Most small businesses don’t want to utilize much time and money on brand advertising simply to generate awareness. You want to get to the point with compelling ads and offers that lead directly to new customers and more revenue. The key is understanding the difference between an “offer” and a “discount.” By strategically targeting your efforts to elicit the right types of purchases and displaying value rather than slashing prices, you can minimize cost and maximize return.

We’re frequently reminding you that online advertising platforms like Facebook, Instagram and Google have opened new doors for small businesses, allowing them to target and reach the right customers effectively and efficiently. Whether traffic is grinding to a halt or you’re still plenty busy, you can undoubtedly benefit from a strategic online advertising approach that focuses on driving purchases.

If you’re primarily trying to reach new clients, paid advertising is really the only option. You simply won’t reach many new clients with unpaid social media posts. Here are some tips for creating ads and offers that will tend to elicit a direction return on investment.

New Customer Offers: There’s never a bad time to offer a free tan for first-time customers. The value of having the opportunity to keep them coming back is well worth the free tan, advertising cost, and more. If you already offer free tans for new customers and decide to promote that on social media, make a separate code for the ad so you know how many people it brought in specifically.

Target the most valuable customers: EFT members are almost always your most valuable customers. Every membership sign-up is a tremendous opportunity that shouldn’t be taken for granted. Look at the lifetime value of your members to decide how aggressive you should be with additional incentives and paid promotion.

Packaging/Bundling: You can also find ways to create “deals” without actually giving much of a discount. Create attractive product bundles that meet all the needs of certain clients and offer them at a very modest discount. The higher-dollar sale is most always worth the discount anyway, and that way you’re able to track it. Or, look at ways to bundle services or packages and present them in a new way. Create something that’s not already on your menu so it’s easy to track and you don’t even need to discount.

Use inherent value: In most all cases, your memberships and packages will already offer great value compared to single sessions. That makes those options easy to promote without discounting. For instance, if you already have an all-inclusive membership that includes all levels of tanning, sunless and more, that price point should already provide great value.

Contests/Giveaways: Giving something away for free is always one of the best ways to reach more customers with a paid promotion – even if you’re only offering one unit. A free package or product that only costs you $10-$20 is enough to increase the reach of your post by thousands of people. You will want to promote the post to get it started, but in total you can easily reach an audience of thousands at a total cost of less than $50 for the prize and promotion.

Utilize your advantages: Think about what tangible aspects separate you from your competition. What would convince someone who has tanned at another salon to come to you instead, based not on a discount but simply that you offer something better? What would be enough to excite someone who doesn’t tan much or at all to give it a try? In most cases, it probably comes back to equipment. If you’ve got the equipment to back up your claims, highlight it: “The best tanning experience in town for just $X a month.” 

Carousel Ads: If you’re looking to simplify your paid social media advertising and cover all the bases with one ad, Carousel ads on Facebook and Instagram are likely your best bet. Carousel ads are easy to create and they’re perfect for multi-faceted tanning businesses. For instance, especially if you have different pages on your website for each category to direct them to, you can do a carousel ad with individual slides for UV Tanning, Sunless Tanning, Spa Services, Skin Care Products, and anything else you offer. That way, you offer something for everyone with just one paid promotion.

 Google Ads: When people are actively searching for tanning services this time of year, you definitely want to be first when people search for “tanning” or “tanning salon.” If you already come up first in searches in your area, that’s great! If not, it’s well worth looking into how much it will cost you. Visit www.ads.google.com to find extensive resources that make it easy to get started.

In any case, you should also consider adding Google Display ads to your repertoire. Google uses search history to direct ads to people who are actively searching for the keywords and interests that matter to you. That allows you to reach customers who are definitely interested in tanning with attractive image and video ads on websites on Google’s Display Network (websites other than Google).