Miscellaneous Entries

We experienced a SSL certificate issue all of last week preventing people from registering or adding listings to both Service Villa Professionals and Service Villa Homes.

The problem is now resolved.

Your customer is always interested in a good deal. Studies have shown that individuals are more willing to buy a product or service if they are getting a discount or a better deal. "Coupons are one of the most effective ways to encourage a consumer to try a new item. They also get the consumers who already use a certain product to keep buying it" explains Diana Wheeler. Some have speculated that with the advent of the internet that the use of coupons would diminish, but the opposite is true.

Kori Rodley Irons from Associated Content says "the availability of coupons on the internet has grown dramatically" mostly due to consumers becoming increasingly net-savvy. She adds that "[coupons] can be a relatively inexpensive and productive use of marketing efforts, and generate sales. Perhaps you might start with a coupon on your own website to gauge response or try some of your established marketing venues."



Service Villa allows each company to post a number of money-saving coupons depending on which membership they have. Basic members can post one coupon, extended members can post up to three and featured members can post up to five. Best of all, the cost of posting a coupon in your listing is included in your membership - there is no extra fee of any kind.

By taking advantage of this free service, your company can explore with different incentives to see which one produces a better response and generates more revenue for your business. Not only that, but businesses that post coupons on Service Villa get more attention than those that do not.

In the browse and search results page, any business that posts a coupon will have a coupon icon displayed near their company description. This tells the user that this company can offer them a great deal. We've noticed that companies that have coupons generate more click-through (views) than those that do not offer them.


HOW TO POST YOUR OWN COUPONS
1. Login to your Service Villa control panel.
2. Under "EDIT YOUR LISTING", select "Your Listing Coupons".
3. Follow the simple directions on screen to add your coupon

Featured and extended listings are both eligible to display images in the company gallery. Think of this gallery of images as your personal product portfolio. This is your chance to stand out from the rest by showing potential customers how awesome your work is. It is a well known fact that listings with attractive imagery will generate more leads for a company. People want to see how good your work is even before placing a call. They know that business that are willing to show off their work usually DO good work.

Some advantages to adding images to you company gallery:
1. You'll be featured on the home page as a company who has an online portfolio. This will give your company further exposure.
2. Your listing will have an attractive photo icon on our search and browse pages letting companies know you have images. Again, this will increase click-thrus to your listing and increase business potential.
3. People are generally drawn to images on the web. Period.
4. Its included in your extended or featured account!

Here is how to add images to your company gallery:
1. Login to your account.
2. Select the listing you wish to upload images for.
3. Click on your company gallery and follow the on-screen explanations.

Some companies doing it right:
1. Go-Go Studio in Tallahassee, FL
2. Interior Universe in Miami, FL
3. Art Design LLC, in Miami, FL

Remember, featured listings can post up to 20 images and extended listings can post up to 5 images, so upload as many images as you can.

You'll be surprised what 5 minutes in uploading images can do for your business.

With the launch of this peppermint-fresh blog, we start a new initiative at Service Villa. We hope to inform, provoke, encourage, and support our customers, registered members and our thousands of lurking visitors with instructive and helpful entries. We want to provide you with business ideas, hints on how to improve your Service Villa listing and more importantly, we want your business venture to succeed.

When we initially launched Service Villa our goal was to become a partner with our customers, to help them through the process of growing a business and help our users find quality professionals. This is just one more effort in that philosophy.

So, cheers and welcome to the Service Villa Blog.