While word of mouth is an excellent resource for small businesses, being able to confidently advertise the company on social media and through paid search is a great way to start growing your business beyond your base. There are many marketing channels you can use when it comes to effectively advertising your business. Identifying and reaching out to your prospective customers is part of the selling process. Despite many marketing channels, many small business owners lack a well-done marketing strategy.
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How do we source our data?
After analyzing more than 2,500 businesses that have benefited from UENI’s website building services, our experts managed to develop a relevant guide on how to advertise your business properly. Several marketing professionals helped us decide which marketing platforms are the most popular. Using the right marketing tool enables you to get in touch with your target customers.
What is more, our research includes plenty of advertising-related articles and guides from all around the world. Understanding how different Internet users launch their promotional strategies and gain website visitors has helped us decide which is the best way to advertise your business using various online marketing channels.
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Top 4 effective marketing channels
Being a small business owner comes with plenty of responsibilities attached. Moreover, making sure your company seals as many deals with as many customers as possible is a very time-consuming activity. But what happens if your current marketing strategy does not bring you the expected effects? Maybe it is the right time to switch to another advertising channel or try a multi-channel digital advertising approach.
The most popular marketing channels, according to a recent survey conducted by advertising professionals, are:
- Social Media Channels (including Facebook and LinkedIn);
- Web Pages (having your own website listed on Google);
- E-mail;
- Paid Ads.
Depending on your business model and what exactly your company offers, some channels may be better than others. But before choosing the channels that will be a part of your further marketing strategies, let’s find out what exactly each advertising method offers.
Social media channels
These days, many people spend up to 6+ hours on social media. Being a small business owner, you may not be able to reach out to a broad online community using paid ads. However, including your company in the local listings advertised on different social media websites is a great idea.
The main advantage of this method is related to the overall cost of getting qualified leads using a social media platform. For example, say you have a Digital Marketing agency that has just been launched locally. Attracting new customers and fulfilling your marketing efforts can be easily done using the free advertising available on social media websites.
Attracting new customers and fulfilling your marketing efforts can be easily done using the free advertising available on social media websites.
What is more, the total outreach of your social media posts is only limited by the time you spend building a local community and developing enhanced brand awareness. Running a local business requires local customers. However, especially when you are selling digital products, you can easily generate publicity using virtual marketing channels.
On the other hand, effective marketing strategies based on social media platforms require you several months of continuous work. For example, depending on your company’s products and competitors, developing a page with more than 10 000 social media followers may take up to one year. Yet, you should never overlook the advantages produced by having a strong social media presence.
How to advertise your business on Facebook?
Facebook is one of the most popular social media platforms available on the Internet. More than 1 000 000 Facebook posts are uploaded every day so the total number of users is definitely an impressive one. Therefore, having such a wide variety of potential customers helps you strengthen your company’s outreach.
What is more, creating a Facebook page is totally free. Therefore, you will not have to pay a dime for initiating your marketing strategy based on this social media website. One of the first things you should do when it comes to effectively advertising your company on Facebook is to create a business profile with an official page attached.
Create a Facebook business page and post press releases
Having a business profile will get you access to many extra functions, such as insights and statistics based on your followers’ recent behaviour. What is more, your timeline lets you post updates and keep your consumers informed about the changes taking place in your company. For example, you can post press releases whenever your company launches a new product or service.
One thing small businesses do when it comes to posting press releases is to hire other digital-based companies. Say you have a Search Engine Optimization company that offers services to local businesses striving for more organic visitors on their website. Yet, thanks to your rapidly-growing team, you can now offer website building services.
It is very important to let people know about these changes. And what better way to create a strong post than looking for the best online press release services you can find for your company? The experts working in such a company will help you inform the existing customers about what improvements you have done to your current offer.
Optimize your business profile and page
When it comes to creating an effective and good-looking business profile, there are several things you should always take into account. First things first, in order to promote your business you will have to join local business groups with similar interests. Maybe you have a plumbing company offering services in Arizona. One of the best things you can do is to join any plumber groups on Facebook and look out for your target audience.
Depending on your company’s business model (B2B – Business to Business or B2C – Business to Consumer), you can opt for groups where other business owners discuss their needs and offers. You can always get new customers at local events, especially if you offer a widely-needed service/product.
Another important section you should take into account when developing a strong social media presence is called Business Listing. This particular section helps you advertise your company’s services and get noticed in the local search results. What is more, if you are not confident enough in your social media management abilities, you can always opt for Facebook Ads to advertise your business. Of course, the overall cost will be way higher, but you might not have to wait that much for the results to appear – or do you?
How to get prospective customers on LinkedIn?
LinkedIn is another quite popular social media website. Compared to Facebook, it was originally designed for business owners to get in touch with other companys’ representatives. It is now commonly used for B2B marketing and hosting professional groups.
One of a few ways you can take advantage of the LinkedIn API is to use a lead generation tool. These tools help you connect with people that may be interested in your company’s services, without having to spend plenty of hours to find the right prospects. Yet, before jumping to such a tool, you will have to identify your customer persona.
Identify a client persona
A client persona is a set of characteristics that define your company’s ideal customer. For example, suppose you are a Digital Marketing company that offers Social Media Management services. In that case, your ideal customers may be business owners, based in a particular country and with a company performing in a specific niche.
After creating your customer persona, you can make use of the lead generation tool to search and connect with people that match your criteria. One interesting thing about these software applications is that they are so advanced that they can beat the LinkedIn Robot Detector. The platform’s API analyzes and detects unusual activity, such as a large number of connection requests, a set of repetitive messages sent to different people and so on and so forth.
Performing one of these activities will definitely raise a red flag and get your account suspended (temporarily or permanently). Yet, when using an effective lead generation software application, you can rest assured knowing your account is safe and your network is expanding.
Just like Facebook, LinkedIn is a rapidly-growing social platform. Therefore, being constantly in touch with your customers and prospects is one of the best ways of making sure your company gets a decent volume of sales. Creating a business page requires a lot of attention to detail. For example, it is very important to include a business address in your profile and contact information. What is more, posting a press release on LinkedIn every time something changes in your company is a great way of maintaining your consumers informed.
How to get potential customers using your own website?
Having a website is one of the most obvious marketing channels you can use to get new customers. Using Search Engine Optimization (SEO), you can easily reach out to many prospects with reduced costs. However, if you want to advertise your business effectively, you will need a professional website that fulfills a set of requirements, such as:
- Your site has high usability;
- Your site is intuitive;
- Your site is appealing;
- Your site is accessible.
If you are not a tech-guru that knows much information about how to create a website and how different Content Management Systems (CMS) work, you might want to opt for a website-building service. There are many such online listings available on the Internet claiming that they will create the best website on the market. However, practice makes perfect and that is exactly what experienced digital marketing companies rely on.
Create your website today with UENI
UENI is one of the most popular website-building companies available on the market these days. Using the simplicity-based approach, their experts will create your website within 72 hours from order confirmation. The one-time fee includes continuous hosting and 24/7 live support.
The websites created by the experts working at UENI can be easily used in different business niches, including Professional Services, Clothing and Accessories, Wellness and many other fields. What is more, the company has built over 625,000 websites since its initial deployment.
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Easy-to-use acquisition process
One of the best things about UENI is its creation process. The first thing you have to do is to pay the one-time fee which includes lifetime hosting. Immediately after processing the transfer, you will be asked to fill in a short questionnaire about your company – goals, services, business model, etc.
Then you will get your website within a week. If you want to edit something or add a particular section, you can always take advantage of the integrated and easy-to-use editor available. However, make sure you know what you do on the website. Changing settings you know nothing about will probably result in messing up your entire platform.
Another great thing about UENI is that you get a 30-day guarantee. During the first 30 days after your website deployment, you can easily request your money back without having to come up with a relevant reason. Of course, the website will be removed permanently and the hosting option will be immediately disabled.
One-time fee with no additional costs
The fact that there are no monthly costs associated with building a website using UENI has convinced many small business owners and nonprofit organizations to apply for this promotion. After getting your website launched, it is up to you to fill it with relevant and interesting content, in order to reach the first pages of search results. Online directories are stuffed with plagiarized articles and low-quality content. Yet, using your website as an effective marketing channel requires several actions from your side.
Extra benefits for your company
UENI also offers you an unlimited storage room for your contact forms. This way, your potential customers will always be able to get in touch with you in no time. Another interesting thing is called Testimonials Widget. This feature helps your prospects gain confidence while automatically syncing with the reviews you get on Google My Business.
If you want to sell your products digitally, you can take advantage of the integrated shopping cart. This particular function will let your customers choose what exactly they aim at buying and allow you to get insights from your clients’ behaviour.
To learn more about the pricing of the UENI website builder, we highly recommend checking out the official platform. There you will find a lot of tips and tricks about improving your website and relevant information about how the tool works.
The benefits of search engine optimization
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a procedure performed by website administrators meant to help their pages reach the top of the search results. There are plenty of SEO methods you can take advantage of. However, depending on your experience and SE-related knowledge, you will only be able to apply some of them, before actually getting to learn how exactly things work.
Any search engine (such as Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, etc.) has the same purpose: get a search query and return relevant results. But how does Google differentiate between your company’s website that sells Social Media Management services and news sites? The Google API works continuously to rank all the websites according to their usefulness.
Yet, the search engine results pages always look different, depending on what exactly your search query is. The first thing you should do if you want to get on the top of search engines is to make sure you properly list your business online. This means that you should include all the contact information, business address and everything else needed for the search engines to identify your company.
Domain authority
Domain authority (DA) is one of the most important things you should take into account when it comes to strengthening your online presence. Many popular platforms, such as local news websites (or a local newspaper), enjoy a high authority domain. This means that when looking for local initiatives, their results will be the first to pop up in the Google search results.
This happens due to a number of reasons, such as:
- consistent content flow;
- media outlets’ services;
- significant age in the search engines;
- broad target audience.
- having a relevant domain name
SEO: Advantages and disadvantages
Using SEO to get in touch with your company’s target audience is one of the most effective online marketing methods. Firstly, the cost is close to zero, as long as you do everything by yourself. All you have to do is to keep creating content, coming up with a cross-promotional deal or backlinking your website in the digitally-based local press.
On the other hand, if you want to promote your business only by using search engines, you will have to wait a significant period of time. Unlike email marketing and other marketing methods, SEO takes time to build up. If you are currently wondering how to advertise your business within a few weeks, you might want to try out other ways to promote your business.
In the case of SEO, the target audience must discover your website and the search engine bots must crawl your platform before moving it to the top of the results page. Yet, SEO is a great method you can use to promote your business and effectively reach out to your potential customers.
Especially if you own a small company, using long-tail keywords will help you narrow down your prospects’ search queries. For example, if you are a wedding photographer based in Denver, you might not want to target the keyword Wedding Photographer, but rather target Wedding Photographer in Denver. This will help your audience tighten up the search results and find the most relevant website to their needs.
E-mail marketing
Email marketing is one of the oldest channels you can use to promote your business online. Sending direct mail to your customer will help you ensure the highest chances of reaching out to them in an effective way. However, email marketing campaigns are not that easy to conduct and require a lot of attention to detail.
The first thing you will need is a client database that includes contact information. You can either gather email addresses using a newsletter or use the previously acknowledged information during the past sales processes. Current customers may be convinced to buy upsells or different products.
What is more, email marketing will also allow you to promote your business by synchronizing to local events. Say you own a car dealership that has been performing quite badly during the past year and a racing event is taking place in your city next month. An email marketing campaign informing potential prospects about your presence at the show may increase the total number of visitors coming up to your presentation stand at the event.
Sending an overwhelming volume of emails
However, direct mail should be used cautiously. Sending many emails to people that have previously joined your newsletter program may be a real inconvenient. This is a crucial moment when you should take contextual marketing into account. Contextual marketing is a communication method based on your prospects’ needs.
For example, if your customers have joined the newsletter directly from the Marketing Tips page, you might want to include an offer for marketing specialists in your next email. What is more, contextual marketing should be also applied when developing your website. Offering a great user experience is crucial if you aim at converting prospects into customers.
Paid Ads
Being one of the most popular marketing methods, paid ads are a great way of maintaining a constant flow of prospects. The main advantage is that you can always choose to show your ad only to relevant people. For example, you can set up a particular age group and other demographic characteristics based on your client persona.
Therefore, you will get a higher conversion rate compared to promoting your business to people that may not be interested in your services. For example, if you own a car dealership, your relevant audience only includes adults, because they have the right to drive a vehicle. Therefore, advertising your business on a social media page that has numerous teenage followers will probably result in a low conversion rate.
On the other hand, using paid ads will result in significant costs. One ad may have you paying well over a couple of thousand dollars, depending on the target audience and the duration of the campaign. Therefore, you will have to take this cost away from the profit. Yet, paying for ads may be worth it if you have a high conversion rate.
It all depends on how your ad is structured and created. You might want to hire a copywriter or an ad wizard for this task. These experts will always help you create an advertising post tailored to your company’s needs and expectations.
Most paid ads campaigns are structured using a pay-per-click pricing model. It means that you only pay for the visitors that click on your ad, not for the overall outreach of your post. Therefore, having a strong website with an intuitive aspect will help you convert more prospects/visitors into actual customers. Yet, making sure visitors buy something off your website is not possible.
The best marketing method for your business
Depending on the field your company performs in, some approaches are better than others. Therefore, it is all about tweaking and trying. However, according to our experts’ experience, native websites that were previously optimized for search engines perform better than other marketing methods.
Yet, we can not guarantee you a 100% conversion rate, using an email marketing campaign is less likely to help you acquire new clients than an SEO website. On the other hand, using a combination of the above-described marketing methods usually results in a broader approach. Therefore, you get more chances of landing a sale and earning more revenue for your company.
In order to ensure maximum efficiency and effectiveness, we strongly recommend looking out for a marketing advisor. These specialists are the ones who are able to help you decide which marketing method works best for your company and how you should approach the advertising operations, aiming at maximum profit.
Frequently Asked Questions (F.A.Q.) How should I advertise my small business?
If you are currently wondering how to advertise your business online, you might want to first assess your business model. Depending on what exactly your company offers, you should use several marketing channels and methods. Some of the most popular marketing strategies include a combination of Social Media Websites and Search Engine Optimization-based advertising.
Alternatively, you might want to include email marketing campaigns in your overall advertising strategy. Communicating directly with your prospects is a great way to promote your business. However, we strongly advise you to get in touch with a marketing consultant before deciding on how to advertise your business. Insights and statistics are your best friend when it comes to advertising your business. Make sure to always track how many clients you got from a particular marketing method and how their spending behavior relates to your expectations.
How can I advertise my business for free?
There are several advertising methods you can take advantage of if you currently have a reduced budget. These work best for startups and other small companies. However, using free advertising requires a time-based investment. For example, one of the most popular strategies you can make use of includes creating business pages on different social channels.
Yet, managing your social media business page will take a lot of time and may not have the best results. Another quite interesting advertising method you can use for free is SEO-based marketing. This will generate a consistent flow of prospects, without having to invest any money.
However, developing a strong SEO strategy requires a lot of knowledge as well as time for the website to deploy and get indexed by the search engine. Therefore, you might want to look out for an SEO specialist that will develop an improvement plan for your website, after coming up with a Search Engine Optimization audit.
Which is the best way to advertise your business?
Depending on your business model, you might have to choose between digitally-based marketing methods and physical ones. For example, if you own a barbershop in your city, advertising it in the local press is one of the best ways of getting more customers. Alternatively, you can use an SEO-based website to market your presence and help people book their place in your agenda.
One of the most important factors that should guide your decision is related to your budget. If you are a startup with a limited budget, you might want to opt for cheaper (or even free) marketing methods. On the other hand, if you are an enterprise-level company, paid ads may bring you more profit, regardless of the price paid for the advertising posts.
What are 5 ways you can advertise your business?
The 5 most popular ways to promote your business are:
- Local press
Yet, depending on what exactly you are looking for, there may be better alternatives for you and your company. For example, if you own a small business that offers only local services, a Facebook business page, a Google listing and a notice in the local press may be just enough to give you a boost in matters of profit.
On the other hand, if you own a digital marketing company that is able to serve clients from all around the world, a great LinkedIn account combined with effective email-based marketing campaigns will give you some of the best results. This happens because you can always reach out to a broader audience, instead of limiting your services to only a certain geographical area or a particular customer persona.
