The first year as a new business can be a very hectic one and you will barely have chance to think, let alone develop a powerful marketing strategy from scratch. If you’re completely new to all of this, then you will need some help along the way. You can’t expect to become a marketing genius overnight but you can use advice from marketing genius’ to save you some precious time.
To get the best of marketing in your first year, talk to influencers, pitch to early adopters, pitch a story to tech bloggers, start an educative company blog, run a competition, giveaway something for free.
Encourage your customers to do the same. Learn about growth marketing techniques and apply them. Give something out for free. Surprise your customers with freebies. Encourage your customers to share freebies you give out. Whatever you do, keep your customers talking. Share exciting information about your product with your social fans. Share relevant company stories.
It is always a good idea to refer to experts for templates and best practice, regardless what you are trying to do and for marketing it is no different. Sign up for those marketing newsletters, read the headlines on the business marketing sites, do your homework. Whilst you might feel like this work is taking big chunks of your time, learning from the experts means that you don’t have to spend time learning the ropes yourself.
To put this into context, imagine developing and email marketing strategy from scratch. Would you know how to create an attractive, professional looking email? Would you know what content to put into your emails and would you know how to use segmentation to create an effective marketing strategy? If the answer to all of these questions is ‘no’ then you could definitely do with some help in this area.
Email marketing is a fantastic way to generate leads, whether you are selling flowers or providing will writing services. Getting this channel right can do wonders to your marketing success. You can also use free email template services to help you to construct a professional looking email campaign.
You should also have considered getting a website built, even if it is just to showcase your services and give your company an online presence. You really do have to have a website if you are relying on customers contacting you for your services. The first thing that anyone does to find a service is to type the keywords into Google or whichever search engine that they use.
Websites don’t have to cost a fortune so do a bit of research and if you feel confident enough to try and look after your own website, there are plenty of free or cheap web hosting solutions that you can use.
Whilst for some people, the idea of taking this on sends you into a complete meltdown, for the more technology savvy amongst you, this is a good way of keeping costs down. There are lots of templates you can use on platforms like WordPress if you feel this is something you would be able to make use of.
Last but certainly not least, social media offers a wealth of free advertising for your business. You can build up followings of people that are interested in your services and you can create content that will appeal to your potential customers and make them aware of your brand. You can create multiple social media platform accounts to reach out to a large audience and share useful content that drives people to your website.