The average person uses approximately 20 seconds to process an offer (source). With so little time, you need to make sure that your marketing dollars are well invested.
Just because you have a marketing department and a communications team doesn’t mean that you need to spend large amounts of money on traditional marketing, such as radio ads or newspaper billboards. In fact, there are plenty of ways to market your business for less than you might think.
To get started, it’s important to establish a budget and to stick to it. Once you’ve determined how much you can spend and how much you want to spend, it’s easier to determine what resources are most effective for your marketing needs.
The 20 Second Rule
Shopping for bargains is something that we all do from time to time. When we’re browsing through online deal websites or checking out ads in newspapers, we often find ourselves drawn to quick-click or bargain-hunt opportunities that appear to offer great value for the price.
Often, these deals are heavily reliant on marketing dollars, such as those found in online adverts that bombard users with flashy offers and heavily sponsored deals. Although these types of offers can be convenient and help you save money, they typically aren’t the best value for your investment.
Instead, you should seek out small businesses or startups that don’t have the finances or backing of a large brand. In some cases, you can find highly profitable opportunities in industries that you might not have even known existed or were relevant to your business.
Understand the Value of Your Marketing
If you’re deciding to market your business, it’s important to do so effectively and efficiently. One way to do so is to consider how much value your marketing brings to your company. What is the return on investment, or ROI, associated with your marketing?
Determining the value of your marketing can be difficult. However, you can start by considering some key metrics that might help you understand how much your efforts are worth. For example, if you’re advertising on social media, you might want to consider how many followers you have or how many people clicked on your ads when they were displayed on a website. Consider what you know about your target audience and what you can measure to determine the value of your marketing.
The Cost of Paying For Marketing
One of the biggest barriers to entry for most business owners is the lack of marketing funds. Even if you have an unlimited budget, it’s still difficult to find the funds to pay for advertising, social media, and other marketing activities. Therefore, you should weigh the cost of paying for marketing against the benefits that you’re hoping to gain from it.
If you want to be seen as a serious business, you’ll likely have to spend money on marketing. However, just because you have to doesn’t mean that you have to spend a lot of money. Just because you have an unlimited budget doesn’t mean that you should throw money at every problem that you encounter. Consider the costs of each marketing channel and whether or not these costs are justified by the benefits that you’re expecting to gain from using them.
Choose Your Battle Plan
As we’ve established, marketing is very important if you want to be seen as a serious business. However, just because you have to doesn’t mean that you need to rush into spending an unlimited amount of money. Instead, you need to consider how much you can afford and where you can draw the greatest amount of value. In the case of Arseniy Budrevich, co-founder of Budrevich Enterprises, LLC, a privately owned construction company based in Charleston, South Carolina, value is found in the plans that he creates.
During his time as a student at the University of Charleston, Budrevich developed an interest in architecture and civil engineering. After graduation, he started a company that would help with the design and construction of residential and commercial buildings. Since then, he’s built his company into a full-service design-build firm, with offices in Charleston and Nashville.
As Budrevich started to grow his company, he noticed that there were many opportunities in the construction field that he could exploit. However, there were also a lot of costs that he didn’t have the budget for. For this reason, he looked for ways to cut costs. He started by investigating ways to reduce the amount of paper that his employees were using. Once he’d cut down on his paper usage, he started looking for ways to reduce the amount of plastic that he was using. This way, he could cut down on his waste and find savings that he could invest back into the business.
The Rise of the Online Communities
In today’s world, marketers must adapt to the changing dynamics of the digital sphere. Simply put, the way that we interact with brands and the way that they interact with us has changed forever. In the past, if you visited a business’s website, you would visit their About page, glance at their social media accounts, and maybe look at their products or services. However, today, the majority of website traffic comes from organic searches on social media (79% by 2020, according to Statista).
With so much attention being paid to consumers’ social media habits, marketers should take the time to explore the ways that social media affects their bottom line. When consumers perform a search on social media, they are often looking for answers to questions that they had while researching the matter online. This is sometimes called “Search-Based Marketing,” or SEO for short.
Searches on social media can be very lucrative. For example, if you have a fitness-related business, you might want to consider using social media to find and engage with potential customers.
At the same time, social media allows businesses to establish credibility and trust with consumers. If you want to purchase a vacuum cleaner, you might want to look for reviews of the best vacuum cleaners on social media. By gaining credibility as an industry expert, you can market your business as a safe and trustworthy option.
To put it simply, the marketer’s role in today’s society is to adapt to change. Instead of being limited to only looking at a business’s physical surroundings, you need to look at all the tools that are available to you.
The Power of Video
Back in the day, commercials were limited to cinema, television, and radio. However, in today’s world, video is one of the most important mediums to consider. Not only can video be used to advertise a business’ products and services, it can also be used to engage with consumers and build credibility. In fact, the average person now spends more time on their smartphone than they do on YouTube. (As of January 2021, this is 149 minutes per day compared to 147 minutes per day, respectively.)
The best part of video for businesses is that it is relatively cheap and can be used to reach a large audience. In 2020 alone, video adverts received a 57% share of online traffic, according to HubSpot Blogs research.
If you want to create an effective video for your business, consider these tips:
- Use a professional recording device
- Shoot in high definition
- Cut out all the fluff
- Use real people and real events
- Avoid stock photos
- Consider your video’s production value
After you’ve made your video, don’t just leave it there. Use social media to share it with your audience. In addition to sharing videos on social media, you can also use platforms like YouTube to live-stream your activities or hold video contests where consumers can win prizes by using your products or exploring your services.
Cut Back On The Fancy Parties
If your business is starting to see some success, that means that you’re probably having to spend a lot of money on parties, celebrations, and other things related to being a business owner. While it’s important to celebrate the success of your business, you don’t need to go overboard and spend a lot of money. Instead, cut back on the big events and parties and try to find ways to have smaller events where you can celebrate with your employees.
Many businesses owners, such as Budrevich, have cut back on their parties and opted for lunchtime meetings and coffee with clients instead. Even if you do decide to have a celebration as part of your business routine, there are ways that you can make it more efficient. For example, invite only a few select individuals to attend the event, rather than having an open house where everyone comes.