Marketing on a shoestring

If your hands are tied financially, there are still some low-cost marketing activities that can have a big impact. I recently read an E-Myth newsletter article setting out some of the things that you can do on low/no-cost marketing and I felt it was highly relevant for many of our clients. I have highlighted the key points below, and hope you find them useful.

You are a small business owner and, like most of your fellow entrepreneurs, you’re feeling squeezed from every side. The cost of doing business, being in business and getting more business just seems to be going up.

When you stop to consider your marketing and advertising budget, it can be distressing. One of the classic reactions in economic downturns is to ‘batten down the hatches’ – to cut costs and protect your business as much as possible. Unfortunately, this often includes advertising and promotion costs.  The downside to that is that it’s difficult to get more business if you don’t market yourself – and when things are rough is when you need business the most!

The truth is that any business can be effectively marketed even on a limited and ‘downsized’ budget.

First, you have to have a plan
Why expend your valuable time and effort in an unfocused and random attempt to garner more business? Regardless of the cost of any given tactic or activity, it must be an integral part of a strategic marketing plan in order to generate the most return on your investment.

Here is a short list of questions you should answer for yourself when developing your strategy:

•  What is the ‘big picture’? What are we hoping to achieve overall? How does this strategy fit into our long-term goals and objectives?

•  Marketing objectives? What is it that we are striving to achieve? More sales? More sales of specific products or services? Re-conversions or repeat business?

• Who is the audience? Existing customers? New prospects? Who are they and where are they?

• What is my unique selling proposition (USP)? What is our ‘promise’? How is our product or service offering different from the other options our prospects have to choose from? What can we do for them and how?

Having answered these questions, you can then take the next step of determining what particular tactics and activities fit in best with your strategy and plan — and then run with it!

Let the promoting begin!
The list of ideas for low and no-cost lead generation activities can be quite large. The E-Myth article has highlighted seven that have been shown to be very effective in the real world for real businesses:

1. Trade services. Bartering didn’t go out with the last century and it is still a viable option for many small business owners, provided that your prospective recipient needs, and recognises the value of, your product or service.

2. Offer free information. Although this is typically done on a company’s website, providing and actively offering information that is valuable to your customers and prospective customers is a great way not only to generate interest in your business, but also to position yourself as a valuable resource and authority.

3. Share customers. Teaming up with non-competing businesses that share the same customer base is a time-honoured way to generate more business with no effort on your part.

4. Ask for referrals. Not exactly a stroke of genius, but this simple act is probably one of the most overlooked — or intimidating — sources of new business.

5. Cold call. Although we understand that not everyone is suited for this task, it can be a surprisingly effective tactic for finding new customers. For many it is simply a matter of numbers: if you call a certain number of people, you will generate an approximate number of leads as a result.

6. Write. This can be done in the form of articles for trade publications read by your target audience, a newsletter sent to a list of customers or likely customers via email, or as special reports, white papers, or eBooks made available on your website or someone else’s. The more your company name is seen and read by your prospects, the greater the awareness of your business.

7. Create an event. Organise a client appreciation celebration in an outdoor location and publicise it beforehand. Create a ‘national holiday’ and invite the public to participate via press releases to the local media and influential websites. Be both creative and bold by conducting a stunt of some type a la Sir Richard Branson! The key here is to make sure people see it or know about it, and that they are the right people.

Do let me know if you have other low-cost ideas that have worked for you.

To read the full version of this article, please go to marketing-on-a-shoestring