Here at Stryve, we recognize that not everyone has a large marketing budget, so we have organized some tips to help businesses such as yourself practice in-house marketing and keep a consistent identity. It’s just a matter of being innovative, creative and consistent in your marketing approach.
1. Identify Your Brand
The first step in marketing is to distinguish your brand. It encompasses everything people see, hear, think and feel about your business. Below are a few questions to answer when identifying your brand:
- Who are we and what do we have to offer?
- What are the core values of our brand?
- What makes us stand out against the competition?
- What is our distinct style?
2. Target Your Market
Knowing your target market is key to determining the best advertising strategies, design approaches and resources to utilize in order to get your brand in front of the right people. Whether you choose traditional or digital marketing campaigns, ensure you are targeting a space where your audience is. Here are a few questions that will help you identify your target market:
- What are the demographics of the consumer that would purchase our product or service? (e.g. age, gender, career etc.)
- How does your idea, service, or product help your target audience?
- How do they consume media? (i.e. magazines, tv, radio, social media platforms etc.)
3. Website Usability
Your website needs to make it easy for a potential customer to find information on your company, product or service. It may be helpful to conduct a small focus group of your target audience and have them provide feedback on your website’s usability. Questions your focus group could answer are:
- What is your overall impression of the website?
- Were you able to find the information you were looking for? If not, what is missing or difficult to find?
- What suggestions do you have for improving the website, including design, information and functionality?
4. Utilize Social Media
There are a number of social media sites to utilize for marketing such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and others. You’ll know that you are using the right social media platform(s) if your target audience is using it too. For example, if you are targeting millennials in a business-to-consumer space, Instagram is a great choice with 53% of their users being 18-29 years of age. Once you have decided what social media platform(s) to use, the next step is ensuring that your content is relevant and meaningful enough to entice your audience to remain engaged. Start small by posting a few times a week and take note of what content they are responding to and what they find most appealing. Check out one of our previous blogs about how to create a successful Instagram ad for more tips.
5. Keep Customers Engaged with Email Marketing
Email marketing is a great way for new visitors and existing customers to get and stay engaged with your business. We suggest using MailChimp. It’s a free service that allows small businesses and organizations to customize templates and send targeted email campaigns or automated messages to customers. A few email marketing ideas you could execute with MailChimp are:
- Monthly newsletters that share information about your business
- Special promotions and sales
- Invitations about an event or fundraiser
6. Build Relationships
Providing a great product or service that entices your customers to return or to tell their network about their positive experience is a great start, but you should also be actively creating new relationships through networking. Think about participating in any of the following networking opportunities:
- Volunteering or sponsoring an event
- Reconnecting with former colleagues over coffee
- Attending a tradeshow
Great marketing doesn’t have to be expensive. The more creative you are with it, the better!
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