Businesses come and go with the wind of change. Since the Great Recession, small businesses have added about 10.4 million new jobs. With them expanding the job market, small businesses are emerging; they are thriving, but sadly, the impact one carries differ from what the others do in the same market. Some cement their effort while others lose their balance.
Not all businesses are set to succeed – mostly due to lacking proper planning to ignoring customer needs. However, responding to the potential pitfalls and taking the right steps in the right time saves small business owners from going bankrupt. Even if they have a low budget, they can still set up a fresh brand.
If you’re an entrepreneur struggling with a small budget, its time you change the way you look at your brand. This article walks you through 7 great tips to own the confidence to grow cost-effectively.
- Maintain An Exceptional Customer Service
Customers expect something when they come to a brand for purchase. And for a business, it must know what the customer expectations are and must be willing to exceed them. According to the American Express, one-third of the customers switch companies after a bad service experience. That means your customer base must be built with great care and consistency.
Since the center of your business is your customers, make sure you leave no stone unturned to make good customers. Respond to them aptly and make sure you’re providing over-the-top services to your audience because all the best brands do so.
- Promote Word Of Mouth
Given that bad customer service can disrupt your small business’s prospect, customers are also the promoters of your brand’s success. Give them excellent service, and they’ll be the loyal ones you have. And these are the customers who good-mouth about your service and become the reason to attract your new prospects.
However, attracting new customers can be 6-7 times expensive when you’re hanging on to a budget. While you understand the needs of your existing customers, treat them well and maintain a good reputation in the local market, chances are that you’ll effortlessly start a contagious vibe that won’t cost you a dime.
- Solidify Your Brand With The Right Content
Small businesses are the ones that usually lag when it comes to an understanding and accepting the power of content. Content is the king when it’s used the right way. You don’t need a huge marketing budget to spend on online and offline ads when you can do it directly with other fantastic yet affordable means.
Content marketing offers you an opportunity to establish brand credibility as it empowers you to showcase yourself as an expert in your field. You can develop a loud brand voice, have a great message, and incorporate them in every instance with your customers. Just make sure you add value to whatever you do.
- Crowdsource Your Logo Design
A logo and related visuals contribute significantly to the brand’s image. Though a professional logo design company in Dallas might be the first option to go for, many small business owners treat it as something a bit extra.
Thanks to the booming gig economy, you can now achieve the design upper hand by running a competition and choose the logo that resonates with you. The best deal about crowdsourcing is that you can have the logo design created within your desired budget and deadline. Moreover, there are several professional sites where you organize a competition and get the best design for your business.
- Leverage The Social Media Authority
Of course, your brand needs reasonable marketing efforts, which is meant to reach a bigger audience, promote your business, and increase your sales. Sure, you may create a website, but having social media profiles can help you drive traffic to your business.
Social media offers a platform where you have a creative opportunity to drive your brand and its image. On average, a business spends about 10% of their finances on social media marketing. Here, you must know your audience, analyze your competition on social media, see the platform your audience is interested in, and curate content as per the requirement of the social media culture. You might even introduce various social media marketing strategies to grab the attention of your followers.
- Partner With Sister-Businesses
Giants in your industry might have the premium access to almost all the resources and may have the flexibility; they might lose the advantage of connecting with the local brands. This is something that small businesses can enjoy because networking doesn’t cost a bit.
Start by teaming up with local brand in the area that offers services similar to yours. For instance, if you have an event planning brand, you can join hands with a catering business to create a sense of mutual benefit for both you. Not only will you both be able to retain your own identity, but will also leverage the power of recommendation and trust.
You and your partners can collaborate to ease the customer hassle and share each other’s content on social media. You both may also offer a reward system to give your collective services a boost.
- Reach Out To Micro-Influencers
Having influencers promote your product is considered as a working strategy. Take YouTube, for instance; the popular the influencer, the more followers they have, with which they might even get over million views of the video. But you’ve got to be a big brand if you want to reach a bigger audience.
Here’s a secret. You don’t need to hire an influencer when you can get a local micro-influencer to do the job just as well. Though they have a lower number of audience, these people are the ones to connect with if you want niche-related promotion of your product. Micro-influencers have high engagement rates, and the costs to appoint them is way less than a popular YouTube or Instagram star. For instance, if you run an online boutique for linen clothing for women, you can send your dresses as a PR package to the fashion bloggers with decent social media following. Micro-influencers are more likely to show your products on their social media as compared to the popular ones.
What do you think of these tips? Have anything informative to share? Hit me up in the comment section.
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