6 Marketing Strategies to Expand Your Small Business
Congrats! You successfully started up your business! You’ve got everything in order to create your business and are ready to go, but now what?
The next step is marketing.
Marketing is the art of putting your products or services directly in front of your potential customers. And you need to make sure you are there when they are looking for them. So how do you do that?
That's a big challenge for many since not every entrepreneur comes from a marketing background. Sometimes, even marketing majors may find the actual marketing experience nothing like what they've studied in the textbooks (have you taken a marketing class in the last 20 years?).
So how should you market your products or services? What works? What doesn’t work? And what should you focus on in the beginning?
Don’t worry. We’re here to help.
Below are the six marketing techniques you can use to gain maximum publicity for your business. Let’s check them out…
1) Start a Referral Program
Referral marketing is a great way to get lots of word-of-mouth publicity. This kind of publicity allows you to get marketing for your business by utilizing happy customers, getting them to promote your business for you. By providing them with a reward for their referrals, you can get plenty of business referrals to market your business to directly.
Most customers feel excited about referral programs since they can earn discounts and free gifts without much effort. These gifts don’t have to be expensive, they can be simple as a percentage discount for their next purchase to a small gift card used at your business.
People already talk about businesses. So why not give your customers something in return for bringing you more people? There are many different ways you can set up a referral program, and most of them don’t cost much.
And when talking about your business earns them free stuff? Who would say no to that? Want to know more? HubSpot has a great article that will walk you through the steps to creating your referral program.
Also, a recent survey showed that about 92% of individuals trust recommendations made to them by friends and family, so with that stat, it’s not a difficult choice to use a referral program.
2) Create a Website
If you don't have a website for your business, you might want to consider building one. There are many different ways to build a website today, some easier than others to navigate.
A website is a great place to showcase everything your business offers and provide valuable information to your prospective customers. We are in the era of digital, and everything is just a click away. And if your business is not, how are people going to see you or know what you have to offer?
Work on setting a good, responsive website for your brand because you can't survive without one these days. And being optimized for mobile-first is one of the most important steps that most people who build websites today understand. Most people don’t sit at a computer every time they look something up - they are typically on their phones. So having a responsive website that can adapt to various screen sizes will make your site easier to navigate.
And if you’re not sure how to do that, contact a digital marketing agency, like Small Hits, to see how we can help. We provide a complete solution for your website needs.
3) Tap Into the Power of SEO
So, once you have an internet presence, you can use the power of SEO to help you rank on Google or any other search provider. But what is SEO?
SEO stands for search engine optimization and is the process of how customers find your site when they search in Google, Bing, or Yahoo, for example. The higher the rank of the website, the more likely someone is to click and use the information on that site for their searches. Websites further down on the results page have fewer chances to get clicks, and not many people go past page 1 of the search results when looking for an answer.
Google and many other search engines use SEO to determine where to rank your site. There is no one part to SEO as it is comprised of many parts. There is on-page SEO and off-page SEO.
On-page SEO includes factors such as coding, metadata, website security, and much more. All these factors you have complete control over and can work to improve. Too much code, missing metadata, a slow site, etc., will all negatively affect your website rankings.
Off-page SEO includes factors that you may not have as much control over, such as backlinks to your website, your site age, social metrics, and more. Moz has a great article that focuses just on off-page SEO.
The more you optimize your website for your industry, the better chance you have of showing up in the search results. And the higher the results you land, the better your site will perform for generating marketing and business. Want to learn more about optimizing your website? Check out our article on Why SEO Is Key To Getting Your Business Found Online.
4) Hold a Contest
Running a contest can be a very effective way to generate leads, increase exposure, and increase your overall customer base. I mean, who doesn’t love the chance to win free stuff? Almost anyone will sign up at the opportunity to win something.
And, don't worry, the prize need not necessarily be 1000s of dollars. As little as $50, a free meal, a free month, etc., per winner can work pretty well for you!
Collect data during your contest that you can use later on to market to, either through an email campaign, direct mailers, phone calls, etc. This data is a great way to market to people without spending too much money.
A contest can also help you generate social content. For example, have a hashtag for customers to use when posting about your company and maybe have a weekly or monthly drawing for the prize. Or have customers leave reviews on Google, Facebook, Yelp, or elsewhere and provide them with a chance to win something.
Shortstack has a great article with examples of some contest marketing we think you should check out.
5) Flyers and Posters Still Work
Yeah, they still do. And with tools like Canva, anyone can make amazing flyers or posters without the need for design school and expensive Adobe suite programs. Simple flyers and posters can attract people to check out what you have to offer.
Check out one of our flyers. Instead we choose sometime closer to a postcard size so it was small enough to take with you, but still big enough to not loose it easily. We created the design on Canva in no time, and their pricing made it easy to order as many copies as we need.
Provide clear and concise information along with beautiful photos, and you will win every time. Don’t forget to include information such as your website, ways to reach you, contests, social media accounts, and branding.
You can then visit companies that will promote your business and leave the flyers and posters there. Starting local is one of the best ways to promote your business for free. Check with your local Chamber of Commerce for other ways to promote your business through flyers and posters.
6) Try Email Marketing
According to a survey in 2019, about 3.9 billion people around the world used email for communication. And the figure is going to grow to 4.3 billion in 2023. So with almost half of the world's population using email, this is a GREAT platform to talk about your business.
But, you'll need an email marketing expert for your campaign. There are many tools to help you with your email marketing like Constant Contact, Mailchimp, Honeybook, and more. Use these tools to design your email campaigns around providing valuable information to your customers - you don’t want to end up in the spam folder.
Need help putting together an email marketing campaign for your business? Hiring a copywriter or email marketing manager will help you move this process forward quickly. Make sure to find someone you work well with and who has some knowledge of your industry or niche.
Conclusion
So, that's about it. The above six techniques are easy to use, cheap, and still very effective. You can use one, two, three, or all of the above techniques - that's very much up to you. Test them and see what works best for your company and industry. Then, once you start to see an increase in brand awareness and your marketing efforts are paying for themselves, you can adjust your marketing plan into something larger.
Don’t be afraid to try new things with your marketing campaigns and adjust for what works best for you. Every business is different, but you may strike gold in the most unexpected way.
