7 Ways to Cheaply Market your Start-Up Business
Marketing a start-up with a small budget is the best way to encourage innovative thinking. Limited funding gives you an excuse to show off your creativity and vision to the world. Here are 7 points you need to consider.
1. Your Elevator Pitch
There is one question that is almost asked every time introductions are in order “What do you do for a living?”. If you answer this too quickly or vaguely you’ll be missing an opportunity to best represent your company. With some clever word-of-mouth marketing you can develop a short and concise sentence that differentiates your business from others to create intrigue and interest.
2. Social Media Engagement
As the owner of a new business your immediate reaction or impulse is to sell potential business to everyone you meet. It’s important too make your company relevant to the conversation. Social media is the fastest and easiest way to engage with your target audience. Beyond listing your business on these platforms, be sure to reply to user comments, add engaging photos, share relevant posts and link blog articles that your followers will find interesting. This builds a good supportive relationship with your community and people will remember the attention to detail your company displays. Your social media comment doesn’t have to be generated by you, sharing someone else’s content can be equally as valuable as it adds to your company’s culture.
3. The Culture Of Your Business
Creating a company culture allows followers an insider’s perspective to the inner workings of your company. A blog can offer a simple yet enriching understanding of your businesses chosen field. Podcasts help customers feel like experts and well informed in the industry today. Speaking at events, big or small, can allow you to teach, share and open a dialogue with your audiences. Offering advice on forums like Quora can make you the “go to guy”.
Sharing your expertise with others through these mediums showcases your abilities and knowledge. This can have a ripple affect – Bloggers, YouTubers, Journalists and Entrepreneurs can create a buzz around what your company is doing.
4. Direct People to your Content
When posting content to your website, be sure to use keywords that are relevant to your specific company’s field – use these words in titles, posts, slogans and articles. Your hyper-targeted keywords will help you be found more easily on search engines, increasing your Google rankings. This marketing strategy is known as SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) and just using this strategy in a basic way can really make a big difference, and it may even be worth considering getting a dedicated SEO specialist on the case.
5. Vouchers/Offers
Very few people resist the appeal of a good deal, making vouchers and offers a great way of tempting customers.Research shows that four out of five customers use vouchers or offers consistently both in store and online. Distributing offers through e-mail is a great way to both reward loyal customers and persuade other potential customers to join your email list.
6. Giveaways
If you are having a hard time getting your business out there to the public, giveaways are great for creating excitement and establishing your companies chosen niche. Try targeting your already invested customers which then in turn may bring about newer customers through sharing or word-of-mouth.
7. Co-Sponsoring an Event
Co-Sponsoring an event in your company’s chosen niche is a fantastic marketing opportunity. It allows you to meet and greet your customer demographic, to listen and learn from them, research new leads and network with potential contacts. Better yet, presenting at an event can result in a lot of exposure for your company and further engagement with attendees.