small business marketing ideas

So you have a small business but need some marketing ideas to get you going.

Marketing is not hard to do but just takes a little effort and time to be effective. We are assuming at this stage that you fully understand your customer demographics and their needs (if not go away and undertake that work) then you’ll know who to target and where.

Some of the best marketing ideas are of course completely free. If you are working offline in the “real world” then I bet there are customers passing your door every day. You can easily hand these people something as an offer if they come into your store - for example a collectors card, or member get member type scheme, or a free gift for orders over a certain value or a discount at certain times of the day or age related discount.

These are all aimed at people passing by, but what about the other businesses in the surrounding area? Many small business owners help each other out by cross promoting each others’ products and services - so off you go and speak with them. Will they put a flyer (and related offers as outlined above) at their check out area? Will they place something around their store or on their walls? Will they put something in the bag of products purchased in their shops ?

As you can see there is plenty to be done. Talk to people passing by your store and talk to other store owners (don’t forget that people passing your store may know of other folks who are interested - friends and family) so point this out when proving this information so they can spread the word of your company - for free.

Do you know of any more small business marketing ideas? Well post them below !