Do you have a small business that has both a physical store and an online store to sell products and services? When was the last time you took some of your time to evaluate your marketing channels and consider what could you do to improve your customer acquisition pipelines? There is a ton of fake marketing knowledge out there and most publications simply repeat the same things that have been told thousands of times. Let’s try to bring some really useful suggestions to anyone who needs to improve their marketing channels.
We still live in a physical world
Socializing with the local community is very important. People like knowing who they buy services and products from. So, being open and accessible is very important in a business environment where social distance and social alienation increase.
1. Organize Workshops
Every business is related to certain knowledge. If you are an SMB owner you have very important expertise. Why don’t you share some of your knowledge with your clients? Let’s say that you own a shop that sells homemade sweets and you have 20 different recipes. You do not need to share all your recipes with your customers. However, why don’t you organize a sweet cooking workshop? Announce a special day once or twice a year when you share your recipes and invite your customers to attend on one condition – everyone brings homemade sweets and shares their recipe. Then you bring everything together and create an annual book on homemade sweets.
It is a lovely idea, isn’t it? Your customers will be proud to see themselves in a book, you will have helped the creation and sharing of important community-driven knowledge, and most importantly people will have fun. It looks like everyone wins. Such an event organized once and year could raise your homemade sweets shop business to prominence and would earn you a lot of prestige. No advertisement can give you that.
2. A 3D Replica Of Your Store
Everyone is busy and most people need a good reason to go places and change their consumer behavior. If someone has a store similar to yours nearby, it will not be easy to lure them to visit yours. Especially if their local store is also a good one like yours. So, rather than going with any wholesale website service provider, like many others do, why don’t you speak to a web designer and discuss creating not just another website, but a 3D replica of your homemade sweets shop?
People would open your 3D online homemade sweets shop out of curiosity. If they see things they like, they will come and visit your physical store. Then you just need to welcome and greet your new customers.
The infrastructure that you need to create and host the 3D replica of your physical store, the technical support, and all the expenses would be $30 – $80 per month, which is really nothing. Consider using a SSD VPS with storage and enough CPU and memory resources, if your online 3D store becomes very popular, get bare metal server. Make sure that your website host provides managed services, so once your unique 3D site is up and running, there will be always someone to deal with the technical and system administration. Within the last two decades, it was the web designers that did that. However, with server management and software applications becoming more and more complex, the website and software application support requires team knowledge and therefore isn’t eh web designer’s responsibility anymore.
2. Maintain A Blog And Show Your Expertise
Having a blog is time-consuming as this is a sort of publication business. It pays off, however. If you have loyal customers, they’d love not just to look at your 3D online homemade sweets shop, but also to learn something on your website.
Interesting and useful content is still the best way to attract eyeballs to your business and to create confidence. If the overall cost of a website and application services are going up, for example, you might create a publication that explains to your customers how to keep their costs as low as possible, while saving their time and your human and technology resources.
For small businesses that need to create a customer base and grow their business in a very competitive market, a comprehensive marketing plan is not an option. It is a must. However, marketing is not rocket science. Simply try to do whatever you can yourself and then, you’ll find out what kind of expertise you need. Don’t be just another checkbox in a corporate spreadsheet. Use the services of MSP providers like HostColor.com. Be an important customer. You will always be one if you rely on your fellow small business owners.”