How To Promote Your Business: 15 Expert Advertising Strategies

Businesses have the potential to thrive in today’s market, but they can also be buried by the competition. The risk of a business not standing out enough to capture a fair share of the market is why business owners need to invest in marketing. Marketing gives you the opportunity to get your brand in front of an audience that could help it grow.

The Importance of Marketing In Business

Marketing is a necessary part of business promotion. Whether you opt for email marketing to build brand awareness or you reach out to your target audience through your business page and paid advertisements, marketing helps you get your message out and build awareness of your brand.

With marketing, it’s possible to help your business reach its full potential, letting it thrive within the target market. Good marketing will allow you to leverage your products and services to get the most leads, conversions, and sales.

Common Marketing Costs

Marketing isn’t always affordable, but it is important to know that there are free options. Free advertising includes word-of-mouth advertising, Google My Business pages, client referrals, and organic SEO traffic. These are all excellent types of marketing to take advantage of.

However, organic marketing techniques can take time, and that time can sometimes be the difference between a business that does well and one that fails. For that reason, you will want to look into paid options, too. Some common marketing costs include:

• Spending on advertising. Advertising may include billboards, posters, radio, television, social media, and newspapers. If you have to pay per advertisement, click, or email, for example, you’re working with a paid advertising method.
• Spending on printing. If you print leaflets, brochures, flyers, catalogs, or similar marketing materials, your business will need a printing budget.
• Costs for professional support. Freelance support in the form of content creators, artists, or designers may need to be added to your budget.
• Spending related to marketing tools or equipment. From customer relationship management (CRM) software to computers and printers, these expenses can add up.
• Spending on events that help grow your business’s audience in the local area or online. Webinars, travel expenses, registration fees, and other expenses fall into this category.

It’s important to keep track of your marketing expenses to ensure you are getting a good return on investment (ROI).

Understanding Your Target Audience

You know you need marketing to support your business, but marketing to the wrong audience won’t help. That’s why you have to find and understand your target audience.

Identifying Target Demographics

To identify target demographics, your first step is to consider who would use your products or services. For example, if you sell women’s clothing, you would first think about marketing to women. Then, you would funnel down further into women of a certain weight or age group, depending on the kinds of items you sell. You might break down your marketing into an even tighter niche, too, such as marketing toward someone looking for an evening gown or athletic wear.

Think about finding your target demographics—age, sex, location, subcultures, interests, and so on—before you set up any kind of marketing campaign. Doing so will ensure you’re reaching people who have a use for your products or services, instead of those who won’t be interested in what you have to offer.

A good tool for identifying your target demographics is Google Analytics. With Google Analytics, you can get better insight into who is connecting with your company and why, giving you a clearer idea of what your audience looks like.

Analyzing Customer Needs and Preferences

Another step you can take to find your target audience is analyzing your customers’ needs and preferences. If you have current customers, sending out surveys can help you identify how they’re using your products or what they’d like to see from your company in the future. You should think about the problems your target audience has and how you can solve them.

Conducting market research and looking into industry trends can be a great help during this process. You may want to review what your competitors are doing to reach target demographics and then take advantage of the work they’ve done to implement some of their keywords or content strategies into your own campaigns.

15 Most Successful Strategies To Promote Your Business

Promoting your business doesn’t just need to be done through paid ads or SEO marketing strategies alone. Here are 15 of the most successful strategies you can use to get your business in front of your target audience and ready to thrive in the market.

Targeted Email Campaigns

Targeted email campaigns help promote your business while staying in touch with your current customer base. You can use your email blasts to send out information about sales, offer coupons to customers, or just update your customer base on current happenings.

Curated Social Media

Curated social media posts are good for building your brand’s presence online. They’re also great because your current audience can share those posts, organically referring additional traffic to your company. Take advantage of posting on sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, but be sure to promote your business through social media content that provides value to the audience.

Strong SEO Strategy

Any website or advertisement should have an SEO strategy behind it. You need to research which keywords your target audience uses while searching the internet. For example, if you sell coffee in Georgia, it may make sense to use keywords such as “Where to buy coffee in Atlanta” or “Hawaiian coffee in Georgia,” depending on what you sell. Your SEO helps potential customers find your products and services, so do your due diligence and find keywords that reflect your company correctly.

Promotions That Speak to Your Target Audience

Most customers love to get something for nothing. Freebies, the potential to win a shopping spree through a contest, or discounts on products can help draw in your preferred customers. When you create a promotional campaign, be sure to set a goal for it. Do you want to bring more people into your store? Are you hoping to upsell items? Define what you want to gain from the promo before you set it up for customers to enjoy.

Sales

Having a sale is a good way to bring people to your business. Consider setting up a flash sale or a short-lived sale on a hot new product to get people to come in the front door. If you’re only having a sale online, be sure to promote the sale ahead of time to give people time to share your social media content and encourage more people to take part in what you have to offer.

Events

Holding an event is a great way to get your business out into the community and to help people see you as a local business they want to invest in. Get creative. For example, if you run a children’s clothing store, you may want to hold a holiday event with face painting or other activities for the little ones that will keep them busy while mom or dad go shopping.

Strategic Partnerships

Get strategic with who you work with to get your business recognized. You may want to connect with influencers on social media to build social proof, for example. You may also want to consider selling another business’s products with yours and vice-versa. For example, if you’re running a salon, you could sell some facial care products in your store, and the beauty spa next door could also carry hair care supplies from yours.

Free Advertising

If and when possible, take advantage of free advertising. There are many kinds of free advertising, ranging from free promotions by influencers who have tried your products to participating in a local event that lets you have free advertising space when you trade your time. You may be able to find free trade shows or gain organic traffic through a search engine, too, both of which allow you to promote yourself free of charge.

Manage Review Sites

Managing reviews is an excellent way to build social proof and use past customer experiences to build up your company’s reputation. Building brand awareness is easier with reviews, as is showing that you respect your customers. If they have a problem, responding to comments on your business profile or other review sites can show you do listen and care. And, as you get more positive reviews, you’ll build social proof that you do what you say you will for your customers. Podium Reviews helps you get more reviews in less time with its AI-powered platform. With more reviews, you can improve your business’s rank and increase your visibility to get more sales.

Sponsor Local Events

Sponsoring local events is good for two reasons. First, your logo or branded products will be front and center in the local community. Second, you’ll build a positive reputation by showing that you care about what happens in your community. So, whether you sponsor a youth baseball team or holiday event, your brand will get recognition by doing so.

Create Engaging Content

To encourage people to spend time interacting with your business online, you should consider creating engaging, entertaining, and valuable content. For example, if you’re running a med spa, you could have blogs or videos about the services you offer. If you have a clothing store, styling videos may help you draw in new customers.

Optimize Your Website’s SEO

Your website’s SEO is an excellent tool for bringing in new leads organically. With good SEO, your website can rank higher in search results and is more likely to be seen by those interested in the products or services you offer. Use keywords that reflect what your company offers and what your ideal customer base is searching for.

Get Involved in an Online Community

Getting involved in online communities can help spread the word about your brand, too. Consider joining forums, such as Reddit forums, to talk about what you sell or the services you provide. You can also create a Facebook business page or be active on buy-and-sell websites. If you have a website, consider building an online community on it instead of using external sites. Design a forum or chat page, and your customers may enjoy interacting with one another there.

Host a Workshop

Host a workshop to teach customers how to use the products you’re selling. When you teach a workshop, you’ll position your brand as a knowledgeable leader in the space. Workshops offer great value to your customers, and they can be a time when you can upsell, too.

Set Up at a Trade Show

If your products or services help within a trade, going to a trade show is a great way to get more clients or customers. Trade shows can be inexpensive, but most have at least a nominal fee to set up. Use that niche marketing experience to gather customer information and get the highest possible ROI on the investment.

Get More Reviews and Promote Your Business With Podium

With Podium, getting more reviews and promoting your business is easier than ever. Podium Reviews helps you build credibility and trust using an AI-powered business reputation platform that makes it easy to capture reviews from customers. Rank higher on Google, get more 5-star reviews, and enjoy increased visibility. Watch a demo to see how Podium helps you capture more feedback.