Know-How Exchange : Taglines/Names

Hi Greg,
I don't believe that there is anything wrong with the name Valley Saver (I assume that is the name of the area you are in). It sounds to me like possibly one of three things.

1. Frequency issue where people are hearing your ads but not enough to make them remember your name. You could also be advertising too little on too many stations.

2. Creative on the ads isn't defining the scope of what your site can help them sell

3. Positioning against printed mediums.

Valley Saver isn't a difficult term to remember in my opinion. At this point, I would consolidate my media to a couple of stations and get my frequency up.

Hope this helps.

Alyson

Alyson, thanks for your input.

1. I have been advertising primarily on one station. It is #2 in the market, adult contemporary. The #2 is a little deceiving. One of the oldest stations in the state, they have 50K watts sitting on a mountain, so they actually overshoot our local market, reaching four states. I am fortunate to have one station that covers the entire region from PA, MD, WV, to the southern regions of VA - all of my market. Add to that smaller campaigns at local stations in the larger towns.

At the smaller stations I am definitely guilty of poor frequency. I have since focused on the two largest markets north and south and invested in more time at each station. My other error was I started out too strong, using a big cut of my advertising budget which is haunting me now. I have been forced to invest more in non-prime hours to keep up on frequency, though some time slots have been a positive surprise. In fact, I'm getting ready to do a Midnight-5am campaign targeting the thousands of night workers here who would greatly benefit from using email response rather than phone calls during the day. The time is dirt cheap so I can run it forever, and my traffic reports show considerable increase after a spot has run in those hours.

2. I'm probably guilty of cramming too much into a commercial, though I did a short run of :30 spots to help on the frequency issue. That is just too short to say what needs to be said. Fine to maintain brand identity, but worthless to build it. On my :60 spots I have tried to break the message down to two different commercials. One focusing on what we are, what we do, what we can help you sell, etc. The second is aimed at #3, position against the print media - local newspapers and the weekly classified papers. I focus on the following points.

Time to publish - instant vs. up to a week
Cost - free vs. paid (even the free papers charge $10 or more for a photo)
Control - ability to edit anytime vs. being stuck with missing info, typos, etc.
Always open - their hours vs. business hours, or worse, an answering machine
Peace - delete ad upon sale vs. taking the phone off the hook until the printed issue is dead.

Ron, your answer suggests to me that there is in fact a problem with the name.

The name may be easy to remember, but if a tag line is needed to reinforce it, then I see a problem connecting name to purpose. A truly powerful domain name needs no reinforcement. It takes a big budget to connect a more abstract name with purpose (I realized this after my original post, so my third idea was rather foolish).

MotorcycleTrader.com, for example, can stand on its own. I can put that domain alone on a billboard and there is little question of what that site does. Now, stepping back and taking a look at my domain (pretending I don't know anything about it), I ask myself, is this a religious website, a coupon site? Perhaps it is about saving the valley from rapid development or some other cause. It isn't clear at a glance.

If a change of name is in fact the answer, which of the above is better? My primary competitor in print is a "trader" so that word has easy association to purpose here, yet using a word that brings the competitor to mind doesn't excite me either.

Don't forget that you are also competing with heavy hitters. Ebay is a heavy hitter and is more likely the real issue, not your brand name or marketing.

While your online service covers a limited geographical area, how do you compete with the world?

Its all about the channels these days. Conventional print covers your local geographical area, and your online service does the same, but to lesser effect. Why? Because print was there first, and people prefer it over online listings.

You may have to accept that the Internet covers the world, as well as your corner of it. In that respect, you are overshadowed by the goliath eBay. Ebay has SERIOUS traffic, and huge global dominance in the online listing category. Certain niche markets have evolved, such as motorcycle, auto insurance, etc.

No doubt, you are caught in the middle. Which way to go? Well, its all up to you.

Darcy Moen
Customer Loyalty Network

I don't even blink at Ebay. While Ebay has huge traffic, they are still a small part of the total classifieds market (employment is the only segment to exceed print, and it takes a dozen national and regional sites to do it). And they are so full of garbage from everyone wanting to get rich that most people I know don't even go there anymore. Ebay is also not very user friendly for the average user, which is why drop shops are popping up all over.

My site is quick, simple and free. Because it's local, payment issues and shipping problems are virtually gone. I've had a few advertisers tell me they sold within 1 hour of listing.

If people here really want to auction, we have dozens of auction houses throughout the valley where you can bring your items (or many will send a truck) and walk out with cash the same day.

The commercial advertiser is probably the largest user base of Ebay (in numbers of ads), not the individual advertiser.

Goliaths in general don't bother me. They all have their weak spot for me to kick. I helped bring a printing franchisee into the top 5 worldwide with everyone throwing Kinko's in my face. I didn't blink then either. I have helped dozens of small businesses reposition and recover from the invasion of Wal-Mart.

If I had to look over my shoulder for a heavy hitter, I would be looking at craigslist (they are first to tell you to deal locally to avoid scams). They do not have a site in my region, but are getting close. Yet, they have their weaknesses as well and I will aim directly at them.

Your input is truly appreciated Darcy, but to me Ebay is a very small issue, if one at all.

I think the one who really touched the problem, though indirectly, was Ron. I just need to figure out what the new name will be.

Here is my research from the Iowa Illionis market...
Many, many people have never used a locally based classified. They have heard of Ebay but are fearful...
it is breaking the ice, getting them on to the site (for more than a look around) that makes a difference.

I suggest setting up a number of activities for getting new users onto your site. Here are some ideas..
Charity Sales, free listings, free items that can be purchased via local store coupons, etc. Break the ice, and they will be back...

How has Craig's List become so successful? Seems like that might be a good model to investigate, and there have been many articles published about it. Their name isn't particularly descriptive, although it's local in many different cities, so that helps.

"Free" is a really important fact about what you offer, and the possibility of "selling in one hour" sounds very appealing. FreeTrader? FlashSell?

Why not survey past users and ask just a few quick questions, like how they heard (you may know that already), what was most important to them in making the choice to try, what their experience was, what is their level of web usage, and ask them to vote on some proposed names (including the current name); also give them an open-ended comment box.

In asking about their level of web usage, I'm wondering if it's hard to get radio listeners to go to the web? They're in the car, at work, etc. Maybe you could create an email referral process with past users passing something useful or interesting on to their acquaintances that includes your brief description (Local classifieds - quick, simple, and free.) and a link to your site.

Maybe your users would sign up to get a newsletter periodically or any time certain kinds of new items are listed. This is just an example of possible more web-centric ways of broadening your base. I'd want to put effort (and advertising $) into contacting people who we know are comfortable using the web, AND into contacting them when they can immediately check it out. Good luck.

Marge

Craigslist started as a small, community based site in San Francisco, and grew from there with word-of-mouth. There source of income is employment classifieds. They have more than classifieds. Forums, personals, etc.

The survey idea is a good one.

(Approx. 25% owned by Ebay)

1. Yes, I am getting traffic. Converting? Well, I'm not so sure how you would put that into numbers, because there is no way of telling how many of those visitors are there to sell, and how many are there to shop.

2. I'm doing this for some test marketing on the other names. I want people to know they are in the right place and not deceived in some fashion. Dual logos, names, etc. are not uncommon. Magazines do it, newspapers do it, other websites do it. For all they know, it's a merger.

3. The first part of the title is "what", not "who". This also helps SEO. If people are searching, they don't know "who" they are looking for, only "what" they are looking for. If they know who I am, they will be going directly to the domain. I have, however, shortened the title.

4. The free ad model is the basis of the site, as it is the basis of my major competitor in print. Build the traffic, support it with commercial ads. The call to action is definitely needed. I had already decided to rotate some into the commercial placeholders on the page. Thank you for reinforcing that decision.

5. The search will be on every page, but is currently undergoing some refinement, including auto notification.

6. I'm writing the "about" info now.

7. I have recently solicited user comments for use on the site. Those will also be rotated into the commercial holder space and added to another page.

All good points. Thanks.