Great Marketing Ideas For Small Business – As we close the door on another calendar year, it’s time to start thinking about effective marketing strategies for small business owners in 2018. One of the smartest things a small business owner can do for their business is to take the time to develop a small business marketing plan that will set them apart from the competition.
Before we dive into marketing strategies, it’s important to have the right tools in place before marketing your business. In order to beat the competition, it is important that your business has the right tools to deliver excellent customer service and help stay on top of business operations. In addition to a secure payment processor, having employee scheduling software can help streamline your operations and keep track of changes. It can track holidays, vacations, and make employee forecasting a breeze. Find out how you can make your life easier so you can get back to loving your business again by starting your free 30-day trial below.
Great Marketing Ideas For Small Business
Your story can be an effective marketing tool. Get the word out on flyers, your website, social media, and emails about how and why you started your business. Build a personal relationship with your customers, so they know why they should support your small business. Even though people are looking for a deal, telling a coherent story (connected to a good deal) will separate your business from the commercial giants.
Marketing Strategy: What It Is, How It Works, How To Create One
Include some facts about the impact of small business in your story. Tell your customers that small businesses account for 54% of all sales in the U.S. also remind people that small businesses like yours have a positive impact on their local economy as they provide 55% of all jobs.
The National Retail Federation (NRF) found that more than half of online shoppers during the holidays bought something that was recommended by a retailer. Create a gift guide to give your customer options and help cut through the noise. Creating a gift wrap doesn’t have to be time-consuming or complicated. Your gift guide can be as simple as a blog post with a list of gifts, descriptions, and links. You can also hire a designer to create a gift guide for your website and print.
Get inspiration from ‘Oprah’s Favorite Things’ where Oprah features items from different businesses. Use this principle to add your products to the leading offers of influencers and popular bloggers. For a small commission, some bloggers are happy to help small businesses promote their offerings to their target audience.
Tap into the curiosity of the unknown by providing privacy protection in your marketing campaign. If you have an email list, send an email to your subscribers offering different deals or gifts. Your call-to-action should take your subscribers to a landing page with one of your offers. You can get creative with your secret offers by using a tool like Zembula, where your subscribers ‘scratch’ their screen to reveal a secret reward.
Small Business Advertising Ideas For 2022
Take your secret offer offline if you don’t have a website or email list. Let customers choose their secret gift in the store by spinning a wheel or drawing from a hat.
Give your customers a free gift after they spend a certain amount. Encourage foot traffic from your email subscribers by asking them to print or show the offer on their mobile device in store to redeem their free gift.
Take this opportunity to promote your business by offering useful branded items, such as calendars or pens. Alternatively, offer a reward or loyalty system to customers who create an account with your store. This encourages customers to load points when they are given a reward or coupon once they reach a certain number of points.
Haste makes people act quickly. When you create a promotional campaign, start by announcing the promotion through email, social media platforms, and even through physical banners around your store. Follow up the announcement with a final promotion call. This tells your customers that the offer is about to end and they need to act fast if they want to get the best deal. If you remind customers that time is running out, it raises the level of urgency and forces action. This is a way to move customers from an idle stage and into an action mode.
Digital Marketing Ideas For Your Small Business
A 2017 BrightLocal study showed that 85 percent of consumers trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations and 73 percent of consumers say a positive review makes them trust a business more. More people are looking for reviews than ever before and almost every customer has searched for a business online at least once this year. In fact, according to data from that same study, seven out of ten consumers leave surveys when asked to do so. Many businesses struggle to differentiate themselves from their competitors, so having a good online reputation is important to help customers make a decision.
Create profiles on multiple review websites to make it easy for your customers to leave reviews and always be sure to stay busy by thanking positive reviews and answering any questions asked.
The NRF survey found that six out of ten respondents would be happy to receive gift cards. Help the popularity of cards as the gift of choice by creating a marketing campaign around gift cards. Offer both plastic and e-gift cards to give customers more options. Your gift card marketing campaign can include a percentage or a free gift card when customers spend over a certain amount in store or online.
Get customers involved in the store by setting up a hunt. You don’t have to have a big store for this to work. Give customers a short list of items available in your store and ask them to bring pictures of the hidden items at checkout to claim their discount. Scavenger hunts are a great way to get customers to check out your store. Hide some items in the back to encourage customers to look around the store. Limit the scavenger hunt to a few items and make the game short, so that customers don’t lose their interest.
Marketing Strategies To Make Your Online Store Successful
Direct your customers directly to your in-store deals using a sticky footer. Get creative with the type of feet you use. If you are a women’s boutique, use high heels or use paw prints if you have a pet store. Search online for companies that specialize in flooring to order your custom flooring.
There is strength in numbers when competing with large companies for sales and customer loyalty. It makes sense to partner with other local small businesses to increase your marketing power. Partner with a few businesses to spread the cost of advertising to reach more people.
Consider cross-promoting your products with related local businesses. An example is if you own a store, you can work with the owner of the coffee shop to offer a ‘buy one, get one free’ coffee to everyone who produces a receipt from your store. In return, you offer coffee shop customers a discount on your shop.
Partnerships are important and should be part of your small business marketing campaign. Considering that 91% of consumers want the products and services they use to support a cause, consider including a give back element in your marketing campaign. Be sure to find a way to involve your customers in your outreach efforts.
What Are Good Ideas For Small Business Marketing?
If you’re promoting your food bank, why not encourage your customers to drop off non-perishable items at the store? On the other hand, you can choose to set aside a portion of your profits for your chosen charity. Advertise your fundraising goal and let your customers know about the difference their donations will make.
Hosting an event at your store is a great way to promote brand awareness and engagement with your customers. A well-executed event is a great source of awareness and customer acquisition for businesses – and it doesn’t have to break the bank to run. Offer inexpensive treats, such as cookies, and place your cookies in designated areas — such as near discounted items or gift cards — to catch the eye. As a small business, it’s likely that you stock items that larger stores don’t carry, so put your unusual and unique pieces front and center to grab customers’ attention.
Videos of your product or service on YouTube can help promote your business and brand. Showcase new products, give lectures and talk about relevant (and interesting) things happening in your industry. Create content that helps your audience like instructional videos to help them understand your product better.
HubSpot predicts that video traffic will increase to 80 percent of all internet traffic by 2019. In this digital age, moving forward on video marketing will give small businesses a competitive edge.
Effective And Doable Online Marketing Ideas For Local Small Business
Use social media to create sweepstakes. Use helpful tools by creating quizzes, contests, sweepstakes, and coupons on social media. Many tools have ready-made templates that you can brand with your business colors and logo.
Ask social media users to provide their email address for the opportunity
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