New Marketing Methods: 10 Techniques Suitable for Small Businesses
Are you looking for new and effective marketing methods? Did you know that the success of your business stems from good marketing at the beginning, and then your ability to retain customers later? The goal of marketing is to connect the value your business provides with the customer base that needs that value. This is a simple concept, but it takes a million forms.
In fact, there is no magic generic strategy that will revolutionize your business. In this article, we will share with you a list of 10 modern small business marketing tactics that have been proven successful over the past few years. In this list you will discover:
- Five of them will form powerful growth strategies for your business.
- Three of them are worth trying over the next month.
- And one of them can skyrocket your growth rate over the next year.
Top 10 New Marketing Methods
We have absolutely no idea which strategy will work for you. Because we don’t know you, we don’t know your business, and we don’t know your customers. But fortunately, “you” know your business very well, and you know your customer base. And after familiarizing yourself with the modern marketing methods that we will review below, your knowledge of powerful new marketing techniques and methods will increase, and any of them may hold the key to your future growth, and you will know exactly what you should do to market your business afterwards:
1. Partner with other businesses
Teamwork is always more effective than individual efforts, and combining resources with another business can help you do things you could never have done alone.
It’s usually best to target businesses in your local area, even if your customers aren’t local, and aim for a complementary, mutually beneficial agreement. Some examples of joint ventures include:
- A coffee shop can offer free coffee coupons to customers of a plumbing company.
- A marketing firm might partner with an accounting firm to recommend each other’s services while meeting new clients.
- A beautician can offer free manicure sessions to clients of a hair salon.
The possibilities are endless. Identify a point of intersection between your audience and that of another business that isn’t your competitor, and find a way to exploit that intersection in a way that benefits both of you.
2. Promote a free consultation.
People want to consult experts when it comes to professional services. If you can establish your feet as an expert in your field, you will be able to get new leads easily using the free consultation technique. And if your sales process is characterized by good personal interaction, you will be able to convert a large percentage of potential customers into actual customers.
Many service providers worry about giving too much information in a free consultation, and feel that potential clients may get the information and walk away, when in reality the exact opposite is the case. It’s true that freebies will take advice and leave, but these people aren’t the type to buy services anyway, and people who are interested in paying for quality service will be impressed with the value you provide in the consultation.
This technology is suitable for you if you are looking for new, effective and inexpensive marketing methods. But it is not suitable for all types of businesses, it will be a strong marketing opportunity if you provide a consulting service or high-priced services.
3. “Google My Business”
Google My Business is one of the most powerful tools you can use for your business. In fact, if you are running a local business targeting local customers, this is the most powerful free marketing method available to you.
Google My Business consolidates all the different Google platforms in one central place, this includes your Google Plus profile, Google Maps profile, your Google reviews, access to data in Google Analytics, and Google Insights.
If you have a brand with a unique name, you can use a large image that appears when people search for that name. Google My Business gives your business instant visibility and credibility.
And the best part is that getting a high ranking in the results of the “Google My Business” application is not difficult, all it needs is to improve your profile, and then just collect reviews and ratings.
4. Social media platforms
There is no substitute for using social networking sites in business and commercial projects, as 67% of customers use social networking sites for customer support, and 33% prefer to use social platforms instead of the phone. If people can’t find your business on social media, they will look for your competitors who are already on their favorite social platforms.
The question is not whether or not you should have active social media accounts, but rather how much time and resources you should invest in them to grow your social audience.
It makes sense for some businesses to invest heavily in boosting their visibility on social media. For example, Instagram users who follow influencers in the field of fashion want to buy new models constantly, so building an active audience interested in fashion will enable the clothing seller to establish a direct sales channel with customers. But investing in Instagram may seem inconsequential to some other businesses that will be suitable for other platforms to market their business.
The key is to identify who your customers are, and how you should communicate with them. If social media is the answer to both of these questions, then you have an excellent marketing method for your business.
5. Content marketing
Content marketing is defined as the process of creating content on the Internet for the purpose of marketing a particular brand or products, provided that this content is attractive, consistent, and relevant to attract and retain a specific audience, and urge them to buy.
In contrast to paid advertising for one-time and short-term results, content marketing focuses on long-term, sustainable results. The initial profit will be low, but sustainable growth in visitors, leads and long-term customers will be the main driver of the business going forward.
Content marketing is not easy, and it takes every component to do the right thing:
- Content quality.
- Related topics.
- Optimizing content to comply with SEO standards.
- Optimize content for readers.
- Write and promote consistent content.
The content is not limited to blog posts, but includes videos, online courses, and a host of other mediums through which people consume information. If you are considering using this strategy in your business, be sure to save the time and capital required for it.
6. Advertising on Facebook
Two million small and medium businesses advertise their products and services on Facebook, which is an effective and inexpensive way to market to almost any audience. Facebook ads are excellent at advanced targeting, and allow you to target a specific audience based on geographic location, interests, age, gender, online behavior, and many other factors.
In addition, the Facebook Ads Manager tool makes it easy to manage and test various ad groups, and helps you find the perfect combination that increases the performance of your ads without the need for extensive technical expertise.
If you’re running a business with a strong visual component, try Instagram ads instead. Instagram is a subsidiary of Facebook, so Instagram ads benefit from the same database and targeting options, and allow you to connect with the most visually appealing audience.
7. Google Adwords
More than 40,000 searches are performed on Google every second. No other advertising medium can get your business in front of so many people.
Google Adwords is considered the godfather of online marketing channels, having been on the scene for a long time. It is a competitive and expensive method, but if you are good at using it, you will achieve very good results from it.
Unlike all the channels we discussed above, Google Adwords is a very symbiotic channel that can be mixed with many other strategies to achieve the best possible return. It is also a paid marketing method, so it allows you to achieve immediate results, and you can expand it as much as your budget allows.
8. Offer incentives to employees.
Sometimes focusing on new marketing methods prevents us from benefiting from traditional marketing methods that are still bearing fruit. Referral marketing is one of the best ways to find new clients, and who is more qualified to convert you than your existing employees?
Your employees know your products and services well, and they know your customer base, and some of them will promote you without financial incentive, but the majority will not, and therefore employees who refer work to you should be encouraged to repeat this using financial incentives or other valuable rewards.
Hold training sessions and teach employees how to promote your business efficiently, but remember that this method of marketing will only work if they feel really positive about you and your business, and have a strong incentive to recommend it to their friends, family and acquaintances.
9. Coupon marketing
Coupons and similar discount tools are an effective way to build your business through sales promotion strategy. Coupons have proven to be a highly effective sales booster for businesses of every size and type.
Coupons will excite new customers who usually shop at your competitor and it is proven fact that customers will break their shopping routine and pattern to take advantage of good coupon offers.
The main goal of using coupons is not sales, the higher the discount offered, the more popular your offer, but the goal is to attract people to your store and urge them to try your product, and then implement customer retention strategies after that.
Whether you’re selling a product or offering a service, you can use coupon offers to quickly promote your business. If you understand your target market and have clear goals, coupon marketing can give your sales and revenue a huge boost in a short period of time.
10. Offer free things: samples, gifts..
We can understand offering free tools as a marketing procedure through which the business owner offers prizes, specific gifts of his products to potential and actual customers, for free, and the aim is to impress customers and gain their loyalty!
Such items and free gifts can be offered either in the pre-sale or after the sale, depending on the objective and plan set by the business owner.
When this strategy is applied in promotional marketing in the initial stage, the aim is to draw the customer’s attention, so that he thinks about buying, and this prevents him from going to a competing brand for the brand!
As for when the strategy of providing free materials and gifts is applied in the after-sales stage, the aim is to show the company a distinctive character that distinguishes it from other companies – a competitive advantage –
This contributes to gaining customer loyalty, so he always comes and returns to the same company to buy always, and begins to provide opinions and suggestions to his acquaintances and friends so that they try this company and start buying from it (and this is word-of-mouth marketing in practice)!
summary
The article can be summarized in the following points: These were 10 new marketing methods that have proven successful in thousands of businesses and that you can successfully use in marketing your business.
It is true that only half of these methods are worth considering when developing your marketing plan, but we think that three of them will be suitable for you, and as we said at the beginning of the article, one of these channels can skyrocket your growth rate over the next year.
The answers to these questions will determine which marketing methods will work for you, and which will be a waste of your time.
- What are the key demographics of your target customer base?
- where do they live?
- Where do they spend their time online?
- How do they search for the products your business offers?
- Who do they listen to when making decisions about your product?
Use the answers to choose three modern marketing methods from the list we gave you, then do some small experiments on each strategy to see what works and what doesn’t.