Hi Richard,
It's clever and will grab some people's attention. If you're brave enough to keep reading, I'll give you three specific things I'd try for next time (I do this kind of stuff for a living)...
1 - Headline - If you think about people reading a newspaper, they skip through most of it, just reading the articles that grab their attention. The articles do that with curiosity invoking headlines. Your headline is your company name and so, I'm afraid, a bit of a waste of advert space in that prime top position.
Something like "Do You Hate Sanding & Finishing?" would certainly grab me! But - you must test results with each advert so that you know how well it's worked. Just because one or two friends/colleagues like it, does not mean it will actually work.
2 - There's no offer - so you're just telling people who you are and what you do. Coca Cola do this by spending about a $1 billion per annum on big adverts, just to protect their market share (around 50%). As small businesses, we can't afford to operate in the same way.
A different way to advertise is to put an offer of some kind in there - "August Only - Free Polishing Mop With Order", or whatever would be a decent free offer [make it something that doesn't cost much - and don't spend on huge stocks].
3 - There's no call to action - that's the final push to get people picking up the phone or visiting your website. e.g.
Order Now For Delivery Tomorrow
01xxxx xxxxxxxxxx
order online at
www.xxxxxxxxxxx.co.uk
Hope this is useful to you. You'd be amazed the difference that a bit of this sort of thing can make to your advertising response rates.
It's worth picking up a couple of decent books on advertising, just like you'd buy a good book on finishing techniques if you wanted to be better at finishing, you're better off reading advice from marketing experts instead of the woodworking ones for help with your adverts!
I recommend Tested Advertising Methods by John Caples as a brilliant introduction to marketing in print.
Cheers,
Lee
