(Non Sottovalutare lo Scaraeo Unicorno)

Today’s topic… Small business marketing.

Today’s topic comes from Sherry: “What are easy and low-cost ways to promote small businesses?”

The incredible strength (lifting 850 times its weight) and resourcefulness (mandibles to access tree sap and multipurpose horns) of the small but mighty unicorn beetle inspired a few of the ways (IMO) small businesses can unlock marketing strategies that are easy and cost-effective. 

𝌞 Create Informative & Relevant Content

Create valuable content your audience wants: blogs, videos, and infographics that showcase your expertise. Use keyword research, ask chatGPT, feedback from customers, listen to discussions on social media, and explore relevant trends your audience cares about to find topics.Include content about you and your brand to build trust. Sharing your story, values, challenges, and successes fosters transparency and connection, making your brand more relatable and trustworthy.

📲 Leverage Social Media Platforms

Use social media to build a community around your brand by sharing valuable content, showcasing customer love, and offering behind-the-scenes glimpses. Focus on the channels where your audience is most active. Consider repurposing content you’re already creating (blog, email, website); however, ensure you keep it authentic and tailored to the platform at hand. Use tools like Canva to create customizable templates with pre-set dimensions, access a library of free and premium photos, and add simple animations. Upgrading to Pro allows you to create and save brand kits with your logo, colours, and fonts, ensuring consistency across all your social media graphics.

→ If you’re on Instagram: craft engaging captions that spark conversation (ask a question, encourage them to leave a comment.) Mix up your feed with photos, Stories, and Reels (the latter being the platform’s favourite!). Offer a peek behind the curtain with customer love, tutorials, unboxing new products, interviews, or a day in the life. Don’t forget to leverage relevant hashtags and interactive stickers to boost discoverability and gather valuable audience feedback to fuel your future content strategy (i.e. Questions, Polls, and Quizzes.)

→ If you’re on TikTok: focus on organic growth to start. Craft engaging (informative and entertaining) content that resonates with your audience. Creatively showcase your products (in action, tutorials, benefits, and humour) and leverage relevant trends and hashtags to help increase visibility and engagement organically. Don’t forget location tags to boost local discoverability. Offer behind-the-scenes peeks to build connections. Plus, TikTok allows images too, for added content flexibility.

→ If you’re on Pinterestorganize your content with clear, keyword-rich board titles and descriptions. Pinterest isn’t just for inspiration; it’s a powerful search engine for your modern shoppers! Boost discoverability by strategically using keywords throughout your profile, boards, captions, and descriptions. To engage your audience further, consider creating collaborative, invitation-only boards to expand your reach and attract more potential customers.

👥 Encourage User-Generated Content

Motivate your customers to create and share content related to your business. Encourage customers to share their experiences with your brand using a specific hashtag. This builds trust, promotes user engagement, extends your reach organically, and gives you another source for content. 

⏳ Automate Your Email Marketing

Boost sales, save time and nurture customers with automation. Segment your list and create automated workflows (welcome emails, abandoned cart reminders) that deliver targeted messages based on customer behaviour and interests. This not only saves you time but also personalizes the experience, increasing engagement and sales with well-timed triggers (like abandoned cart reminders) that nudge customers towards a purchase.

🤳🏻 Maximize Impact with Micro/Nano Influencers

Engage with creators and micro- or nano-influencers who can promote your products or services to their dedicated followers. These partnerships are often more cost-effective than working with larger influencers and can yield higher engagement. Consider hosting them at your storefront for a new product launch, giving them first access to the product or service and product discounts that they can offer their followers.Other ways to work with micro/nano influencers is to send them products for reviews (as shareable content); partner with them to run giveaways or contests, which can help boost your brand visibility and follower count. 

🤝 Collaborate with Complementary Businesses

Partner with other local businesses that complement your offerings to cross-promote and share resources. 

The above are just some of the ways to ignite your small business marketing journey. As always, there’s more to explore!Sherry, I hope this addresses your question. Thanks again for sending it through. 

Yours Truly,

Di