Business Blogging with Dorothea's in Historic Folsom - Marketing 3-4-5™ in the Real World (Video)

Welcome to Part 5 of Marketing 3-4-5™ in the Real World, our series that explores how real local businesses use Marketing 3-4-5™ to quickly become more effective marketers.

Dorothea's has been a fixture in Folsom's Historic District for decades.

In this case, Dorothea's has an established website but lacked the ability to easily create content so we set up a Content & Community Microsite for them where they can use Locable's content tools, cross-promotion, tools, etc with a link to and from their primary website.

Product Overviews and Product Unboxings enable people to window shop from anywhere

Dorothea's features a wide range of holiday-themed products as well as local-oriented products. We created two different product overview posts to highlight a Halloween witch and County Christmas eggs with the Folsom bridge using a prompt-based approach to create this content in just a few minutes.

In fact, this post you're reading is being created using our Guided Blogging feature and simply replying to prompts to generate the post itself.

Sharing backstory to highlight unique finds

While some products are mass-produced to bring the price down, others are more unique with special attributes that make them valuable to people. Sharing the story of the artist, their location, the way the product came into being or was sourced all help people appreciate what makes these unique products special.

Highlight the product and consider the background

When photographing the 4-foot tall witch, it was too large to have an unobstructed background so we positioned it so that the products in the background provided a window to the store.

The photo itself is interesting and enables window shoppers to "look around." You never know what's going to catch someone's eye and make them want to come in and shop or even ask for your help finding something special.

Collect emails in store to grow subscribers and collect customer reviews

Sitting on the counter next to the register is a simple email sign-up sheet. As people are being rung up they can sign up to get email alerts, offers, etc. 

These are people who are excited about a purchase they're making and it's a great opportunity to alert them that you're going to request a customer review - asking if they'll take 2-minutes to leave you a review will dramatically increase your review collection process.

You can use Express Email Newsletters to distribute your content, offers, events, jobs openings or volunteer opportunities, and more as well as highlight content from Local Connections™ you want to support and promote.

They add a couple of emails a day or 50-75 per month. These customers can now be reengaged to grow repeat purchases, referrals, and more.

Just 10-minutes to create an unboxing and product overview post

"It was pretty simple, it was pretty straightforward. For me, it's putting it on the calendar as a reminder [like other things]. Monday morning and Thursday morning I'm going to spend 10-minutes." Jim Metzker

Taking this approach to make marketing a priority, dedicate some time (not a lot), and create a habit is the sort of transformational impact we love to see small businesses make with Marketing 3-4-5™ and Locable's suite of simple software tools.