Cheap But Not Easy - Marketing Your Small Business on a Budget

Print and radio ads that cost a week or more of your salary.

TV ads that cost a month’s worth of your business’ entire revenue.

If you are (or have been) a small business owner, then you know what I mean. Getting the word out about your business- at least through traditional means- is ridiculously expensive. And even then, it’s not always effective.

My computer repair business once did an ad on a radio station. In our eyes, we got a great deal. Instead of paying upfront for the ad, we essentially did a Groupon-like special. The radio station promoted our services at a special 50% off rate and directed customers to their website to buy the deal (e.g. $80 worth of service for $40).

Both the radio station and I ended up disappointed. The deal generated a whopping three conversions—$68 for each of us.

The ad rep, excited to be working with us at first, never called back after that first run. Even some sales people have dignity, I suppose.

So What’s a Small Business to Do?

Know Where Your Market Is

Running a local computer shop, I knew where most of my market was: shopping at grocery stores during the day, and going to and from work in the mornings and evenings. So that’s why I splurged on my company’s biggest marketing expense:

Rent.

That’s right. You might think we’re nuts, but we thought of rent as a marketing expense. You see, my partner and I could have run the business from home, or from some $400 per month hole in the wall in an office park. But we wanted to communicate professionalism (a marketing goal) and make it easy for customers to find us (another marketing goal).

So we paid $2,000 per month for a location right across the street from a popular grocery store and on a main thoroughfare where tens of thousands of people commuted every day.

No surprise, then, that most of our new customers were walk-ins at first.

Know Your Online Market, Too

After a few months—right around the time we stopped agonizing over using company funds to buy coffee—we turned our attention to our next most important market: The Internet.

My company only cared about people living in a particular city, so we listed our website in local directories, registered with review sites like Yelp and Google Maps (now Google+), and focused on optimizing our website for local SEO.

Of course, that might not work for you, especially if you’re not a broadly appealing service company. So here are a few ideas to spark your creativity:

• Are your customers interested in crafts and custom goods? You better be on Etsy.
• Are your customers savvy bargain hunters? Sell on Ebay and Amazon.
• Cater to artists and musicians? Join forums and social media groups.
• Sell specialized B2B products or services? Forums and groups are still great, such as Google+’s Woodworking or the Green Living Forum.
• Sell food? Register with takeout and delivery sites like WhoDelivers.com.
• Focus on a particular community? Find blogs and newsletters run by people in your area.

Establish Credibility

In today’s interconnected marketplace, establishing credibility is easier than ever. It’s also one of the best ways to market your small business.

For my IT business, my partner and I identified websites and trade publications that catered to the IT industry, and wrote for them. We always had clips on hand to show potential clients, and the “link juice” from the articles being published online also gave our website a big SEO boost.

You don’t have to limit your writing to the Internet either. Plenty of local newsletters and other small print publications are hungry for interesting content.

If writing isn’t your thing, try YouTube or Vimeo. Anyone can make a video these days. Use high quality equipment and good music, and you’re 90% of the way there.

Don’t skimp on your website either. You don’t have to pay a professional thousands of dollars to do a super slick custom site. But at least shell out $50 to $100 for a stylin’ WordPress template that fits your niche. You may be tempted to go with a lower-quality free template, but here’s the catch:

Most free templates aren’t SEO-optimized, and most of them don’t come with support.

Next Steps

Once you’ve established your business’ physical space, online presence, and professional reputation, then you’re ready for a few more specific marketing steps.