Look Around: Home / Blogs & EGuides / Digital Branding

Businesses worldwide are scrambling to figure out the best way to market their services on social media. While Facebook and Instagram have shown promising results for many types of businesses, the work behind a knockout social media presence could end up costing you more time than you'd like to spend.

Though many of these platforms are great for connecting with potential customers, you might not connect with people in your service area. On top of that, many social media users aren't necessarily encouraged to recommend services like plumbing to their family and friends. 

This is where Nextdoor comes in. Nextdoor is a neighbourhood-driven app focused on bringing communities and local businesses together.

But how can you utilize Nextdoor to find more leads? And what are the advantages this app has over more common platforms? Let's dive into the world of Nextdoor and find out if this is the business-focused app you've been waiting for.

Finding Your Social Media Flow

Before we look at Nextdoor and the many advantages it can provide your business, we should first establish some simple ground rules for having a fabulous social media presence. You can use these tips for any social platform you use, even Nextdoor.

Many businesses struggle with handling their social media accounts initially. But over time (and possibly with the help of our social media geniuses over at ADHOME), you'll find your audience and generate meaningful leads.

Create a Brand

Branding is something you hear all the time, but what does it actually mean? In simplest terms, branding is the identity or personality of your business. For plumbers, there are several different directions you can take this:

• Family-focused (i.e. IKEA, McCain Foods)
• Professional (i.e. Tesla, Microsoft, Blackberry)
• Blue-collar (i.e. Home Depot, Canadian Tire)

Knowing your brand is a fantastic first step towards developing your social media strategy, especially the type of content you want to create.

Provide Useful Content

The key to great content is information. Facebook, Instagram, and Nextdoor provide various tools to produce helpful content for your audience; the trick is knowing which content is suitable for which tool.

For example, general posts are a great way to promote special deals, while live streaming may be an even better way to show off your knowledge or answer frequently asked questions. This process may seem like trial-and-error in the beginning, but with time and practice, you'll be creating world-class content your competitors will envy.

Show Off Your Work

Now, what's marketing without showing off what you're made of?

No matter what platform you're on, it's always important to show off the quality work you do. Pictures, customer reviews, and videos can all illustrate your commitment to your customers while also giving you the chance to show off your expertise.

 

What Is Nextdoor?

Now that we've taken a look at some quick strategies you can use to rock social media, it's time to meet the new kid on the social media block: Nextdoor.

Nextdoor is one of the first apps to focus on bringing neighbours together. Instead of searching for people you know and adding them as a friend, Nextdoor automatically connects you with other members right in your community. Nextdoor members can post about things going on in the community, like events happening in your local park or information on stolen property, and, most importantly, they can even share business recommendations.

This locally-focused way of connecting is not only excellent for getting to know the area you live in, but it's also essential for helping businesses leave a lasting impression with real customers. Instead of relying on Google reviews (which are helpful in their own right), Nextdoor makes it incredibly easy for people to recommend your business to others in their community.

For example, if someone posts on Nextdoor that they're having trouble with a constantly running toilet or leaky pipes, people in their area can advise on how to solve the issue and, most importantly, recommend your services based on prior experience. Commenters don't have to be friends or followers—they only have to live in the same community as the original poster.

Signing Your Business Up for Nextdoor

Create a Personal Account

Becoming a Nextdoor member is similar to signing up for other social media programs, albeit with a few different steps. You'll need to create a personal account before you can sign your business up.

• Add your email address, postal code/ZIP, and address
• Fill out some basic personal information
• Verify your account with a phone number or email address

At this point, you can personalize your profile to reflect you best and even take a look at how Nextdoor works before jumping into creating your business account.

Starting Your Business Page

Now that you've joined your Nextdoor neighbourhood, you can start building your business account. 

• Go to www.nextdoor.com/create-business
• Log in to your account
• Pick an email address for your business account to use
• Search for your business through your business name and address
• Choose your business category from a drop-down list
• Personalize your business page

Personalizing your business page is your opportunity to practice some of those branding skills we talked about earlier:

• Add a high-quality profile picture
• Write a short description of your business
• Add more categories to help people search for you
• Upload pictures of your business like your location, trucks, and employees on the job

Marketing on Nextdoor

Congratulations! You've made your business account on Nextdoor.

Now is the time to get yourself familiar with all of Nextdoor's features. However, before you can start offering deals, you should spend some time interacting with people in your service area by answering questions and providing useful advice.

It's important to interact with Nextdoor members to help you set yourself as an authority in the community. When you're a local expert, it's more likely that people will choose you when they need help with their plumbing.

There are other ways to help market yourself on Nextdoor, including some tools that only Nextdoor provides:

Encourage Recommendations

Asking for reviews and recommendations is already something you should be doing, regardless if you have a Nextdoor account. It's pretty simple to ask for reviews: ask your customers to leave you feedback whenever you complete a service.

However, reviews and recommendations on Nextdoor might be more meaningful to other people in the community. Because Nextdoor verifies all the users on their platform, your reviews will be more genuine and representative of your customer's experience. You can even encourage more recommendations by politely responding to the reviews your customers leave!

Create "Local Deals"

90% of consumers make most of their purchasing decisions based on what is within a 15-minute drive from their home or work. This means that it's more important than ever to localize your advertisements.

"Local Deals" is Nextdoor's marketing plan for targeting specific communities with dedicated deals and offers. Creating a "Local Deal" takes minutes and shows up right in the newsfeed for Nextdoor members in the community you wish to advertise.

This can have a tremendous impact on your lead generation. For example, suppose winter is around the corner and a neighbourhood you know has an issue with bursting pipes. You can directly advertise to that community and give them the help they need before they experience even more costly damage.

Becoming a Neighborhood Sponsor

The "Neighbourhood Sponsor" program is an automated advertising system that boosts your posts, "Local Deals", messages, and other content to specific neighbourhoods. Unlike "Local Deals," these are just sponsored posts that will help ensure you stay top-of-mind for your community rather than offering a specific deal to the community.

Being a "Neighbourhood Sponsor" helps you connect with more people, answer questions, and provide you with more opportunities to set yourself up as an expert in your community.

Want To Focus on What You Love? Call ADHOME Today

We get it; marketing isn't for everyone. And we completely understand if you want to ensure you're putting your time and energy into helping people rather than creating ad campaigns.

Our geniuses at ADHOME Marketing will be happy to create a world-class marketing strategy using tools like Nextdoor to bring your services to more people than ever before. Start today by contacting us for a free consultation!