Using MySpace to Market Locally

The Galveston Daily News (reg required) had an interesting article recently about Island Bicycle Co. was using MySpace to market to its customers locally. Kudos to Kevin at Buzznetworker for finding this story.

I often hear people complain that MySpace traffic is bad traffic as it doesn’t convert, and you cannot use it to effectively market to locally. Well the Island Bicycle Co. debunks both of those myths.

MySpace offers a lot of potential for small businesses according to Carlon Haas, Austin-based Internet marketing expert and president of Brave New Marketing:

"Marketing through MySpace is becoming one of the best ways to guerrilla market these days…“Using the search tool on MySpace, you can get demographic information by ZIP code. It has all the targeting of an expensive direct mail campaign at zero the cost.”

Jeff Neilson, who is the owner of Island Bicycle Co. first thought of using MySpace just as a guerrilla marketing tool. But after a MySpace search and found that 22,000 people that used MySpace lived within 10 miles of his store, Jeff realized that he had a great marketing opportunity.

The Island Bicycle Co. MySpace strategy is simple according to Jeff:

“Every day I send out 20 friend requests. With the kids’ market, because of our logo, they tend to grab it quick. They like it, they want a bike and (the logo) looks good on their front page Once a week I’ll send out a blurb announcing a bike special or telling people that new bikes have come in. That goes out to all my friends.”

The success of the marketing campaign can be seen in the bottom line. Last week Island Bicycle Co. sold three bikes to people who said they found the shop through MySpace. For a small business, that is a lot of sales.

As Harish Rao, CEO of online community building firm EchoDitto puts it:

“As business owners, we look for any way in which we can connect with our prospects and our clients. The beauty about MySpace is that it allows businesses to be able to do that kind of thing. People feel like they have a personal relationship with you or your company.