Are you looking for effective marketing ideas to get customers in the door?
As a business owner, you’re an expert in delivering your services and you can deliver those services better than anyone. That’s one of the reasons why you got into the business.
Letting people know about your expertise and your services is another matter. It’s one of the top challenges small businesses face every day.
You have to tell people what you do, how you help them solve a problem, and what makes you different than anyone else.
Once you figure that out, you have to choose the best outlets to get that message out. That’s where creative marketing ideas come into play.
Keep reading to know what low budget marketing ideas you can use in your business.
1. Join and Participate in Online Forums
Every day, there are millions of people turning to online groups and forums trying to solve a problem.
They could be trying to lose weight, find an accountant, find a recipe that’s fast and easy or trying to find travel tip.
These online forums present a huge opportunity for you to get in front of a new audience and show off your expertise. You can join groups on Facebook and Pinterest to find where your target market spends time.
You can also answer questions on forums like Reddit and Quora.
To make online forums work, you need to visit them every day and focus on being useful. If you focus on selling your service, you will turn people off and possibly get kicked out of the group.
2. Host a Workshop
A workshop is a great way to show off your expertise and build credibility and trust.
You can choose a topic around one particular issue that your audience faces. A mortgage broker can host a workshop on building up a credit score to get the best interest rate.
There are low-cost options for renting space, too. Your local library, for example, may have meeting rooms available for free.
3. Customer Referral Program
Out of all of the marketing ideas, nothing is more powerful than word of mouth marketing. Word of mouth is what drives between 20-50% of all purchases.
A lot of business owners avoid asking because they think it makes them look desperate. The truth is, you’re leaving money on the table by not asking.
How can you leverage your customers and create a referral machine?
First, you have to deliver an incredible client experience that people want to talk about. Second, you have to ask for a referral. Third, you have to give customers a reason to refer their contacts to you.
Create a system around asking for referrals. For example, in customer service surveys, ask if clients can refer people to your business.
4. Show them Signs!
Do you spend a lot of time on the road?
Why not use that to your advantage by having a sign or wrap on your car that shows off your business. With traffic increasing in the U.S., people have more time to look at your car and learn about your business.
Another great use of signage is at your retail location. You can capture attention with a storefront sign and window display.
These ensure that you get the attention of people as they’re passing by your location. If you want to know more about the different types of signage you can use, check out this sign company.
5. Cross Promotion
One low budget marketing idea is to team up with a company that shares your audience and finds ways to refer business and promote each other.
For example, a realtor, financial advisor, and mortgage broker all have different businesses that don’t compete with each other. Yet, they share a similar audience.
They can refer business to each other and promote them in email newsletters and social media.
Think about other services that are complementary to yours and ask those providers to be referral partners.
6. Go Through Your Rolodex
Businesses are built on relationships. People buy from people they know, like and trust.
Do you have a stack of business cards and contacts that you’ve collected at networking events? Have you ever followed up with them?
Rather than letting those leads collect dust, start to build a relationship with them. Let them know where you met, and ask if there’s anything you can do to help them. You can even ask them to join you for coffee to get to know what they do.
It’s a lot better than cold calling because you already have a relationship established with them. As you build the relationship and follow up with them periodically, they’re more likely to trust you and hire you for business.
7. Demonstrate Results
Get reviews and testimonials show people that you are good at what you do. Rather than having them sit idle on your website, use them as a marketing tool.
Post the occasional review on your social media channels and send them out in your emails.
You can also encourage your customers to leave reviews on Google, as that will help your SEO.
8. Win Local and Industry Awards
Local business papers usually have a top 50 businesses, 30 under 30 or 40 under 40 awards. There are also industry awards that you can apply for as well.
Awards are great marketing tools that you can use to cement your expertise and level of service.
You will have to mind your budget when applying for multiple awards because there is usually an application fee per award. Some awards have an application fee per category. That can add up quickly so be sure to pick awards that are most relevant and can enhance your credibility.
Low Budget Marketing Ideas with Big Returns
You can be the best at what you do, but if no one knows about your services you’re going to wind up broke, burned out and, frustrated.
The marketing ideas listed here are friendly on your budget and can work. The way to make these marketing ideas work is to pick between one and three ideas and stick with them.
Do them every day because consistency with what drives momentum and results.
Running a business isn’t easy but having a reliable resource at your disposal can make it easier.
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