Steps to Success: Marketing Your Business on a Budget

Good news: You don’t need a huge marketing budget to promote your business. Why not? There are abundant opportunities to gain exposure through social media.

“Customer-ize” your marketing. Since social media is all about engagement, use social media platforms to learn about your customers, identify topics that matter to them, and engage with them rather than sell to them. Ask questions, solicit opinions, and find ways to strengthen connections. Get people talking about your product or service.

Platforms. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Pinterest are essential platforms. For these and others, there are many low-cost/no-cost ways to reach out. Here are some from an article on bootstrap marketing in The Balance:

• Blog: Start your own blog and/or comment on other related blogs.
• Vlog: Upload videos to a branded YouTube channel or embed video on your website and share on social channels.
• Post a podcast, webinar, or tutorial workshop, or host a real-time Q&A session.
• Use Meetup to organize networking events with potential customers and demo or distribute samples of your products.

Spotting trends. These approaches can help you spot trends. Focus on what people are searching for online; keyword research is an easy way to identify hot topics, and there are free tools, such as the Google Keyword Planner and Soovle, for this. Getting to know, understand, and communicate with your customers is probably the most powerful marketing technique you can use. Best of all, when you do this through social media, the only real expenditure is your time.