Top Marketing Techniques and Strategies for Small Businesses
With the right marketing techniques, small business owners can drive more traffic to their website, increase leads, improve sales, grow revenue, raise brand awareness, and retain/gain more customers. In this marketing article, we’ll explore the best marketing techniques for small business owners. Let’s get started.
List of marketing strategies for small businesses:
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- Printed material, eg, flyers, business cards, postcards.
- Value additions.
- Referral Networks
- Cold calling
- The internet
1. Printed Material (Posters, postcards, and flyers)
Pinpoint your audience or ideal customer base and distribute flyers and posters. The printed flyer or advertisement should be brief and to the point, highlighting the services, you offer and provide contact information. Special offers, coupons or discounts would most likely attract potential clients. Most public spaces, such as libraries, malls, and churches offer free bulletin board space for announcements and advertisements.
2. Value Additions
Tell them how you are different. You don’t have to promise the moon to add value; often you have to state something that the customer may not realize about your product or service. Common value additions include guarantees, discounts for repeat customers, point cards and referrals rewards.
3. Referral Networks
Ever heard of “word of mouth”? You have probably done it without even noticing. Referral networks are valuable because the referrals are coming from business to business. Network whenever you can with similar companies, and people with the same mindset. You will be surprised at how much you can help one another.
4. Cold Calling
Cold calling forces you to sell yourself as well as your business. When cold calling you will notice you think on your feet and inspire creativity and flexibility when facing potential clients with more ease. Eventually, it will become easier, and you will become more confident at picking up the phone. An excellent way to make cold calls more engaging is to stop thinking of them as “cold” calls. Think of them as “introductory” calls instead.
5. The Internet
It is nearly unlikely that a business, even a local will not have at least a website with the vital details such as location and hours. Not having a site means not having a point of access for the growing number of people who Google first when they want to make a buying decision, this includes social media accounts for your business such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest. Get with the times and be accessible through all networks.
6. Follow Up
Get feedback, ask questions, and return calls. Find out why they choose your company from other companies, ask how their overall experience went, what was the customer most satisfied with, what was least satisfying, etc. Getting feedback will allow you to improve your business and learn more about your customers.
Conclusion
There’s no magic formula, and marketing is continually changing. If there are marketing techniques on this list you are not doing, try working them in your mix in the future. Measure the results afterward to see what worked for you, refine it, and keep at it!