Many small businesses start off with a small marketing budget. It can become frustrating because you have so many marketing ideas with no budget for them. The biggest misconception is that you need to have allocated a big budget to marketing for your business to grow.
In today’s everchanging technological and digital age, if you are creative and can allocate enough time to marketing, you should be able to effectively market your business on a low budget.
Creating a website, will not only allow you to reach more potential customers, but it will also make your brand look more professional. When creating a website, it is important to ensure that it is user-friendly on both web as well as mobile.
It is okay to spend a bit more money and time here as you need to put together creative content that is interesting for your target audience and best represents your brand.
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Social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram are the perfect platforms to reach a wider audience and connect with potential customers.
Stay active on social media platforms, especially the platforms that best suits your business. If you are not sure what social media platform will work best for you, read our blog on the top social media platforms for SMBs. These channels can be used to run ads, competitions and simply educate people. The great thing about social media is whether you are spending money on ads or simply posting organic content, you are guaranteed to reach more people.
Create trigger campaigns, send out newsletters and get customers to subscribe to your mailing list. Take time to put together meaningful content that your customers will benefit from to keep them subscribed to your list.
Businesses tend to focus a lot of energy and time on gaining new customers when they should also put in as much time and effort into keeping their existing ones.
All too often, I see businesses focus on acquiring new customers as opposed to focusing on keeping the current customers happy.
One of the top benefits of email marketing is that it has a huge return on investment compared to other methods.
Media sponsors are financial sponsors that secure advertising for an event. This can mean purchasing advertising space on local television or in a local newspaper or publishing content about the event on their own channels, like creating a blog post about the event or cause
Look at the different types of sponsorships that will best suit your business and pocket.
Blogs are great when it comes to giving customers product information, tips and guides. The more your content speaks to your audience and brand, the more customers will keep coming back to read more.
Eg. Find more marketing tips and tricks here.
An in-kind sponsorship is an agreement where the sponsoring business provides goods or services in lieu of direct financial support. Services and good are exchanged as opposed to money.
Promotional partnerships are like media sponsors. The difference between these types of sponsorships is that promotional partners are typically individual figures rather than companies and media outlets. A promotional partner advertises the event or cause to his network.
Partnering with a company or individual means you both benefit. You can assist each other with referrals, and form a great partnership.
Think about the business people you want to partner with and remember, the relationship is a reflection of who you are to others, including your customers.
Join community groups and attend networking events, these are great places to meet like-minded businesspeople who are also interested in networking and growing their business. This is also a great way to stay up to date with any industry-related changes and events.
Always ensure you are going above and beyond for all customers and potential customers. Make your employees understand that customers satisfaction is of utmost importance to the business.
Interact with customers regularly, get advice and tips on how your business can improve and make life easier for them. If you have a good relationship with customers, you are more likely to gain more customers from word of mouth.
Marketing doesn’t have to be expensive. These are just a few ways for you to promote your brand without emptying your bank account.
If you follow these few tools, you can definitely market your brand without spending an exorbitant amount of money.
Host free live webinars/how-to guides/tutorials for customers and potential customers. You can use social media, your website and even newsletters to promote these events and get people to attend. This is a great way to educate people as well as answer any questions they may have.
Keep an eye on our upcoming webinars here
Author:
Steven Howard
eCommerce Product Owner
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