The importance of marketing in Small Businesses

Marketing is a crucial component of the success of your business. It’s what helps you gain customers and turn those customers into loyal, repeat clients.

The basis of marketing is building relationships with your customers. To do that, you need to effectively communicate the value that your business offers them.

You must also strike a balance between how much money you’re spending to reach prospective clients, and how much money you’re making in return on investment (ROI).

Marketing can help grow your business and make it easier for people to find it by building trust through brand awareness, allowing potential customers to see why they should be doing business with you rather than someone else.

What's guerrilla marketing?

Guerrilla marketing is an unconventional way of performing marketing activities. The term was first used in 1984 by Jay Conrad Levinson in his book Guerrilla Advertising.

Instead of relying on traditional advertising to create awareness, guerrilla marketers utilize alternative techniques, focusing on small group interactions and personalized experiences. They aim for a large return on investment, for example, one free television advertisement versus the cost of purchasing ad space during the Super Bowl.

Guerrilla marketing is highly focused and relies on attention-grabbing tactics that are specifically tailored to the target audience. A good guerrilla strategy is relevant to the product being promoted and takes advantage of current trends and technology.

Allocating a budget for your marketing activities in your small business

The first step in allocating your budget is to know how much money you plan on spending on marketing.

Your marketing budget should be a percentage of your business’s overall revenue — and it should account for the size and age of your company.

For example, if you have a million-dollar company, you won’t spend $100,000 on one billboard that would be a waste of money. Instead, you’ll allocate different budgets to various types of content such as video production, blog posts, etc. This makes sure that more people see it and get a chance to convert into customers.

Next up is tracking the ROI of your marketing spend which is key for ensuring you run efficient campaigns that provide value for every dollar invested.

Use the 80/20 Rule

The 80/20 rule is known as the Pareto principle. In general, it can be applied to many aspects of your business. For example, 20% of your customers will provide you with 80% of your revenue. Or 20% of salespeople will generate 80% of sales. Or even that 20% of mistakes cause 80% of problems.

Use this rule to evaluate which areas you should focus on and which you should let go.

For instance, while the majority of products in a store are not front-and-center (towards the back), they still get attention through promotional efforts and online advertising even if they don't sell as well because they are still valuable to have or have some niche appeal.

6 marketing ideas you can use today

Partner with Local Businesses

• Partnering with local businesses is a great way to take advantage of their loyal customer base and community following.
• This strategy is mutually beneficial. The other business will receive free publicity and the opportunity to cross-promote their products or services, while you can form a new marketing channel, access new leads and generate sales with the exposure they provide.
• For example, if you own a bakery, you could partner with an office building near your shop that encourages its employees to support local businesses by offering them coupons for your baked goods. If you team up with several different businesses within walking distance of your store, it becomes much easier to reach potential customers who have never tried your offerings before.

Referral Programs

A referral program is a way for your existing customers to refer your company to their friends, colleagues and family. Usually the customer will receive a discount on their own order for referring someone else. Referral programs are extremely valuable because they allow you to reach out to other potential customers without needing to find them from scratch.

As an example, you could offer a discount of 10% on a future order for every new customer referred by an existing customer. You can then invite your existing customers to share the unique URL that takes someone through the process of claiming their 10% discount (and making their first purchase).

To get started with referral marketing, you need:

• A way of inviting people who have already made a purchase with you in the past
• A simple way of generating an individualized URL or code that they can pass onto others. This should be something that allows you to track referrals back to an individual so that you can reward them afterwards (e.g., which customer did this person come through?)
• A website and online store where people can make purchases in order for the system to work automatically.
• An incentive (like a discount or free sample) that is high enough quality and desirable enough so that your customers are willing to put in the effort required.

Go Live on Social Media

You can post a video on Facebook or even live stream it to ensure that everyone knows when the broadcast will be happening. You can also consider what you want to discuss in the show and invite people to participate. When broadcasting, make sure that the links for social media are easily accessible so that people can follow along with the broadcast and interact with you as well.

Start a Blog

Ask yourself: What are your company's strengths? What makes you better than the competition?

You definitely have something to offer that people won't get from the big guys. In fact, we'd wager that you're a bigger deal than you realize!

If you've ever felt like your business was trapped in a rut, that it wasn't getting the recognition it deserved, you probably want to start blogging. The world of small business marketing is saturated with content—and being different or original is key to building an audience.

You can be different and still market your business effectively by doing what everyone else does: write blog posts about interesting topics (not just your industry) and post them on a blog platform. You can also promote your blog by repurposing content from other sites (e.g., social media platforms) and adding links back to your site so customers can easily share stories about how amazing what you do is with their own social networks. A strong social presence helps make sure potential customers are aware of what you do, leading them to buy from you!

Get Involved in Your Community

You don’t have to be a huge corporation or spend thousands of dollars to get involved in the local community. You can start by getting your company name out there by donating goods, services, and time to those who need it! This is an excellent way to encourage goodwill between you, your customer base, and potential customers. Some ways you can do this:

• Volunteer at local charity events
• Sponsor a local sporting team
• Donate goods and/or services to local schools and churches

Don’t have time? No problem! You can simply donate money. Sponsoring a little league team, high school sports team, or marching band is just one more way you can give back to the community.

Give Back to Your Customers

Giving back to your customers is a great way to show them you appreciate them. Customers who feel appreciated are the ones who will bring you the most referrals and repeat business. There are many ways you can give back to your customers, but here are a few ideas:

• Give a gift in exchange for a referral. For example, you could offer a discount on their next service or product when they send you one new customer with an email address (for future marketing efforts) and phone number (to call them with their thank-you gift).
• Give back to customers who refer others to your business by sending them something like gift cards. This way, they know that every time they refer customers to your company, they’ll be getting something in return!
• Be creative about it! Maybe instead of offering something free for referrals like discounts or gift cards, offer something more fun—like free tickets to see their favorite band in concert.

Even small businesses can market themselves with big ideas.

When it comes to marketing, small businesses often feel as if they’re at a disadvantage. They can’t possibly compete with the budget of larger companies, and it seems like there’s nothing they can do to get their brand out there.

But the truth is that there are plenty of marketing methods for small businesses, and you don’t need a big budget to be successful. In fact, many of the most effective marketing methods for small businesses are completely free.