital marketing strategist can work SEO-rich, custom-designed, targeted ads into each part of your digital presence.
Search Ads
Think of search marketing (aka search advertising) as keyword-prompted text ads for your site (or social profile, etc.) that appear on Google, Bing, and Yahoo.
As part of your dry cleaning marketing strategies, search ads give your business a fast, bright spotlight when customers search.
Display Ads
Meanwhile, display advertising is essentially what it sounds like – the online version of traditional advertising, using mages (like banners) and videos. These ads target the local users you want on the sites, apps, and social platforms they love. Keywords also prompt display ads, so they can reappear to potential customers through retargeting.
Invest in search and display ads, and boom — you’ve dramatically amplified your business’s visibility.
Social Ads
As important as it is to post on social media, you can turn your social into a powerful marketing tool with social media marketing.
Social media marketing lets you utilize the super-specific targeting available from social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram. You can precisely target the exact customers you want in your specific area.
[Related: Why You Need To Keep Marketing Your Business — Even When You’re Busy]
Work with Hibu for Flawless Dry Cleaning Marketing
Figuring out how to market your dry cleaning business is easy when you partner with Hibu. With our one-on-one service and flexible pricing, we help you to excel in an often-confusing digital marketing world. In fact, we’re experts at helping dry cleaning businesses like yours.
Talk with us about our custom digital marketing solutions — we can help you with all the things we talked about above, plus review management, reputation management, and marketing automation.
Reach out for a free consultation when you’re ready to start marketing your dry cleaning business. Just call us at 877-237-6120, or complete our Get Started form.
