42 Low-Cost Ways to Promote Your Business

by Janet Attard

Are you starting a business on a shoestring or need ways to stretch your small business marketing budget? Marketing a business doesn't have to cost a lot. Here are 42 low-cost, high-impact methods to advertise and promote your business.



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How can you promote your business when money is tight or you’re just starting up? How can you advertise your business and get your name in front of potential prospects on a limited budget? How can you market your business in the most cost-effective way?



Promoting a business is an ongoing challenge for small businesses. Whether you're just starting out or have been in business for years, these proven advertising and marketing tactics will help your business find new customers without spending a fortune.





42 Ways to Promote Your Business

Plan your marketing. To market your business successfully you need a planned, organized approach. Hit or miss marketing wastes time and money. Start by defining your marketing strategy and setting a budget. Identify your best prospects, and then determine the best promotional strategies to reach them. Be as specific as possible. Is the decision maker the CTO of the company, the director of human resources, or a 37-year-old working mom? Will you find them on Twitter, Google Plus, Pinterest, Facebook, YouTube or Instagram? What about in-person networking at local business meetings advertising marketing plan worksheet If you don't have a website, get one set up. A working website is critical for marketing your business even if your business has a big social media following. Depending what you sell, your website serves as a lead generation tool, online brochure, catalog, and information source for your potential customers. You have complete control over how you promote your products and services on your website and how long promotions and other content is visible. You don’t have that control with social media. If you can't afford to have someone custom design your website, set up your site using one of the companies like Wix, SquareSpace or Godaddy that provide templates and tools that make it easy to create a basic website. Whether you choose a ready-to- use template, or have someone build a site for you, be sure the design is responsive. (In other words, that it looks good and is easy to read on mobile devices as well as on desktop and laptop computers.)



RELATED: How to Advertise Your Website for Free

Include a blog. A blog (or other written articles on your site) serves two functions. It informs your customers and prospects, and the content, in turn,improves your chances of being found in search engines. You don’t have to be a professional writer to add a blog. Just write information your customers will find helpful at different stages of the buying cycle or provide tips and hints on using what you sell.

Use Basic SEO your website. SEO stands for search engine optimization – in other words, setting up your web pages so the search engines understand the content of the pages and may link to you when someone searches for what you sell or the kind of information you provide. Although some companies spend a lot of money on SEO, there are a number of things you can do yourself to improve the SEO of your site. Among them:

- using a different title for each page on your website

- using phrases people search for in the page title

- including your business name, location and phone number on all pages on your site Set up a business listing for your company on Google and Bing. Google and Bing both offer a free listing for local businesses. To get listed on Google, go to Google My Business Bing Places for Business. Set up your business profile or page on social media sites such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest. Be sure your business profile includes a good description, keywords and a link to your website. Look for groups or conversations that talk about your type of products or services and participate in the conversations, but don't spam them with constant promos for what you sell. If you're just starting out and don't have a business card and business stationery, have them made up -- immediately. They tell prospective customers you are a professional who takes your business seriously. Your business card Get your business cards into the hand of anyone who can help you in your search for new clients. Call your friends and relatives and tell them you have started a business. Visit them and leave a small stack of business cards to hand out to their friends. Give several business cards to your customers if you are a service provider. That way, when their friends and neighbors ask them for a recommendation, they have an easy way to pass on your business name and contact information. Sign up for an email service, and send an email newsletter and/or promotional offers to customers and prospects for your business. Be sure you ask for permission to send email before putting any person's email name on your list. One good way to build a permission-based email list of people who want your mailings is to give something away. It could be a free ebook, or even a free tip-sheet on how to do something related to your business. If you're a health coach, for instance, you might offer people who sign up for your free newsletter a tip sheet with "10 Easy Ways To Lose Weight Without Going on a Diet." If you don't have anything to give away, try offering a signup discount on products or services as an incentive. An email service like Constant Contact Talk to all the vendors from whom you buy products or services. Give them your business card, and ask if they can use your products or service, or if they know anyone who can. If they have bulletin boards where business cards are displayed (printers often do, and so do some supermarkets, hairdressers, etc.), ask if yours can be added to the board. Attend meetings of professional groups, and groups such as the Chamber of Commerce, other local business groups, local chapters of national groups such as NAWBO, or civic associations. Have business cards in a pocket where they are easily reachable. Don't forget to ask what the people you speak with do, and to really listen to them. They'll be flattered by your interest, and better remember you because of it. Pay for membership in those groups that attract your target customers. If the group has a website and publishes a list members on the site, make sure your name and website link get added. Once it is added double check to be sure your contact information is correct and your website link isn't broken. Become actively involved in 2 or 3 of these groups. That will give you more opportunity to meet possible prospects. But remember: opportunists are quickly spotted for what they are, and get little business. While you won't want to become involved in many organizations that require a lot of your time in, you can --and should-- make real contributions to all of them by offering useful ideas and helping with projects when possible. Being active in local groups can bring you valuable word of mouth marketing . Post Interesting information and pictures regularly to your social media accounts. The information or photos should be interesting to your audience. Tips on how they can improve their life or business or special offers are likely to get the most likes and shares. Pay to boost your most popular posts on social media sites. Target the boosted posts at groups of people who are most like your customers. This can be an inexpensive way of getting your business in front of potential customers in very targeted locations or who have interests that match what you sell. Run a webinar. Pick a topic for the webinar that will be popular with customers and prospects. Some examples include important industry news, strategies for improving some aspect of life or business and ways to solve common problems. You could also teach a short introductory course in a webinar. Promote the webinar in social media and in your newsletter. Encourage friends to promote it on their social media accounts and newsletters, too. Require attendees to register with an email address so you can remarket to them after the webinar. Look for something unusual about what you do, and publicize it. Send out press releases to local newspapers, radio stations, cable TV stations, and magazines whose audiences are likely to be interested in buying what you sell. Post the press releases on one or more online press release services, too, being sure to include links to your website. To increase your chance of having the material published, send along a photo (but not to radio stations) with your press release. Editors of printed publications are often in need of "art" (drawings or photos) to fill space and break up the gray look of a page of text. Help Reporters Find You. Reporters are constantly looking for sources to quote in their stories. One way they find those sources is to use services that distribute their request for sources to publicists, experts, marketers and others who want to be sources. To find out when reporters are looking for information you can provide, sign up for these lists and scan them regularly. One such service is HARO (short for Help a reporter out), and is free. Another service, called PRLeads is fee-based. Write an article that demonstrates your expertise in your field. Send it to noncompeting newspapers, magazines, and websites in your field that accept submissions from experts. Be sure your name, business name, phone number, and a reference to your product or service is included at the end of the article. If the editor can use the article you get your name in print, and possibly get your contact information printed for free, too. Publicize your publicity. Whenever you do get publicity, get permission from the publisher to reprint the article containing the publicity. Make photocopies and mail the copies out with sales letters or any other literature you use to market your product or service. The publicity clips lend credibility to the claims you make for your products or services. Ask for work or leads. Contact friends, acquaintances, former employers (if you left on good terms), nonprofit organizations, schools and colleges, and even other businesses that have customers who may need your services. Let them know your in business and ask if they can use your services, or if they can give you the names of people who need what you sell. Ask Customers to Review Your Business. When someone is ready to choose a product or a service provider, they want to be assured that they are making a good choice. One way they gain that assurance is by looking at the reviews. To increase the chance that customers will leave a review, send them a note thanking them for their business, and ask them to review your site online. Include a link to a place you’d like them to post their review.

Related: How to Get Referrals and Recommendations Network with others who are doing the same type of work you are. Let them know you are available to handle their work overloads. (But don't try to steal their customers. Word will get out, and will ruin your business reputation.) Offer to be a speaker. Industry conferences, volunteer organizations, libraries, and local business groups often need speakers for meetings. You'll benefit from the name recognition, contacts and publicity you gain from being a speaker at these events. If your product or service is appropriate, give demonstrations of it to whatever groups or individuals might be interested. Or, teach others how to use some tool you use in your work. Put videos of your product or service on YouTube and other video-sharing and slide-sharing sites. Find out what federal, state, and local government programs are in existence to help you get started in business. Most offer free business counseling If you are a woman-owned or minority-owned business, post that fact on your website. You should also consider getting certified by private, state or federal organizations Send out sales letters to everyone you think might be able to use what you sell. Be sure to describe your business in terms of how it can help the prospect. Learn to drop a business card in every letter you send out. Follow up periodically with postcard mailings. If you use a car or truck in your business have your business name and contact information professionally painted on the side of the vehicle. That way your means of transportation becomes a vehicle for advertising your business. Use a magnetic sign on your vehicle . If you don’t want to have your name painted on your car or truck, order a magnetic sign with your name, logo phone number and slogan. You can get them in various sizes and can remove them whenever you want. Magnetic signs can be ordered through many online printing and sign shops and are very reasonably priced. Get on the telephone and make "cold calls." These are calls to people who you would like to do business with. Briefly describe what you do and ask for an appointment to talk to them about ways you can help them meet a need or solve a problem. Get samples of your product or your work into as many hands as possible. Offer a free, no-obligation consultation to people you think could use your services. During such consultations offer some practical suggestions or ideas--and before you leave ask for an "order" to implement the ideas. Learn to ask for referrals. A satisfied customer is often glad to refer you to their friends. Help them remember to do so by asking for referrals, and leaving them extra business cards or fliers that they can give to their friends and family who need your services. If someone gives you a lead, follow up on it right away. Use other people to sell your product or service. Instead of (or in addition to) selling your products yourself, look for affiliates, resellers or people who will generate leads for you in return for a commission on sales. Be sure your pricing structure allows for the fees or commissions you will have to pay on any sales that are made. Get together with businesses that serve the same market but sell different products and services. Make arrangements to cross-promote each others' goods and services bypassing leads back and forth, sharing mailings, and making referrals. Have sales letters, brochures, flyers and other pertinent information printed and ready to go. Ask prospects who seem reluctant to buy from you: "Would you like me to send information?" Follow up promptly with a note and a letter that says, "Here is the information you asked me to send." Run a contest. Make the prize something desirable and related to your business -- it could be a free gift basket of your products, for instance, or free services. Test buying Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising on the search engines. If you are not yet advertising on search engines search for offers that give you $50 or $75 in free advertising to start. Read the directions for the service you plan to use, and very carefully watch what you spend on a daily or more frequent basis until you are comfortable using PPC ads and see you are getting a return on your investment.

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About the author:

Janet Attard is the founder of the award-winning Business Know-How small business web site and information resource. Janet is also the author of The Home Office And Small Business Answer Book and of Business Know-How: An Operational Guide For Home-Based and Micro-Sized Businesses with Limited Budgets. Follow Janet on Twitter and on LinkedIn