Marketing In A Small Town

From my career blog: moteluniversity.blogspot.com

The lights are on, the product is ready, the door is unlocked, and the Open sign is blaring. A brand-new business is open in a small town. Marketing principles are universal, but the social setting in a small town is different when compared to the bigger cities. In a little community a business must make itself known in a specific way, make deals and build relationships with other businesses in town, know where to drum up business, and refine the experience of the customer to appeal to their natural tendencies.

Small town business owners watch each other. When they enter other businesses they have an eye out, always for the owner or proprietor of the business. Often, on a universal impulse, they will pull the owner aside and talk to him or her about business. One route to fast friends is being able to relate, one to the other. By taking the time to talk to fellow business owners a strong preference develops between them. Business gets referred one to the other, and is reciprocated.

It is essential that a business owner develop a familiarity with other businesses owners in the area. That kind of marketing is free, and results in a perpetuity of business. 

Another way to get known in the community is to work outside. Make it a daily habit. Business owners do drive by, whether on purpose, or coincidentally. If you are outside, taking care of your place, they will see you. That garners respect, and lets the business owners and the community know how much work and care you put into the business. If your landscaping, however insignificant, is well kept, it will get noticed. If you are seen outside putting work into it, an assumption can be made that the business is in good hands.

An example of this occurred when the owner of an auto repair shop with whom I had recently done business walked two of his customers over to my motel. As we talked, and after I had checked in the customers the auto shop owner said, "I've seen you out here, working every day. I know you take good care of the place." That thought expressed by him held in it every accomplishment a business owner wants to achieve by taking care of the grounds. 

It is almost guaranteed that the auto shop owner networks with the other business owners in Thames, and I and my motel will be mentioned among them. 

Keep your word to other businesses, and honor your obligations to them. The auto shop owner waited patiently while I collected the funds to pay my deductible. He was pleased about the timely payment, and by honoring my obligation to him and his business, my motel stood out. If I managed life the way I manage the motel, then he knows that the TJ is a safe place to send his customers.

If the business is facing competition, like a restaurant or motel, it is essential to reach out to the new businesses. A deal can be struck between businesses. "If you send me business, I will reciprocate." In that respect it becomes necessary to have the customer inform the other business who they were referred by. "Tell them (insert business name) sent you." Some will, some will not. The point is to be consistent about it. When you frequent the business to whom you have referred customers, check with the owner to make sure they know that you are sending them business.

There are businesses that a new establishment should immediately build relationships with. In the case of a restaurant it would behoove them to make friends with the local hotels and motels. A consistent referral to your business will increase your sales, and thereby your revenue all year round. The restaurant just a block down from the TJ gets the bulk of the motel's business because they have an excellent menu, they are good to the motel - referring business to the TJ - they keep ideal hours, and they pride themselves on being a local staple.

Motels and hotels, particularly during the busy season, can increase your business significantly. Because they are open 24/7 they also get customers checking in that arrive after normal business hours. The same restaurant a block down stays open until 11 PM, getting the bulk of my business after 8:30 PM. Does it benefit them? Has the restaurant prevailed in good times and bad? Yes. Give that careful consideration, particularly if your location has tourist traps. 

Another benefit to serving motel and hotel guests on a regular basis is that a small, but significant percentage of them will write reviews. These days it is a popular trend to go experience a place, and then tell the online community what they thought of it, from the attraction to the food they ate.

Finally, empathize with your customer. Last night I ended a long day when I had the opportunity to go and purchase something I normally have to pass on. But when I thought about handing over management, getting in the car, driving to the destination, going inside the store, finding the item, waiting in line to pay for it, then driving back to the business, my exhaustion got the better of me. I decided not to. 

We are all subject to our cravings. We are creatures of impulse. There are billion dollar companies built off of these impulses. In a small town, so is yours. The goal is to make the experience of your business quick and easy, particularly if you are dealing with a product, or products. Make it easy to enter, easy to get what you need, and easy to get out. The more that idea is mastered, the more business you will attract. The laziness principle, as I call it, can only be overcome by simplicity. Refer to your respective design, and/or streamlining tips for your industry for more help.

In conclusion, the community is already talking about you. By building relationships with the local businesses, and by sending them customers your venture can only succeed. You can also make sure that the people are saying the right things, and giving the right impression, by acting the part. You are being watched. Make sure that you exercise some controls over what is being seen by working outside your doors. You can work on your grounds, building, or home. You can work the community, by being a business owner whenever you are among the citizens. 

Understand where you can drum up more business. By establishing a relationship with the hospitality industry you can receive referral business, and get some invaluable online reviews in the process. If you are in the hospitality business, get out and get known as the representative of your business. Finally, make sure it is easy, and convenient for a customer to visit, get what they need, and get out with minimum hassle. The majority of marketing in a small town is done person to person. Tap into it, and you will have a fighting chance of staying in business in a micro-, and isolated economy.

When One Is Lost

For Tex.

            The unexpected.

            It takes you off course, and puts a question mark on the end of everything. That’s normal. Within a moment the Universe changes. Nothing goes back to how it was. And how it was, at that moment, feels like the better times. Perspective will consistently get you. Fortunately it is something you can control. Take a look at your unexpected. Decide what you are meant to get out of it, and then do not be surprised when it all implodes. We are human. We feel.

            Why would God implant in us the rational mind, but distort it with emotions? Why should the two conflict?

            That is the dynamic that makes the human being the essence of divinity. We are love, we are compassion, we are empathy, we are sympathy, we are the shapers and creators of our own destinies, the manifestation of our own acts. Such is our power.

            And yet.

            The unthinkable.

            It takes all your precious plans and dashes them against the stones. Suddenly, all your constructs, your systems, your differences, and your pride fall in noise-laden showers. Provided you have a heart, it is normal. There is once again a Universal shift whose change is permanent. We are naked and stripped of flesh and sinew, hands up in exasperation, and defense. Absolutely susceptible to the overarching question – why?

            Why these weapons which strike mercilessly at our core? Why destroy our carefully polished veneer?

            The core of the person is often sicklied over with our tiny interpretations of what we should, or should not be. When the unexpected, the unthinkable arises, whatever gloss we have constructed cracks, and falls. The pieces are best left alone. We can no more restore the coating piece by piece than we can put a broken egg back together. 

            And yet.

            The unimaginable.

            We, through our fear, refuse to embrace the unknown with which we are suddenly presented. Common sense demoted to philosophical rhetoric. The greatest gift the unexpectedly departed give us - the defusing of our petty conflicts, and differences, we tend to toss aside. Yet through the miracle we are, our dual nature of emotion and rationality, the realignment of the Universe, and the shifting of perspective; what was unimaginable a precious moment ago manifests within us the enigma of change.

            Deep within, next to that question – what am I meant to get out of it? – is the question, is it worth the cost? I retort – did you have any power in the payment? No. So the unexpected, and so the pain.

            And yet.

            The miracle.

            Inevitably it is gratitude. Inevitably in the precious reserve of memory there is only good. Inevitably we heal. Inevitably, if you so choose, you win. The unexpected, the unthinkable, the unimaginable all move worlds that were once thought to have permanence. It even moves the worlds within.

            Will you honor the departed by welcoming the blessing they so wish for you?

            Will you?

            First mourn.

            Then embrace.

            Then mend.

            It is in the taking apart and reassembly that we, as human beings, are strengthened. We blossom from wreckage. We profit from chaos. We achieve resolve from endurance.

            Are we not magnificent?

            The very essence, and seed of the divine?

            We are.

Bathwater

Published in BYU-Idaho's Outlet, Journal of Art and Literature 2011:

Freddy splashes in his bathwater. His tiny hands slap the surface, sending droplets everywhere. A healthy puddle threatens to reach into the adjacent room. He stops and smiles at me. At seven months he’s a big kid – 20 pounds and 30 inches long. He looks at me with round, blue eyes and an adorable smile. It is open-mouthed and all gums. I smile back at him just as his attention diverts to the suds and the dozen toys floating around him.

He picks up a rubber duck with his chubby little digits and sucks on the bill.

            I experience a moment of envy.

            I am sorry to say that it is not the first time.

            I wish I was tiny again. I remember my baths, or maybe the comfortable feelings they evoked. When I was an infant I know I was loved and protected. I know I was never bored; I too, sat in a lake of toys.

            As I grew, my baths evolved. The change involved two things – new tubs, of course, and new toys. The edges became sharper, the masculinity started to take shape, and interests began to be realized. In essence I was playing with action figures and boats in lieu of rubber ducks and teething links.

            I don’t know when it happened. Between being a kid and maturing into a teen the toys were put away and never pulled out again. I still remember their last resting place beneath the sink - I wonder what Mom did with them.

            Despite the years I never lost my love for baths. They are my time to relax and read.

            In an instant my right pant leg is soaked. Freddy has just broken his own record. It’s the biggest splash yet. All I can do is laugh.

            We laugh at each other.

            I am laughing at the fact that until four months ago my baths had been toy-free for well over a decade. Now, I can’t help but step on a rubber duck, or a plastic donut when I get in the tub.

            I rub my son’s head. He loves that. He has a skull like granite; hard and, if he follows the Haxby trend, impenetrable. I take a small, blue cup from the edge of the tub and dip it in the water. I pour water over him to keep him warm. He turns his head and reaches for the cup, latching onto the edge with the surprising strength of an infant.

            He wants it. I can’t let him have it. He likes to dip the cup in the bathwater and drink from it. I am able to pry his tiny fingers from the edge. He cries, his mouth open and screaming, his eyes scrunched shut.

            I grab his favorite duck, one that looks as though it has hatched from a pumpkin, and squeeze it. Its squeaking distracts him from his tears and he takes it.

            The days when his rubber ducks lose their appeal and a truck, or boat, or an ATV replaces them I will write it down. He will know when he changed, when he grew. I see him driving a truck over the edges of the tub and around the faucet, making the noise of a rumbling engine in his throat, knocking shampoo bottles and soap into the water.

            He squeals suddenly and goes back to the business of exporting water from the tub to the floor. The duck is floating at the other end of the tub. I hand him a link and put a towel down to stem the flood.

            He’s having such a good time I can expect to sit here another twenty minutes. I don’t mind. He’ll play, he’ll talk, he’ll sing and splash and abruptly - he’ll be done. He’ll rub those beautiful baby eyes with his fists and complain to me. He can speak some words quite clearly, and in context. I’ll listen, and hear that it’s time for a bottle and a nap.

            When he is ready, I pass him on to his Mother, wrapped in a towel and happy.

Often he’ll be asleep before I finish cleaning up, so I never say anything like, “I’ll see you in a minute!” I just tell him I love him.

            I wish for him to take advantage of these early years. I wish for him to be this happy all his life. When that little tongue of his finally gets itself efficiently around the English language it will be time to start chipping away at childhood and teach him responsibility. The time for accountability will soon follow.

            Then he will be grown.

            He latches onto my leg. He wants to stand up.

            He struggles and grunts as he rises. Standing there he looks at me.

            “Dada,” he says.

            I smile. It falters.        

            Time to get out.

            Time to grow up.

            The bathwater settles and cools, as if removing life from it takes its warmth. In my arms I can feel that the boy carries it with him.

            That gives me hope.

Turning 30

Submitted for publication with the BYU-Idaho Press 2010:

The night before it happened swore I wouldn’t be 30 years-old until 3:53 PM, the minute I came out screaming. I wrote a journal entry. It said, “I am saying goodbye to my 20’s. I don’t know what happened to them. All I can remember is a lot of painful growing up followed by the hard realization that I am a late bloomer.

            “I will be 30 when I finally graduate with a bachelor’s. Oh well, at least I was married and had my first child before the decade turned . . . barely.”

            I woke up that cool October morning and went to a baptism. My wife’s youngest brother was baptized by his Dad. It was a bittersweet goodbye to the baby of the family, and a fresh hello to the newest kid.

            I had been scheduled to work.

            That’s how much I cared for this day.

            My wife, ten years my junior, is still alive with vibrance and energy. She had a wide smile and was bouncing, tugging at my sleeve, telling me to call in sick. When she exuded that energy it was like she held control of my free will. I obeyed on condition that my father-in-law, a practicing physician, write me a sick note.

            He complied and we left Rexburg, Idaho forthwith.

            She rarely drove.

            This time she was insistent. She is also a master distractor. I was thinking less about the last hours of my 20’s and more about where she was taking me. The further south we drove the more I ran numbers through my head; gas expense, mileage, the budget to be expended upon arrival, the hours used, and the energy required to act surprised and happy. I was hesitant to spoil myself these days. I had been paying for the same stupid splurges for two years.

            When we crossed the Utah state line, all I could do was speculate on the destination. Halfway there I started to feel a little spunky. I took a cell phone picture of myself and sent it to my friends and family with the caption, “30, and still so fine.” I received replies from everyone.

When we arrived in the metropolitan area of Salt Lake City we had been driving for three hours. She continued on.

            We went over the point of the mountain and suddenly we were not moving anymore. Traffic was stacked all the way down the hill. October was hotter down here and I worried about the car overheating. We were averaging four miles an hour for thirty minutes but the temperature held.

            When we finally cleared the wreck we could see that some idiot hadn’t learned how to set his trailer on the hitch. We dodged pieces of Jayco as we came off the point into happy valley. As I looked around I felt like I hadn’t been absent from this place long enough. Although it had grown and changed, everything looked the same.

            This was one of those places where I had had some hard growing-up experiences. Nevertheless, I felt like a visitor.

My wife called her mother and told me to plug my ears and hum to myself. Once again, I complied. This was one big surprise already and I wasn’t about to ruin the crescendo.

            She smiled, nodded, and took the next exit. We went over the pass with my wife muttering, “Where is it. She said it was on the – RIGHT!”

            She pulled into a parking lot between a Conoco and a restaurant. All I could see was a huge Cal Ranch store in the back and I thought there must be a killer sale here or something. Then she took another hard right into the parking lot in front of the restaurant.

            She put it in park and smiled at me.

            I looked at the windows that were painted with an unfamiliar something and then I looked up. It was called The Sushi House.

            “It’s all you can eat,” she said. She was a tense ball of expectation. She wore a precarious smile that would either bloom or break depending on what I had to say. I found that I didn’t have to expend the energy to act surprised or happy.

            In this moment I had peace. I knew I was married to a genuine person who loved me in spite of all the flaws, mistakes, scars, and reality that was me. My smile was huge. Then my dry humor came out.

            “’Better be good sushi for a three and a half-hour drive.”

            She laughed because she knows me.

            We went inside and were sat in a largely empty dining room. The waitress handed us a slip of paper. Printed on it were 30 or more different sushi roll styles. We could have as many rolls as we wanted for $18.99 per person.

            We ordered 14.

            I knew, as soon as I tasted the first roll that my sushi experience was forever ruined. This was so delicious and authentic that I knew that I could not go to my local sushi bar with the same excitement again. We ate until we were fit for a good, long nap, paid our bill, and waddled out to the car.

            “It’s a good surprise?” she kept asking.        

            “Wonderful surprise, honey. Thank you.” I kept replying.

            She took us back onto the Interstate and headed north. My next birthday present was waiting on 3300 South in Salt Lake. On the trip there we talked about the day so far and I had another surprise.

            I hadn’t thought about turning 30 for hours. 3:53 PM passed without my acknowledgement. I was happy not to focus on it.

            After a harrowing exit and about 36 traffic lights we turned left into a tiny strip mall. There sitting where it had for years and years was Dr. Volt’s Comic Book Shop. I was on the verge of tears. Inside this small shop was rich plethora of comics from all over fandom. Weeks could be spent here and you’d never read them all.

            We arrived 30 minutes before close and I enjoyed every second. This was such a birthday! The sushi was settling well, the comics were top rate, written in conjunction with a story by the insanely talented Geoff Johns, and we still had hours till we were home.

            The greatest element of my marital relationship is our ability to be the best of friends and talk, which we did for as long as she could keep those big, beautiful eyes open.

            This was an elemental day, a day in which the eternal love of my wife was shown to me. I am grateful to have had such a strong start to a new decade and, like Tim Mcgraw vowed, “My next thirty years will be the best years of my life, raise a little family and hang out with my wife, spend precious moments with the ones that I hold dear, make up for lost time here, in my next thirty years.”

            Thank you my darling Rachel.