The end of the year is the perfect time to reflect on all you have accomplished and look to the opportunities that lie ahead in the New Year. Opportunities to increase awareness of your small business are just over the horizon, but ensuring sales success can be a bit challenging. That’s why it’s important to create and implement new strategies now for further growth.
Which marketing strategies are the most practical for a small business like yours? Below we’ve outlined three simple, yet highly effective strategies that will help you build buzz, connect with new customers and open the door to new revenue opportunities!
Strategy 1: Establish a Brand Identity
If you think having a clear brand identity is strictly a concern for big companies, it’s time to strike that notion from your mind. Whether you’re a start-up, a retail shop or a local service provider, you need a brand identity to build awareness of your business.
With a recognizable brand identity, you can command potential customers’ attention, create content that’s more engaging, earn their trust, and set the scene for their return.
To create a brand identity, you must focus on a couple of key areas:
- Develop an “elevator pitch” succinct, easy-to-understand summary of your business and the ways it can add value to your audience’s life. The average customer not only wants to know who you are and what you do – they also want to know what you can do for them. What pain points does your product/store/service solve? If you can successfully convey these points in a brief summary, you’ll attract the attention of your audience.
- Focus on the visual elements of your brand identity. This can be achieved by creating an eye-catching logo, establishing a color palette and choosing a font (or fonts) for your marketing content. Why are these elements so important to developing a brand identity? They work together and individually to tell the story of your business and keep your product/service on the top of their mind. When customers see your logo, brand colors and fonts on your website, social media pages, at your location and/or your traditional/digital marketing assets, you’ll increase brand awareness which leads to brand retention after continued exposure.
Strategy 2: Invest in a Refined Online Presence
Every business needs an online presence. From local brick and mortar shops to service providers to ecommerce sites, customers expect your business to maintain a trustworthy and reliable website. With a polished online presence, your business can increase its brand awareness, improve its searchability and offer a better user experience.
Some of the most effective methods of establishing or refining your online presence are:
- Ensuring that your website is quick to load, easy-to-navigate and formatted for all devices. Websites that take more than a couple of seconds to load, do not have clearly defined pages and categories and/or do not automatically format for smartphones and tablets hamper the overall user experience. That in turn will harm your website’s search engine rankings and increase its bounce rate (the amount of times a customer only viewed one page of your website before leaving).
- Providing a safe and secure site for customers. This is accomplished by including a SSL certificate on your website to ensure that all information that your customer enters (especially credit card or financial information) is encrypted and scrambled. This makes it impossible for hackers and criminals to access this private and personal information as it’s being sent between two systems. Not only does this increase your website security, it provides a better user experience and lets Google and other search engines know that your website is trustworthy.
- Claiming your business on social media platforms, listing sites, and directories like Facebook, Yelp or Angi.com. This will ensure that you are controlling your brand’s presence no matter how your customers, or potential customers, find your business. The opportunities vary depending on the type of business. For example, a retail store will want to have a strong Google Business Profile and listing on Yelp. While an accountant will want to have a good company page on LinkedIn and a listing on the website of the local Chamber of Commerce. Take some time to search for directories that are specific to your industry.
Strategy 3: Rely On Your Network
One of the best strategies to invest in for future opportunities is your professional network. The friends, colleagues and associates you’ve encountered during your professional career are often some of the most reliable resources for attracting new audiences and converting them to customers.
If you’re beginning your career and do not have a robust network, here are a few simple ways you can the lay the foundation for solid professional network:
- Join local networking groups – attend their conferences/webinars and get to know the various members to establish the roots of a powerful network
- Attend community events – befriend the local chamber of commerce and earn the trust of your neighbors
- Get to know the other business owners in your neighborhood and practice reciprocal referrals for each other’s businesses
- Spend time working at a coworking space, like HeadRoom, where you can easily collaborate with other business owners
Now you have three great strategies to practice in 2022! Here’s hoping you’ll open the door to many new opportunities and achieve success in your business endeavors!
If you’re a small business owner who’s interested in finding ways to invest in new business strategies, HeadRoom may be able to help you. By relying on coworking or shared office spaces you’ll be able to reduce your expenses. Then, you can use the money you saved on expensive, long-term leases to invest in new business strategies.
If you’re interested in learning more about our coworking or shared office space in the Philadelphia suburbs of Media, Aston and Wayne, PA, please contact us today. We’re currently accepting memberships for the New Year!