NextDoor is a newer social media platform that helps users connect with other people in their neighborhood. This niche makes the platform a great place for local businesses to advertise. NextDoor’s ad platform is still relatively new and not all of their advertising options have been rolled out for everyone in order to not over-saturate the site with advertisements. However, the options they do have can be an effective way to get your business out there.
Business page
Any business with a physical address can create a business page on NextDoor. Much like Facebook, you can connect with potential customers, post announcements, and get recommendations. Recommendations are especially important because they are shown with your posts. Having good recommendations helps build trust with your community. You can also post offers and events. Offers are posts about any discounts or promotions your business is running and you can target those offers by neighborhood. Events are the same, but they must be actual events that people can attend, like a class, happy hour, or open house.
Neighborhood Sponsorships
Neighborhood sponsorships are exclusively available to certain businesses, including real estate agents, mortgage brokers, rental properties, and home renovation experts. When you buy a neighborhood sponsorship, you can run automated ads on the news feed and in the email digest. For real estate agents, you can also run sponsored listings on the real estate tab. Overall, neighborhood sponsorships are a great way to build some brand awareness in a community.
Sponsored posts
Sponsored posts look a lot like in-feed Facebook ads, showing up in the main newsfeed like a regular post would, as well as in the marketplace and email digest. Unfortunately, this option is only available to larger regional and national brands and also requires a minimum budget of $25,000 a month. Hopefully this option will be expanded to other businesses a later date, but nothing has been announced about it yet
Overall, NextDoor is a great way to connect with your community as a local business. Even just having a business page helps build brand awareness by posting offers and events. It also builds trust by letting you communicate with customers and get recommendations for your business.
