I responded to a post today from someone who was frustrated that there really isn’t much information out there on how to market your business when you don’t have much money and you have some major responsibilities like a family to support.
I can totally empathize with that since I have a family to support too and have been through this challenge in the past. So I created a list of 5 Free and Low Cost Strategies to market your service if you have a limited marketing budget.
I’m sure there are a million ways but here are 5 that I came up with:
1. Email Newsletters
Cost: Free
Do you know some potential customers? Call them and ask them if it would be ok to send them an email once or twice a month with information that could help their business. Use your email program, Outlook, Gmail or whatever you use and start creating articles to send to them. Stay away from trying to sell them, you want to inform them about the benefits your service would provide them.
2. Blogging
Cost: About $100 for the year.
You can get a domain for about $10 per year and hosting for about $7-$10/month. You can start blogging and attract some potential customers to your business who are searching Google, Yahoo, Bing etc for the type of service you provide.
3. Create An Entrepreneur Network
Cost: Free
Team up with some other startup business owners and try to help them grow their business. I know this sounds really counter-intuitive but for me (and I think for most people) it is easier to think of ways to help other people than it is to help yourself. Plus, when you start helping other people, other people will start helping you. It’s a beautiful thing. Plus you will increase your network and that will help build awareness of your business and start getting you some referrals.
4. Contribute To Blogs and Forums
Cost: Free
What is your business? Are there any blogs or forums out there that are talking about topics related to your business? Yes there are. Type in a word to describe your business like “computer software” and then add the word blog or forum so the search would be “computer software blog” or “computer software forum”. You will get a list of blogs or forums that you can go to, search some of the conversation going on and then respond when you feel you have something valuable to add to the conversation. If you do a good job responding, you will show that you really know what you’re talking about and people from those blogs or forums will come visit your website, get to know more about you and contact you for more information or to buy your products or services.
5. Beat The Streets with a Flyer ($10 for Paper)
Cost: $5 for the paper
Don’t worry, I’m not talking about doing hard-core door to door selling. I always HATED that in sales. What I did a lot because it was easy and very effective was create a flyer on bright colored paper with a picture, an interesting or funny headline (that pertains to the picture), 5 bullet points that people should know about my product or service and a “call to action” that included some type of free gift.
So What Do You think?
Could you use any of these strategies?
Have you or used or heard about any creative ways to market a business?
