10 economical ideas for small business marketing

Are you a freelancer, small business owner, or solopreneur? Are you confused by all the advice out there about marketing? Have you tried a bunch of ideas for small business marketing and not gotten results? Read on to discover a few economical and effective solutions to your dilemma.

How should you start marketing your small business?

Before you start marketing your small business, you will have to sit down and develop a marketing strategy. Your goal is to position yourself or your business correctly in the marketplace. You are going to take into consideration:

• Your Product or Service – Your clients or customers need to understand the features, advantages, and benefits of buying the goods or services you offer. When thinking about a product, consider the key features, benefits, and the needs and wants of customers.
• Price – consider your position in the marketplace. Are you / your business new or established? Are you offering a luxury product or a high end service? Will you undercut competitors by lowering your prices initially?
• Place – location- e-commerce or retail. Are you accessible and easily found?
• People – mainly you or your employees and how you provide customer service
• Promotion – this is what we will cover in this post.

What are the types of marketing?

There are many types and subtypes of marketing. The main types that will probably concern you are:

• Traditional marketing -print, broadcast, direct mail, phone, and outdoor advertising like billboards.
• Digital marketing -advertising through digital channels such as search engines, websites, social media, email, and mobile apps.
• Content marketing – falls under the digital umbrella but refers to the creation and sharing of online material (such as videos, blogs, and social media posts) that does not explicitly promote a brand but is intended to stimulate interest in its products or services.
• Brand marketing – Brand marketing describes a long-term, strategic plan to continuously boost a brand’s recognition and reputation.

To read about various subtypes of marketing, please click on this list from HubSpot.

Where do I begin with marketing my small business?

Your branding comes first. This is what makes you stand out from your competitors. Begin your branding by completing the following:

• You will need to create a consumer profile. This is what defines who you are marketing to, how you will package your business and how you will appeal to them.
• You will need to research your competitors.
• You will need to define your mission and your unique value proposition.

To learn how to create a consumer profile, define your brand position and brand proposition, read our article 16 Steps to building a branded website.

What is the most important asset to marketing my small business?

Aside from your storefront, if you have one, it is your website. That is where you will be found and vetted online. You will want your website to be up to date, responsive, fast loading and designed to support your brand, service or product. The design and functionality of your website is critical to your success. Consumers are terribly selective and impatient and if your site is ugly, outdated, hard to use or doesn’t have the design characteristics aimed at appealing to your targeted demographics, users will bounce off and go elsewhere.

To learn more about designing your website properly, read our article How to design your website layout.

After your website is finished, use Google analytics to track your visitors.

Your third step is choosing the most effective social media for your business

You have limited time and money, so where do you invest time and effort? That will depend on the nature of your business and your goals. Ask yourself what you want to do:

• Build your reputation
• Make sales
• Get leads
• Drive traffic to your e-commerce store or website

Consider next the nature of your business

• Local
• E-commerce
• Service based

Think which channel will serve you best

For example:

• Any how to do something will be best served either by your blog or a YouTube video. YouTube is the second biggest search engine and features everything from plumbing DYI to make – up tutorials. You can monetize YouTube and associated affiliate marketing products a number of ways while building your reputation and becoming a trusted source.
• Do you have an e-commerce site? Pinterest is the way to go, particularly if you sell home goods, fashion, food, travel, jewelry, artisanal products, art, wedding related products etc. Pinterest is one the largest website traffic drivers in the world and visitors from Pinterest are more likely to convert into leads or sales faster than from other social media sources.
• B2B – post and interact in groups on LinkedIn
• Visual Businesses – florist, photographer, beauty industry, stylist, influencer – Instagram
• Brands -Brand business pages and advertising do well on Facebook
• Local B2C businesses do well in Facebook Groups or on NextDoor
• Authors – Amazon advertisement

Put your time and effort into social media that will work for you. Pick one at first and develop it by devoting yourself to it.

Build your email list

You own your list. Build it the following ways:

• Valuable content in exchange for their email.
• Sign up sheet when you do a live event or trade show.
• Ask for business cards at networking events.
• Offer club memberships with discounts on your website in exchange for emails.
• Sign up form for your newsletter. Include a share feature within your newsletter so that they can post to social media or e-mail friends.
• Include opt in links under your signature on all your emails.
• Create an online course.
• If you opt to use a pop up on your website, make it the last thing people see. No one is going to sign up for anything before they read about you or your business.

Afterward, you will have to nurture those leads with email marketing.

Create your Google Business Profile – it’s not just for local businesses

To gain more visibility, create a Google business profile. Google My Business gives your business location, hours, phone number, link to your website on Google Maps and in local search results. Your customers can post reviews, and you can post photos, events, and articles there. You can use Google My Business even if you dont have a storefront.

From Chron

‘Many businesses operate without having a physical location for customers. Mobile mechanics and welders, web-based companies, delivery services, and other businesses that don’t require customers to visit a physical location are still valuable members of the local economy. Some of these businesses may actually have a physical location that is not customer-facing.

Running a no-address business is becoming increasingly popular, especially with the growth of web-based businesses and remote work. These businesses should still consider listing on Google Maps in the city where the business is registered to generate leads and contacts in the local community. The listing is valuable, even for businesses operating on a national or global scale.’

How will I implement ideas for small business marketing?

Use free or inexpensive tools suited to your client/customer base and your own temperament and abilities.

Traditional Marketing

The benefit of traditional marketing is that almost everyone has switched to digital marketing. We are inundated all day long by marketing messages, a large percentage of email marketing never gets opened, and it is almost a rarity to receive something beautiful or useful in the regular post these days.

You can use Canva to create gorgeous flyers, postcards, business cards, invitations to events etc. They have free and paid versions of the service. The cost to print materials inexpensive and the finished product is of outstanding quality. Here’s a sample of a postcard I created for a mailing.

Content Marketing

Are you comfortable behind or in front of the camera? Do you have something to teach the public? Then make videos, create a channel, and upload regularly on YouTube. If you have any late model smart phone and good lighting, you can create videos. Link back to your website, social media and affiliate products. Use relevant keywords when uploading your video so that your content can be found.

If you are creating social media posts, again use Canva. They have templates for all social media. Here is a sample of a Pinterest pin I created to drive traffic.

Digital marketing

There’s two types of digital marketing – organic (free) and paid advertising. With organic digital marketing, you are building trust, a community with shared values, a loyal customer base, your brand, engagement and website traffic. But it takes time, so don’t expect overnight results.

Organic

• SEO ( search engine optimization)
• Blog posts
• Social Media posts
• Email blasts, newsletters (you can use the free version of Mailchimp)

To learn to blog effectively, read:

Learn how to blog like a pro – for free

Is the RankMath SEO plugin the best on the market? (2021)

Brand marketing

You are building your brand using any of the above methods. You are boosting trust, recognition and reputation. You are also building a long term relationship with your customers. Your brand is not about your logo. It is about what you are offering to your customer.

You must develop your brand position by:

• Defining your target audience
• Understanding how your brand is currently positioned
• Understand how competitors are positioned
• Giving the target audience a reason to buy

You must also:

• Develop a distinct and value-based positioning idea
• Define the key benefits your product offers to your target customers
• Define what makes you different, or better, than your competitors
• Develop a positioning statement and value proposition

To learn more read:

6 proven tips for branding small businesses

Powerful storytelling for small business

Building a branded website / Start here

Conclusion

There are a number of free or low cost marketing methods that small business owners can implement to promote their products or services. Those methods include content marketing, brand marketing, traditional marketing and digital marketing.

If you would like help with your marketing, contact me.