If you want your small business to succeed, you need to know how to promote it properly. If you are not putting enough effort into marketing and advertising your small business, you will not be able to keep up with the competition. Following are six ways you should be promoting your small business.
Start a Blog
Content marketing is one of the best forms of inbound marketing. As opposed to outbound marketing, inbound marketing lets visitors come to you. As long as you are employing a proper SEO strategy, you will be able to attract free traffic and visitors. A good SEO strategy includes doing proper keyword research and writing high-quality content for your sites. If you are a local business, you should be doing local SEO as well. For local SEO, you should make sure that you set up profiles on directories such as Google My Business, Apple Maps, Bing Maps, Yelp, and any local directories in your area. Your keywords should be location based to help attract local visitors.
Get On Social Media
If you are not on social media, you are missing out on a great marketing opportunity. Social media is a great way to reach more people. At the very least, you should have active profiles on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Depending on the industry you are in, you may want to consider setting up profiles on platforms such as Google Plus, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and Snapchat. You should use your social media presence as a way to promote your site and services, present yourself as a source of information, and as a way for you to communicate with your customers.
Use Videos
The power of video marketing should not be underestimated. A video is a powerful tool, and small businesses can leverage it to get more engagement online. You can start by setting up a channel on Youtube. Posting videos on your blog and on your social networks such as Facebook and Twitter will help boost engagement. Another thing that you can do is stream live videos and webinars. Facebook Live, Youtube Live, and Pinterest are good places to start. Live videos give you the best opportunity for connecting with your audience.
Use Email Marketing
Email marketing is powerful for a simple reason. Let’s say you start a blog. People may read your site, find it interesting, but then leave and never come back again. You can only convert a small percentage of first-time visitors into customers. On the other hand, if you can capture their email contact details and then email them a few times a week, you can establish a relationship and connection with them. It will be a lot easier for you to convert them into paying customers at that point.
Use Paid Advertising
If you are just starting out and you have a small budget, you may want to stick to free marketing methods, such as blogging, social media marketing, video marketing, and email marketing (which can be free if you use a service such as MailChimp). However, if you do have a bigger budget, you should consider promoting your business through paid advertising methods. With paid methods, you can reach more people and scale your business according to your needs and wishes. If you want to grow your business faster, simply invest more in your advertising campaigns.
There are various paid advertising opportunities online. You can start with paid social media ads. Facebook is probably the best place to start, simply because it has great targeting and reporting features. You can narrow down your target audience based on specific demographics, such as age, marital status, income, and even topics they have shown interest in. Other platforms you can advertise online include Twitter and Instagram. You can also do paid search engine marketing. Google Adwords is where most people go, but you can also use Bing Ads for Bing and Yahoo.
Use Offline Methods
Finally, don’t forget about offline methods. Advertise in your local paper or magazine. Hang up flyers. Create agreements with other local businesses to refer customers to each other. Advertise on billboards. Give out your business card. Attend local events and trade shows.
