Marketing for any business must include:

-      Determining your marketing goals

-      Identifying your key demographic

-      Developing a plan to reach this demographic

-      Implementing this plan

When it comes to marketing for small businesses versus large businesses, the principles are the same. The difference lies in selectivity. Large businesses can afford to spread their marketing initiatives over a variety of mediums, small businesses have to choose the avenues that will be the most beneficial.

Dreamscape has a lot of experience improving the marketing efforts of small businesses. Here are some important aspects for you to consider:

Power of the Internet

It’s very important that all businesses have an online presence. This should start with a well written, attractive, and easily navigable website.  But to further your outreach, consider creating a Facebook page and a Twitter account for your business. Both services are free, and if you use them well, you will see a positive return on your time investment.

Some quick rules of thumb: enter at least one Tweet a day, post somewhere between 1-4 items on your Facebook page a week, and always respond to people that reach out to you on both mediums. Your customers want to be valued, starting and continuing a dialogue online is an easy (and, once again, free) way to show them they are appreciated.

Budget Marketing

Beyond free social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, most other marketing initiatives will cost you money. However, there are some actions you can take to reduce marketing expenses.

Budget-Conscious Marketing Ideas:

-      Piggy-Back

• Have a booth set up at an event, such as a charity walk or run, or partner with another business to send out mutual mailings and increase your customer base.

-      Barter

• Offer some of your products or services for advertising space.

-       Always be “On”

• Take every opportunity to promote your business. When you send out mail, toss in a brochure. At the end of your emails, list your web address and a very brief pitch.

It’s important to remember that any marketing effort, no matter how expensive or cheap, will do you no good if you’re reaching out to the wrong demographic. Always take the time to determine your demographic.

If you do this, chances are your “small business” won’t stay small for very long.

Facebook has been sued several times over privacy concerns. They’ve recently attempted to mend many of their security loopholes, but the platform is not airtight.

If you read the Facebook privacy policy, you will see that although you can control your privacy on the site to a certain degree, Facebook does have leeway with some of your content. Take for example, this statement in clause #3:

Even after you remove information from your profile or delete your account, copies of that information may remain viewable elsewhere to the extent it has been shared with others, it was otherwise distributed pursuant to your privacy settings, or it was copied or stored by other users.

Most Facebook users take for granted the “safety” of Facebook and many don’t consider Internet privacy in general. What’s important to remember is, once information is placed online, others can always find a way to access it.

Facebook as a Marketing Tool

From a marketing end, Facebook is a great tool. Beyond being a place for business-customer dialogue, many companies do well in developing applications (such as quizzes) that are entertaining for users. But it’s important to use user’s information cautiously. Certain applications that you may develop, could, if used improperly, get you sued. All press is good press – until you threaten your customers’ security.

Your Personal Facebook

On the other end, Facebook, and other social media sites like Twitter, can be very dangerous to your business. It’s important that your keep your personal life as private as possible. You never know what may offend potential customers. Let people follow your businesses’ Facebook page, but not your personal one.

The bottom line when it comes to putting anything on the Internet, is consider what your customers would think. If it’s something that may risk the positive perception of your business, don’t put it on the web. But if you must, make it as private as possible – at your own risk.

Establishing a relationship with a potential customer or a current one is an effective way to ensure profit. With the advent of the Internet and social media, it’s much easier than ever before.

Internet:

-      Create a content rich and attractive website. Make your domain name easy to find and search.

-      Offer options for customers, in store (if applicable) and online, to subscribe to your newsletter for additional savings. Use the form to learn more about your customer so you can make your e-mails more relevant (and therefore more personal).

Social Media:

-      Create a Twitter page where customers can learn more about what’s going on “behind the scenes.” Even better, use the format to respond to questions and to create conversations. Use Facebook in a similar way.

-      Encourage current customers to review your products or services on sites such as Yelp.com or Amazon.com. There’s great power in “word-of-mouth.”

-      Make your blog RSS feed compatible. This way readers can stay both current on your content and easily share it with others.

Outside of the customer relationship, knowing more about your customer base will help you to better target both the formation and marketing of your products and services.

What’s great about the Internet is it allows for an easy way of collecting data about your current and potential customer base. Here’s how:

-      Create a membership system, which allows customers to receive your newsletter as well as discounts. Request information such as gender and age in the sign-up form.

-      Use Facebook’s analytics to track who follows your business. You can learn such things as gender and location through this service.

-      Create fun Facebook applications, such as quizzes, which incorporate demographic questions, to help target the quiz results as well as gather information.

There are many creative ways in which to learn more about your demographics. But the key is to be constantly aware of the customer’s privacy. If you wouldn’t feel comfortable providing certain information, don’t expect a customer to.

Back in instant messaging’s heyday, I was always a bit perturbed when someone left an away message with a not-so-specific location.  “At the nail salon.” Now, I’d love to join you for a pedi, but where to head? I’m from New York, where nail salons are about as common as pizzerias, so a generic reference whittled the possibilities down to, oh, about 6 shops in a 2-mile radius.

Today, Twitter is the hot way to tell everyone your business, and–much to my delight–geotagging has made its way into those 140-character posts. Applications like UberTwitter can automatically post a link to a map of the user’s location when a tweet is sent via cell phone. It’s a virtual “You Are Here” for anyone to see. No GPS necessary, either; the application uses the nearest cell phone tower to determine where you’re tweeting from. That New York nail salon? No longer in question.
Imagine the possibilities for marketing. Have an event coming up? Tweet the locale, so everyone knows where to head. Off to a conference? Let clients know which hotel you’re staying at. Have a traveling business or delivery service? Ask employees to tweet from the truck so customers–and you–can track their progress. Geotagging can help target marketing outreach and locate new areas to expand business.
Now, not everyone dabbles in Twitter. It’s one of those “love it or hate it” things, but when everyone from Lance Armstrong to Auntie Anne’s is tweeting, it’s more “gotta do it” than anything else. Fortunately, the Dreamscape Marketing team can take social media off your hands. We’ll stay on top of the latest trends, whether it’s managing your Twitter account or posting news about your latest product on Facebook. A social media campaign can boost traffic to your Web site, improve customer relations and help identify potential business associates–just leave it to us.