8 Expert Online
Marketing Tips for Small Businesses
Small business digital marketing pros share
their top picks regarding the best ways for businesses with big plans but small
budgets to market their products or services.Today, businesses have more ways -- and places -- than ever to
market themselves. But deciding on a marketing method, particularly when you
are a small or even a mid-sized business with a small budget and limited
resources, can be difficult. While social media marketing is generally free, it
can be time-consuming; and the same goes for blogging. But traditional print
advertising, as well as digital advertising, can be expensive.So which
marketing channels are best for SMBs? Dozens of small business owners and
marketing professionals share the following list of top marketing strategies
for SMBs.
1. Blog. "One of the best marketing strategies for a small
business is blogging," says Maren Hogan, chief marketing brain at Red Branch Media.ls for 2016
"By providing
your prospects and clients with informative, non-salesy content that you can
house on your blog, promote socially and offer to other networks to supplement
their
strategy, you and your team can quickly establish yourselves as
experts in a desired field," Hogan says.
It can also positively
impact your SEO.
"By blogging at
least twice a week, you significantly increase your website's ability to be
found on search engines," adds Mike Lieberman, chief marketing scientist
and president,Square 2
Marketing. "The more you blog, the more traffic your site will
get from Google, Yahoo and Bing... [because] you are adding fresh content to
your site [assuming your blog resides on your company website]," he says.
And "if each of your blog posts includes a call to action, you might even
generate some leads from your blog."
Business owners and managers should also consider guest blogging"Guest
blogging is one of the best marketing tools I've ever found," says Susan
Payton, president, Egg Marketing
& Communications. "By contributing to relevant blogs with
useful content, you can expand your reach and show off your knowledge."
Moreover, you can typically link to your website via your author bio,
"making it easy for people to visit your site."
2. Leverage social
media. "If your
small business isn't using social media, it's time to start," says Mike
Volpe, CMO, HubSpot, which specializes
in inbound marketing. "Social media produces almost double the marketing
leads of trade shows, telemarketing or direct mail."
Because social media
can be (or seem) overwhelming, "choose one social media platform that your
customers, prospects, and industry leaders engage with the most -- be it
Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google+ -- and start building a presence
there," Volpe says. "Once you've set up an account, start connecting
sharing your original content, joining discussions and engaging with the
community. Keep your social efforts frequent, but above all, relevant and
helpful to your audience."
3. Create a Facebook
business page and use Facebook advertising. "Facebook is one of the most important marketing
tools for any business to use, especially a small business," says Tori
Hoffman, the social media strategist at Potratz,
an automotive advertising agency.
"Americans spend
one out of every seven minutes on social media, providing a huge opportunity
for small business owners to build a relationship with fans by sharing relevant
content and interacting by commenting and liking fans' comments," Hoffman
says. "The more a user interacts with a page, the more likely their
friends are to see it, increasing awareness."
"We have been
having great success for our mobile marketing clients with Facebook
advertising," says Bob Bentz, president ofATS Mobile, a mobile marketing agency.
"The ads appear right in the news feed so it's really impossible to miss.
It is especially effective with local clients, because there is virtually no
waste as with traditional media," he says.
"A local
restaurant, for instance, can promote just to the zip codes where it draws
from. It can even target specific age groups and sex," Bentz says.
"Best of all, you can target those customers during the time that they are
most likely to buy; for instance, you can display your ads just before and
during the lunch and dinner hours." And if your Facebook campaign isn't
getting the desired results, "there's no long-term commitment. You can
cancel at any time."
4. Post to Pinterest
and Instagram. If you are
selling a highly visual product or service, say you are in the bridal or food
business, you should be regularly posting images on Pinterest and/or Instagram.
Posting is free and both platforms have large followings, particularly among
women.
"You can drive
major traffic to your website via Pinterest, and no platform uses hashtags to
build audiences like Instagram," says Eric Elkins, CEO and chief
strategist at WideFoc.us, a real time
social media company.
"For goods and
services specifically targeting women ages 18 to 65, [we] recommend companies
utilize Pinterest," says Ria Romano, partner, RPR Public Relations. "Since women are
inherently more visual than men when it comes to shopping online -- it's not
just a cliché -- a picture really does speak 1000 words," she says.
Indeed, "for every dollar a female consumer spends on our clients'
products and services they find on Facebook, the same shopper will spend $3 on
the same product or service on Pinterest."
"My favorite
place to sell my handmade jewelry is Instagram," says Mindy McCarthy,
owner of MinMac. "It's
the queen of virtual markets. Potential customers can scroll through your
collection of pictures and see who they're supporting," she says.
"They make a connection with you as a person, not just a business owner.
It's very rare that I post a piece of jewelry that doesn't sell within
minutes."
5. Leverage email
marketing and email reminders. "Email marketing is great for engaging customers, but
you're really limiting its potential if you keep it in a silo," says Ron
Cates, director, Digital Marketing Education, Constant Contact. So be sure to integrate
your email marketing campaigns "with your other marketing campaigns for
maximum impact," and vice versa, he says. For example, "if you're
running a Facebook contest, increase the number of people participating by
notifying your email subscriber list of engaged customers," he says.
"If you're running a time-limited deal or special offer, send a reminder
via email
"The impact of email is
undeniable," Cates states. "We've seen from our customers that
upwards of 25 percent of all sales of coupons and deals can be attributed to
reminder emails." 6. Try
PPC (Pay-per-Click) advertising/Google AdWords. "SMBs need to be
as targeted with their marketing efforts and dollars as possible, especially if
their product/service is location specific -- and PPC ads are one way to do
so," says David Waterman, account director, Digital Marketing, The Search Agency, a search marketing and
optimization firm.
"PPC ads can be a
cost efficient way to dip your toe into the online marketing world and use your
marketing dollars to specifically target the regions and terms that relate most
to your business," Waterman says. "Some media/marketing companies
even offer automated bidding solutions that allow the SMB PPC novice to gain
the same level of targeting and exposure without the heavy lifting."
"An efficient
Google AdWords campaign, where you are sure you know how the platform works,
can be a huge quarry of leads for small businesses," adds Kyle Peterson
of Clement | Peterson, a tech
PR and marketing firm. "Start with uber-targeted keywords, paying close
attention to keyword match types, negative keywords and search query results to
eliminate irrelevant visitors, like people looking for jobs," he says.
"Then, enable
some form of conversion tracking so you know that new visitors are scoping out
your business and not immediately bouncing," he says. "Scaling up the
spend is the easy part. Making sure you aren't wasting money on irrelevant
clicks is where the biggest AdWords challenge lies."
In addition, or
instead of Google AdWords, Waterman recommends small and midsized business
owners check out Bing PPC advertising.
7. Conduct webinars. "Use webinars to build your list
and generate leads," says Nicole Skuba, a partner at marketing firm Blue Tree Digital. "Webcast experts
say some webinars see a 70 percent rebound effect comprising those who viewed
the live broadcast as well as new individuals," she says. "Webinars
are also more interactive and keep the attention of leads or potential
clients."
Just make sure your
webinar is content rich, with relevant content (that is content relevant to the
target audience), well organized and hosted by someone with experience
conducting or running a webinar.
8. Don't forget about
press releases. "Competition
for visibility is intense," says Abby Hammer, product manager, Vocus, which owns PR Web. "Press releases help small and
midsized businesses amplify their content across hundreds of global and local
channels, allowing them to achieve the same exposure as much larger
brands," she says.
"By including
press releases as part of an integrated marketing strategy, small businesses
are able to get their content directly in front of consumers and connect with
journalists and bloggers -- interactions that can result in lasting
impressions," Hammer says.
In addition, the cost
of posting a press release via a wire service is relatively inexpensive,
typically $200 to $300, with releases being picked up by the major search
engines and thousands of websites. And small businesses have a number of wire
services to choose from, including PR Newswire and PR Web.
