What’s the number one factors that make a business successful and profitable? If you guessed customers, then you’re exactly right! In order for a business to acquire customers, people need to know about the company and the only way people will know about the company is through effective promoting.
Before the internet came and advanced the world, promoting your business was very simple. You weren’t bombarded with a wide variety of options to choose from. Back then, to effectively promote your business you needed to choose between handing out flyers, putting an ad in the newspaper, or mailing out postcards. Today, the options for promoting your business are seemingly endless and can be a little overwhelming for some business owners.
In today’s world of business promotions, you
have things like social media, search engine optimization, and much more! If
you’re a business owner who’s having a bit of a hard time trying to determine
which promotional method will work best for your company, trust and believe that
you’re not the only business owner struggling in this area.
Let’s check out a few ways that you can get
your business or product out there for the world to discover.
1- Team Up With Other Businesses
Sometimes in order to help yourself, you have to help others. If you’re a small business with a small marketing budget, consider teaming up with businesses that are complementary to your business to increase customers, which will then increase profits.
Teaming up with complementary businesses can include various vendors, supply companies, and manufacturing companies as well. So think of it like this, it’s really a win-win scenario, plus when any of the companies you team up recommend you, it boosts your credibility and vice versa.
There can be tons of ways for a startup to establish a strategic partnership; for instance,
- If it is a travel booking app, you can partner up with an established eCommerce store whereby they get a $100 voucher from you when they purchase $XXX or more.
- If it is a consulting startup, you may partner up with local chamber of commerce.
So, the options are unlimited, if you spend some time brain storming and finding relevant strategic partners. But, once you have them onboard, things can go simply great.
2- Set Your Business Up at
Various Events
Although today’s world is driven by digital technology promoting your business at physical events is still a great and highly-effective way to promote your business. Events like trade shows can be anything from local events that will get your name out there to local communities on up to national trade shows that bring thousands of people from all over the world to attend.
If you’re a local small business owner and
aren’t quite ready for the big, national tradeshows just yet, then it will be
very beneficial for you to attend local community events to meet potential new
customers. When you decide to set up a booth at a big tradeshow, you definitely
want to have promotional
products with your business name on them. It’s helpful if the
promotional products you hand out are things people can actually use. Some
great examples of promotional products include:
- Push-pull
water bottles - Drawstring
backpacks - Pens
- Tumblers
You also want to distribute flyers and leaflets with your
promotional products so people will have information on your business to look
at after the tradeshow. Because this is a digital age, you want to make sure
you put a link to your website or social media page on your flyers, leaflets,
or brochures.
3- Social Media Business Account
You’re probably thinking, how is social media
“out-of-the-box?” Well, as mentioned earlier, if you’re a business owner that’s
not up to par on the social media business perks, then it is definitely
something out-of-the-box for you. Hubspot
states that globally, over 3.2 billion people use social media!
Being able to keep up with the new
advancements is detrimental to the success of your business. The last thing you
want is for your business to be stagnant all because of being intimidated of
learning how to navigate a social media page. Look at social media as a new
learning experience that you need to understand to make your business
grow.
The fact that over 3.2 billion people use
social media should flash dollar signs in your eyes because imagine if you
could get your business out there to a fraction of 3.2 billion people… can you
even imagine how profitable your business would be? Some popular social media
platforms include:
- Snapchat
Now, you don’t have to have a social media account for all of these platforms but you want to have at least one or two of them. Plus, social media accounts will allow your business to reach several demographics too so you really can’t go wrong… you just need to be consistent with your social media page so people know that it’s an active account and can communicate with you.
The Bottom Line:
The list of out of the box marketing methods is not limited to the above discussed three options. You can find tens of other options, but the above list is a great way to get started.
