Most people believe it takes money to make more money in the business world. Sadly, this may not be the case if you are on a very tight marketing budget. It is no wonder the biggest marketing obstacle for small businesses is establishing the right marketing budget. Sadly, you need to have a budget for marketing if you are to create enough noise around your brand. Here are a few tried and tested marketing solutions that have proven quite effective for shoestring marketing budgets.
The first strategy is to ensure you are participating in business competitions and awards within your industry. Such competitions can end up giving you a cash reward, recognition or even an online badge to put on your website. No doubt participating in such awards will boost your credibility a great deal, and your clients will find more reasons to be associated with you. In case there are no awards within your industry, how about you plan and host one to create the much-needed attention and connections?
Taking part in charity work is also a tried and tested way to create publicity and awareness around your business. It is important to note however that donating to charities should be done for selfish purposes, though, but there should be a genuine need to help. Charity donations can be in the form of cash, products or services, whatever the society around you requires. Ultimately, you will have improved the livelihoods of the people around you and at the same time create awareness of your business existence.
The third way you can market your business is to plan and host an educational event. It creates an opportunity for your customers and other key players within your industry to know more about your industry and while at it you will become an authority. A great way to host a successful education event could be through a webinar or a workshop. While at it, ensure the topics you cover are those that target the specific market that your business is more focused on.
The last marketing option you can explore is creating blog posts on a regular basis and making YouTube tutorials for your customers. Of course, you also gain credibility as you become more of an authority and expert within the industry. Still on point, you can decide to repurpose the old content into unique and informative content that your online followers can benefit from. Self publishing options include turning a couple of blog posts into an ebook or even a paperback and then planning on how you can reduce the self publishing cost.