Increase demand with these three marketing strategies for small businesses. Every business needs its own custom and appropriate approach to marketing. Here I outline my favorite three approaches to increasing sales in small businesses. Have a look and see which ideas suit you and your business!
Strategy #1 – Direct Response Marketing
Direct response marketing refers to making a direct offer to your target market.
Unlike branding B.S that believes you should spend a tone of money to get people to remember your logo or your cutesy jingle… Direct Response doesn’t muck-a-round.
Every cent that is spent on the campaign can be measured against every cent that it brings in. If it is working well, great, scale it up. If not, cut it, change the angle and go again!
Direct Response is the philosophical approach but you can use it with whatever medium works for you and your audience.
Go old school and use mail out… Or you can reach your audience through Google, Facebook, youtube, or where ever else your audience may be. That doesn’t matter as long as your audience is there.
So what does direct response marketing look like?
Here is a great example from the Law Doctor…
I don’t know who exactly produced that piece but it is a solid concise example of direct response in action for a local business.
There is much more I would like to share on Direct Response Marketing. But for now, we will leave it at that and move onto our next marketing strategy.
Strategy #2 – Content Marketing
I use the term content marketing intentionally… instead of social media marketing. But the two are closely linked.
The term social media marketing has, however, been butchered over the years. With big businesses thinking they can ram themselves into people’s lives by jumping on social media.
They are kind of like the annoying friend that tries to sell everyone timeshares and Tupperware… You know all they care about is making a few extra bucks for themselves… and are not at all interested in whether it will help you or not…
Content marketing takes a different mindset. It is focused on helping, educating, entertaining, and inspiring your audience. In exchange for their attention and future business.
Content marketing refers to the creation and distribution of content that positions you as an expert and shows you can solve your target market’s problem. This content can also act as an organic traffic generation tool.
Personally, this is what I use for my business at the moment.
Again you can tackle this strategic approach in whatever way suits you. Personally, I use my youtube channel… In fact, that is probably where you found me.
I intentionally create videos that answer my target market burning questions.
I use youtube to get my helpful content in front of people… and before you know it I am putting up my rates and turning away clients because I have too much work!
It is an awesome way to market because I am helping people the whole way.
I have seen accountants, videographers, house organizers, designers all use this approach.
It is critical to make sure you are creating content and sharing it where your audience is.
This is where social media comes in! Use it to answer questions, create helpful or inspiring content… and your market will love you for it.
The only trouble with this approach is it takes time to see a return on your time investment.
Strategy #3 – Hit the pavement
The final option isn’t sexy… But it works.
Actually talking to your prospective customers is a sure-fire way to get the ball moving on sales. When you are talking directly to your prospective customers you get direct feedback on what your target market really wants, how they see their industry, what their pains are, and how they would like someone to solve them.
They can also provide direct feedback on your offer.
Use this strategy to learn and refine your offer… And your target audience.
Sometimes your offer may need to be refined… sometimes you will discover you are targeting the wrong type of customer.
Use this strategy to gather data and you will have a huge competitive advantage in no time!