When you launch your business, your focus becomes doing everything in your power to keep it afloat, profitable, and successful. One thing that business owners cannot complain about is the sheer amount of resources available online to help sustain and grow their business. However, this can be a double-edged sword.
With thousands of “business coaches” hawking their latest strategies and blueprints, hoping to score sales, a business owner cannot help but catch “shiny-object syndrome”.
Shiny-object syndrome is when an individual pours all of their attention into something new and trendy, only to drop it for the next, new and exciting idea. Entrepreneurs are especially vulnerable to this behavior as many struggles to keep up with the latest marketing strategies to take their business to the next level.
Which Marketing Tips To Focus On
If you are just starting out, or very early on your business journey, you may be working with a very limited budget. Here are some marketing tips you can start implementing in order to market your business strategically:
1. Create a goal and a budget
In order to get to a final destination, you will need a detailed map to break down all of the steps to help you get there. You need to begin by defining the end goal for your business. Break things down to what is most immediate and what is more of a long-term goal.
Create a budget and keep a tab on all of your expenses. Since small businesses do not have unlimited resources, write down a realistic marketing budget and take inventory of the resources you already have at your disposal. For example, do you already have an e-mail list? Do you have someone internally that has in-depth knowledge of social media? Use these internal resources to move your business forward.
Feature the actual amount of cash you can reasonably spend on marketing activities within your budget.
2. Identify your target audience
Many business owners mistakenly believe that their current audience and customers are their target audience. This is not the case. Begin by asking yourself what are the specific pain points that your business is addressing. Based on those answers, you can determine who is likely to need the solution that you are offering.
You can also conduct market research by way of surveys to determine more insights as to what your customers are really looking for you to offer in your products and services.
3. Test
As both your time and resources are limited, it makes sense that you spend these reasonably, ensuring that you are only focusing on strategies that work. One of the most effective ways of determining which marketing strategies to focus on for the best results is to test.
If you are creating content, but are only hearing crickets, where no one is actually buying, do a bit of research to determine if the content you are creating is useful to your target audience.
Is your e-mail marketing stagnant? Then consider using “sales-qualified leads” (SQL), a variety of subject lines, and A/B tests. Try changing up your call-to-action (CTA) or even try sending your e-mails at different times of the day. This way you can determine when is the best time to send your e-mails, and where they are most likely to be opened.
4. Focus on one social media platform
It can be a real nightmare trying to juggle all of the top social media platforms out there: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and now Tik-Tok. Adding to the frustration is the amount of idiosyncrasies that you need to learn to navigate on each of these platforms.
For some it’s the algorithm that affects viewership, for others it’s the type of content they want you to feature, on others you are limited to the number of characters you can use to post for your followers. It can just be too much.
By knowing who your target audience is, you can determine where they hang out the most, helping you to focus all of your efforts on just one social media platform.
You can begin today by looking at your current social media presence. Where on these platforms are you seeing the most engagement from your customers? Sign up for some tools to help you schedule posts for the future. Monitor keywords that are experiencing a spike in searches.
The idea is to streamline and simplify everything you do so it does not become a burden.
5. E-mail Marketing
One of the best ways to establish loyalty and a long-term relationship with your customers is to create an e-mail list. When your customers opt in to receive news and notifications from you, this is a very good sign and you need to take advantage of this effective marketing strategy.
Via e-mail, you will have the opportunity to stay connected and engaged with your audience, notifying them of upcoming sales or new product launches.
If you are watching your budget, consider signing up for a free e-mail service such as MailChimp. Stay on top of e-mail optimization by continuously testing your subject lines, your time of submission, the day of the week, and other variables to ensure you get more open rates on your e-mails.
Most importantly, as more people use their mobile phones for just about everything these days, ensure that your e-mails are mobile-friendly.
There Are Options
If you think that you need a massive marketing budget to grow your business, think again. There are a plethora of marketing strategies available to you as a small business in order to create a robust marketing plan.
By utilizing the affordable strategies outlined above, you will have plenty of actionable tips to get you started. By using these tips creatively and strategically, you will help draw in the customers and build the necessary revenue to fund the larger, more ambitious marketing strategies you desire.