The Ultimate Guide To Marketing Your Small Business On A Shoestring Budget
As a small business owner, you know that marketing is important to the success of your business. But what if you don’t have a lot of money to spend on marketing?
Don’t worry – there are plenty of ways to market your small business on a shoestring budget. In this blog post, we’ll share some of the best ways to get the word out about your business without breaking the bank.
1. Start a blog
One of the best ways to market your small business on a budget is to start a blog. A blog is a great platform to share your company’s story, announce new products and services, and offer helpful tips and advice to your customers.
Plus, starting a blog is relatively inexpensive – all you need is a domain name and hosting, which can be as low as $5 per month. Once you have your blog up and running, be sure to promote it through social media, email marketing, and other marketing channels.
2. Use social media
Social media is a powerful marketing tool for small businesses – and it’s free to use! Make sure your business has a presence on the major social media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Then, start sharing interesting and engaging content that will help you build a following of potential customers. You can also use social media to run promotions and giveaways, which can be a great way to generate buzz for your business.
3. Get involved in your community
Another great way to market your small business on a shoestring budget is to get involved in your community. This could involve sponsoring a local event, donating to a local charity, or volunteering your time to a local cause.
Not only will this help you build goodwill in the community, but it will also give you the opportunity to promote your business to a captive audience.
4. Create a website
If you don’t already have a website for your small business, now is the time to create one. A website is a great way to showcase your products and services, and it can also be a valuable marketing tool.
Be sure to include calls to action on your website, such as “Sign up for our newsletter” or “Follow us on social media.” And don’t forget to optimize your website for search engines so potential customers can find you online.
5. Use email marketing
Email marketing is a great way to stay in touch with your customers and promote your business. Start by building a list of email subscribers – you can do this by offering a freebie or discount in exchange for an email address.
Then, start sending out regular emails with helpful tips, announcements, and promotions. Just be sure not to spam your subscribers – they should only receive emails from you when they opt in to receive them.
6. Send out press releases
If you want to generate some free publicity for your small business, start by sending out press releases. A press release is a short, news-worthy article that you can submit to news outlets and online publications.
If your press release is newsworthy and well-written, there’s a good chance it will be picked up by a publication, which could result in free exposure for your business.
7. Get creative with marketing
Finally, don’t be afraid to get creative with your marketing. There are endless possibilities when it comes to marketing your small business – you just need to get creative and think outside the box.
So, there you have it – seven ways to market your small business on a shoestring budget. Implement these tips and you’ll be well on your way to generating more exposure and sales for your business.
Business
5 Businesses that are Hot right now in Emerging Markets
Every business minded person is trying to invest in emerging markets now in hopes that profitable returns are gotten in the long run. While most European and American markets are grown and proven to be rewarding, they are fast becoming saturated hence the desire by many investors and even new entrepreneurs to enter emerging markets.
The businesses that would be covered on this list would be the ones that can be started with low capital because everyone knows that selling crude oil in anything country is profitable but how many people can really afford the capital and resources to start a crude oil business! The answer is very few people. This list is primarily for business minded people that would like to do business with low overhead then scale their business over a period of time. Without further ado, let’s explore our list.
1. Social Media Marketing
This business is one that you can literally start from your bedroom. There’s a lot of attention right now on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. All you have to do is a take a course on how to use these platforms to promote products for sale. The next thing is to hone your skills, do some work for free to build up your portfolio and get valuable testimonials you can then use to get your first client. From there, you can grow your business through referrals and more advertising provided you get good results from your marketing.
2. Gaming Platform
Believe it or not, having a gaming platform is fast becoming lucrative in emerging markets, especially the ones in Africa. On one part, the rise in these types of platforms could be due to the want of many African youths to get rich or cash out as they say by investing so little money. This business may be controversial to many, but platforms like this one amongst many others have steadily built their business to profitability.
3. E-Commerce
This one is rather expected. Over the years, silicon valley investors have invested massive amounts into the e-commerce scene in developing countries. Although, some of the e-commerce companies aren’t successful yet, but the investors are willing to bet on the economies of these countries blossoming over the next few years. This way, they can not just make a profit but also have bigger market shares because they decided to invest early. Now, to start this type of business, you need to have a unique e-commerce idea that you can bootstrap then convince big-time investors to help scale your business to help you become competitive in the market.
4. Graphic Design
Graphic design is a very good business you can get into with low capital. What you basically need to do is get good graphic design tools and learn the basics of graphic design. There are so many small-scale businesses being started every day in emerging markets that need the services of graphic designers to help create visual brand assets and marketing materials for them.
5. Crowd farming
From the name, you can deduce that this is a derivative of crowdfunding. Crowd farming has to do with a group of people pooling together resources to invest in farm produce on a large scale then splitting the profit based on individual contribution. This is the case with platforms like Agropartnerships and Thrive Agric just to mention a few of platforms that are taking advantage of the growing interest in Crowd farming.
Business
How to Turn Your Crazy Donuts Ideas into a Business
The donut industry is growing more and more rapidly every year. With big names such as Dunkin Donut, Krispy Kreme, Winchell’s, and Tim Horton being the ones dominating a marketplace worth $16 billion. Most notable is the sponsorship between Dunkin Donuts and one of football’s most iconic names, Liverpool FC. Because of reasons like this, we can see why the donut industry is on a path to more popularity, and we can see why someone would be interested in investing in a donut business.
But how do smaller donut businesses compete with industry giants who have endless resources and several thousand donut shops under their names? Stick around as we are going to give you a few tips on how to turn your crazy donut ideas, into a successful business.
1. Starting Location is Key
Opening your first donut shop is nothing like managing a whole franchise. But it’s too early to think about that. First, you need to come up with a good idea for your location. Do you plan on opening your first donut shop near the main street, where you can catch the eye of casual by-passers, or maybe a strip mall location would better suit you. A key strategy in selling donuts is to always have them on display on a large counter area where customers can see the goodness you’re selling.
Another popular option is food trucks or donut trucks. Selling your donuts from a food truck feels modern, but also classic, and that just might be the niche that works for you best.
2. Keep Working, When Not Working
Your donut shop will always have slow periods during the day. During these slow periods, you can brainstorm ideas on how to increase revenue. During the morning you can add a special price on coffee, or offer a free donut with every coffee purchased. You can also offer catering services for birthday parties, weddings, and corporate or non-corporate events where you can cater to them donuts or cakes, or donut cakes!
3. Figure Out a Solid Business Plan
Having a solid business plan is key for the survival of your business. Choosing to ignore this step will cost your business greatly. By having a business plan in place, you can turn your donut shop into a successful business. With a plan in motion, you can sell others your vision, whether that’s a loan officer or an investor… or maybe a friend who likes to help you out.
Your business plan should start with your executive summary, which is a brief description of what you’re trying to do. Follow that up with a finer description of your business idea that will detail all the areas where your donut shop will be a hit. Marketing is very important, so make sure to include how you’re planning on marketing your business, and how much money you’re planning to allocate in that field. One more thing that will greatly increase your chances of survival is identifying how you can solve some problems that are related to other donut shops or the donut industry in general. You have to have something unique about your donut shop, so brainstorm ideas on what will make you better than the rest.
Business
How To Boost Your YouTube Subscribers And Views Number Fast
As you might already know to be a professional YouTuber can be quite a lucrative hobby, and channels with millions as well as hundreds of thousands of YouTube followers earn more than enough to support their living style and families. The way you earn money on YouTube is through ad monetization as well as promoted and sponsored videos. Of course, in order to be able to live on YouTube, you need to have a large group of people following you that will then see the ads.
And though YouTube might seem like a fun thing to do it isn’t easy at all and you need to be pretty consistent and patient in order to be successful. Saying this, getting YouTube views and subscribers can be pretty hard at first, and you need to have a bit of lack and put in a lot of hard work in order for it to happen. Still, there are some tips on how to get a lot of views on YouTube and the main one is to post things that might be interesting to a wider audience, and try to make it viral.
Let’s take a look at certain tips on how to have a more popular YouTube channel!
Tips On Getting Youtube Views And Subscribers
1. Although you can find a lot of articles on how to get subscribers and views fast most of those are just a YouTube glitch and don’t actually give you persistent and real followers. Instead of trying to trick the system your best bet is to go ahead and start promoting your content. Do it through social media, ask your friends to share and why not visit multiple forums and post your work! Very soon after you will be getting much bigger traffic and enjoy the popularity!
2. Figure out a publishing schedule and stick to it. Saying this if you say news videos will be every Tuesday and Friday don’t miss out of any, and you will get a devoted and large group of followers that are eagerly waiting. This way you will show people that you are serious about what you do and that subscribing is a worth it option.
3. So, along with that, you should start delivering more at the beginning of your videos. This will attract more views as well as subscribers to your channel. Use the first 8 seconds to hook people to it and deliver the core of your video straight from the start.
4. Use Pinterest to your advantage. Asking someone to create a picture of your best YouTube videos, and investing in ads on Pinterest will bring you quite a few people and views in a matter of days.
5. People are interested in reading Amazon Reviews so use that to your advantage and add the name of your YouTube channel at the end of your review. And along with that try to expand your social media promotion and reachability to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc.
6. Also, when it comes to how to get subscribers on YouTube fast, you should start using the power of a good title. By creating an attractive and searchable title chances are your video will be easier to find and thus the number of subscribers and views will constantly grow.
7. And last but not least translate some of your most popular videos. Do it by yourself or hire an agency. This way you will be opening the door to an international subscriber audience!
Summary
YouTube profession is the one of future, and if you enjoy recording things, then it might be just the right for you. Still, it is important to be consistent and innovative in order to succeed. Doing this you will be able to increase the number of views, and subscribers fast, and enjoy all the benefits of YouTube popularity!
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