Decorative Concrete News & Tips Brought To You by Engrave-A-Crete

Twitter can be a powerful tool as a business’ marketing platform, but to really get the most out of Twitter you can’t just rely on randomly Tweeting throughout the day about what you had for breakfast, and how your cat just rolled over.

You Need a Tweet Plan

A better way is to plan out what you want to tweet on a regular basis day to day, and then schedule those tweets using a scheduling service.

These scheduled tweets would be in addition to your normal random tweeting throughout the day, and would serve to specifically brand your business, or drive traffic to your web site, or Facebook page, or YouTube channel, whatever you wish.

Having a plan like this brands you, brings your Twitter presence consistency and saves you valuable time.

You first need to decide who your audience is, and for the most part that would include your existing or potential decorative concrete customers, but it could also include referral sources, those businesses you partner with, a business network you belong to, or even your suppliers.

Then you need to sit down and write out your tweets for the day (or the week, or the month, or however long you want the plan to be).

Follow a plan like:

1. Tweet where you’re working today – invite people to come and see you.
2. Invite people to become your fan on Facebook.
3. Invite people to join your YouTube channel.
4. Tweet about how much stain you’re using on a particular job.
5. Tweet about the YouTube video that demonstrates your work – provide a link.
6. Tweet about the blog entry that’s about your latest completed job.
7. Tweet your phone number and offer a free consult and quote to those that say they saw your tweet.

Schedule these to run about every two hours or so, and then just let it run.  You can do this using free services like SocialOomph, or Hootsuite.

All it takes is ten minutes at the beginning of your day, or the night before, and you have a full days worth of tweets set up, branding your company and driving traffic to your website.

This article was based on an idea posted at Social Media Examiner by Cindy King

Marty Meewis of Colors on Concrete, Upland, CA loves to say “Concrete doesn’t have to be gray.”

He offers this story of how he helped a customer fix an ugly patio that was scarred up after a haphazard cutting and patch job.

The homeowner had a new a/c unit installed and the patio needed to be saw-cut to run the coolant lines.

After the a/c work was completed, the homeowner couldn’t stand all the different patterned styles in their concrete patio.

Decorative concrete staining and engraving was the perfect solution.

Marty stained and engraved a flagstone pattern into the entire concrete patio.

There was already a brick border around the patio, and he had to match the colors in the existing stone and bricks then engrave the flagstone patterns and seal the concrete.

For this 1600 sq. ft. project it took two weeks and a lot of hours shuffling templates around.

Colors on Concrete is located in Upland, CA and can be reached at 909-239-5374.

Their website is http://www.colorsonconcrete.net.

Once you’re done transforming a dull gray floor into a beautiful work of art, there are a few steps to consider when finishing the job.

In this video, final sealing of the decorated concrete is demonstrated.

This is part 29 of an on-going series on Decorative Concrete, and is taken from the DVD Mastering Concrete Engraving, The Basics.

 

 Flash Video [1:43m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

 

 Standard Podcast [1:43m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

When the surface is completely clean and dry, and all stain touchups have been completed, the project is ready for the final sealer.

The exact product used for the initial coat of sealer, which served to protect our stain during the engraving operations, is what we will use for our final sealer.

On exterior projects, the most common sealer is solvent based acrylic. The recommended method of application is by pump sprayer. If you use Concrete Resurrection water reducible concentrate to stain the surface, it is required that you spray the solvent based sealer on.

A professional grade metal pump sprayer utilizing Viton seals is required when using solvent based sealers. Special attention to personal safety is recommended when using this product to include safety goggles and masks.

Be sure your environment has appropriate ventilation to allow solvent fumes to dissipate.

As you are spraying the sealer, move the wand in a circular motion. This will lay the sealer down more uniformly on the concrete.

On exterior surfaces, it is recommended that a non?skid additive be broadcast onto the surface then locked in with a final sealer coat. This will minimize the possibility of slips and falls.

Purchase the DVD Mastering Concrete Engraving, The Basics to see this series in its entirety.

Hopefully you’re at least somewhat convinced that video is a powerful way to market your decorative concrete business.

But how do you add video to your daily repertoire of activities without it seeming like a burden?

Here are a few tips to easily add video to your daily routine.

1) Get a Camera

If you don’t already have an easily portable digital video camera, or a mobile phone capable of taking digital video, consider purchasing an inexpensive portable video camera like the Flip cam which takes video in HD format, and has a built in USP port for easily uploading the video to your computer… it even comes with a simple bit of editing software, all for less than $200.

2) Start Shooting

Take a video of anything and everything that you are doing – you can never have too much video, and then select what you want to publish later by heavy editing.

4) Use Yourself As a Subject

The real subject of your video should be your business and the service it provides, but take lots of video of yourself talking to the camera and explaining what you are doing. Always act as if you are making the video for one single person.

You’ve no doubt seen episodes of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition where Ty and Paul walk around holding a video camera at arms length and talking to it.

Why do they do this so much?  ‘Cause it works! People like feeling like you’re talking to them, and this also lets potential customers get to know you before they get to know you.

5) Always Include Contact Information

Don’t neglect to tell people how to get in touch with you.

6) Upload Video Daily

Be sure to upload video to YouTube as often as you can – the more, the better.

Also be sure to title and describe your videos with words that your potential customers would use to find someone like you.

And include your contact information in the description.

7) Embed the Videos

YouTube allows you to embed your videos pretty much anywhere you want them.

Put them on your blog and Facebook page – anywhere people wills see them.

Remember, you are doing this not for personal narcissistic reasons – you are a business and businesses require promotion, and no one is going to promote you like you can.

Take these easy steps and start adding video to your decorative concrete business today.

Engrave-A-Crete now has an iPhone app.

You can download the app from the iTunes App store at:

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/engrave-a-crete/id351336907?mt=8

It’s free, and is a simple application for keeping updated on the latest Engrave-A-Crete tips and news.

You can have instant updates when we introduce a new product, or are running a sale.

If you have an iPhone, or an iPod Touch, we’d love it if you would download it, and share it with friends.