Need advice and opinions on new business idea

**FullPotentialAdv** · 01-01-2008 07:27 PM

I have just started a local advertising magazine for small businesses around my hometown, which is actually a big city. My target is small business owners who do not have much money in their budget to advertise. I am going to put their advertisement in my magazine for a small fee. The magazine will be free to those who see it in magazine stands at drug stores or wal-marts. My attractions to the magazine are coupons the businesses will offer and speacials.

Please check out my website. It is not final, it is just set up to describe my objectives.

Thank you

**BusinessAdviser** · 01-01-2008 08:01 PM

I company here in town is doing the same thing, and doing so successfully. However, they are more active in their approach for getting their product to readers, which I think is a very large part of their success. They hire individuals to hand out the magazines all over the university campus once a week. Just a thought.

**FullPotentialAdv** · 01-01-2008 08:10 PM

thank you for the advice I will try that.

**BusinessAdviser** · 01-01-2008 08:22 PM

I made a comment on the other post that you made. Check it out. It's a bit more useful. Good luck.

**Gr-Andy** · 01-06-2008 01:09 PM

Originally Posted by FullPotentialAdv

thank you for the advice I will try that.

Yes definently hand it out. Also make a professional powerpoint and have alaptop and go arround to bussniesses and make appointments to speak with the manager. Do a nice presentation and you will do fine.

**jjg21588** · 01-06-2008 03:26 PM

Check out this site thesurvivalkit.com

They are doing exactly what you are saying, but they are targeting colleges and they have both their website and the little books they hand out full of coupons. They have also integrated their coupons as an application on facebook. They are doing very well, and many of the businesses hear in my city purchase ad space.

One thing I would really pay attention too is thesurvivalkit.com's website. They do a very good job of targeting college students and pulling them into there interactive website. Although they could be doing much better if they kept it much more up to date.

Good luck with your business.

**jjg21588** · 01-06-2008 03:31 PM

p.s. they mail a copy of their survival kit to every college student. I can't even count how many times each day I see students carrying these "survival kits" with them. They send a new copy out at the beginning of each term (3 times a year) here at Oregon State University. They also tailer their layout scheme, mainly color, too match each individual college's school colors. They also have that schools mascot all over inside their "survival kits."

**jeremy** · 01-07-2008 08:59 AM

Hi,

Perhaps you might want to have a PDF version of your mag for download? It's easy to make one available from your site and might get more exposure for your mag. Also, you might want to try out a flash version for your magazine like what the people at onezine.com/index.asp are doing. I know some of the mags there are getting like 1000s of downloads a month.

Good luck!

**BusinessAdviser** · 01-07-2008 10:14 AM

Interesting idea. The more value you can provide your customers, such as online access to the ads, the better. Remember that your customers include both the readers and the advertisers.

**girl8907** · 01-07-2008 12:11 PM

Originally Posted by jmenq2

I company here in town is doing the same thing, and doing so successfully. However, they are more active in their approach for getting their product to readers, which I think is a very large part of their success. They hire individuals to hand out the magazines all over the university campus once a week. Just a thought.

i see that the both of you have great ideas, i am a little curious about how this business can be lucrative, if the magazines are free and the small business owners are charge a minimal fee?

**BusinessAdviser** · 01-07-2008 01:39 PM

Originally Posted by girl8907

i see that the both of you have great ideas, i am a little curious about how this business can be lucrative, if the magazines are free and the small business owners are charge a minimal fee?

Think of it as a successfully monetized blog. Does the blogger make money by charging those who view his blog a fee? Or rather does the blogger make money by charging advertisers for their ads on his blog because his blog reachers a large number of viewers?

That is the theory here. If you can produce a product that will reach a large audience, you can provide the product to the audience free of charge (which will maximize the size of the audience) and charge advertisers to reach this audience.