No matter what your industry is, or what market you’re trying to reach, effective marketing is essential for growth. While large corporations have massive budgets, small businesses can still achieve comparable results with a strategic approach. Learning from broad business growth frameworks, customer retention models, and marketing strategies to increase sales can help small businesses compete effectively without overspending. Here are just some of the most important core marketing strategies every small business owner needs to get next-level results.
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Video marketing
Video marketing is one of the best ways to gain new followers and generate sales. When you have high-quality video content, you can engage your audience to build brand awareness and create conversions much easier than with text. Video content can include anything from a scripted story to a fully produced tutorial using clips you made with screen recording software.
There are three main ways brands use video content for marketing:
- To generate engagement and traffic. Posting content to sites like YouTube is an excellent way to gain followers or drive traffic to a website.
- To generate sales. Using video content in paid ads or on sales pages helps drive conversions more than plain text.
- To educate or raise brand awareness. Sometimes videos are posted simply to entertain or educate an audience and keep the brand in their awareness.
All three of these are important, but how you approach each one will depend on your industry and particular market.
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Local search engine optimization
Search engine optimization (SEO) is one of the most important marketing components because you’ll never get organic traffic to your website without optimizing it for search. The problem is that most markets are so highly saturated that it takes a massive budget to get somewhere with SEO. Local SEO is the solution.
As a small business, using local SEO will give you an advantage because it will narrow down the number of sites you’ll be competing with for placement in the search engine results pages (SERPs). Instead of competing nationally with every other website in your industry, you’ll only be competing with businesses in your general area. This will improve your chances of ranking higher and getting more search traffic.
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Social media marketing
Social media has the potential to help you generate leads, sales, fans, and raise brand awareness. At the very least, get on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok because that’s where most of your market will be spending their time.
Each social media platform is different, so figure out which ones are right for you and start posting. Keep in mind that the less you make your posts about yourself and your business, the more followers you’ll get, especially on Twitter. Many businesses make the mistake of using Twitter to promote links, but the algorithm heavily suppresses posts with external links. Consider using Twitter (and other platforms) to post content your market will find valuable rather than constantly self-promoting.
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A regular newsletter
Having a regular newsletter is an effective way to reach your market and slowly build trust and rapport with them while nurturing them into making more purchases. If you haven’t started an email marketing campaign yet, don’t wait any longer. It’s effective, profitable, and has a high ROI of $36 for every $1 spent.
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A blog
All small businesses need a blog where they post fresh, new content on a regular basis. Not only will a blog help establish your authority in your industry, but it’s the foundation for proper SEO, including link building and content marketing.
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Paid ads
There’s no faster way to generate targeted traffic and sales than paid ads. Also known as Pay-Per-Click (PPC) ads, paid ads allow you to reach your target market immediately the minute you publish your campaign. As soon as your ads go live, you’ll start getting traffic and if your sales pages are good, you’ll generate sales.
Compared to SEO, which can take many months to gain visibility in the SERPs, paid ads done right can equal fast profits. The only downside is that you’ll still need to continue your SEO efforts while you run paid ads because the minute you stop running ads, your traffic will cease.
Track your marketing efforts
These core marketing strategies make up the majority of the success equation, but you also need to track your efforts and make adjustments to keep your strategies aligned with your vision. Remember that marketing success is achieved through persistence and refinement over a period of time, and measuring results every step of the way is essential to stay on track and reach your goals.
