How to Promote a Book Store Without Going Broke

Any good business owner knows the value of effective marketing. In fact, promoting your business is probably the most important aspect of managing your company. To promote a bookstore you need to be creative and unique in order to compete with the big chains.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• Fresh flowers
• Giveaway items
• Phone directory

1. Hold a window decorating contest for local school children and promote it by handing out flyers at local schools. Each class that signs up gets a section of your front window to paint according to whatever theme you decide. Leave it up for a couple of weeks and ask local public figures to judge the contest. Reward the winners with age-appropriate books for their classroom. The window decorations will attract a lot of attention and draw lots of parents into your store.
2. Contact your local blood bank and find out when blood drives will be held in your community. Then offer a free item to anyone who shops your store on that day and presents their donor card. Be sure to have them fill out their name and address on a list to prevent the card from being used again and add them to your mailing list. Promote the event with posters at hospitals, physician's offices and high traffic retail locations. Send a press release to the media as well.
3. Place a spelling error in the copy of your weekly newspaper ad and insert a heading inviting people to find the error. Say something like, "We'll pay you $5 if you can spot the spelling error in this ad." Bury the error deep in the ad to ensure people read the whole message and make it clear the money is good toward a purchase at your store.
4. Surprise customers by giving something away for free when you don't have to. It could be a unique bookmark or a copy of a book in the same genre as their purchase. It will delight your customers, and they will tell all their friends and coworkers about it, which is great advertising.
5. Create a beautiful and attractive book display in your store with flowers. Find a local florist and offer to display a sign for their business in exchange for a discount on the flowers. Flowers will give a fresh look to your store and create an inviting ambiance that will keep customers coming back.
   
   

Tips & Warnings

• Coupons and flyers should always have a unique code on them so that when redeemed, you can identify what the distribution source was.