As a small business owner, you probably struggle to get your business in the same hall of fame as the big sharks, right? It’s a day-to-day struggle to stay on top of each section — promotion, networking, cold calling, convincing people to buy from you while trying not to be too pushy — the list is endless when it comes to small Business Marketing Problems.
But what if there was a method that would bring customers to you instead of you running after them? What if there was a way for your business to speak for itself? Or to have people willingly give you their data as possible leads in exchange for your expertise?
Luckily for all of us, there is such a method — it’s called inbound marketing. And it’s the best thing that has happened to the market since money. When properly implemented, inbound marketing for small businesses can bring you money in ways you wouldn’t even think were possible in the earlier days.
This is what you’ll learn from this guide:
Now let’s start.
‘Translation: no presence on Google. Even big brands struggle with this issue although to us mortals it may seem that their success just happened overnight.
For small businesses, it’s even more overwhelming. Regardless of whether the problem is a tight budget or lack of tech staff, the result stays the same — nobody knows you exist. And how can you sell your product and grow your business if your clients can’t see you?
According to DemandMetric, brands with a consistent presence are 3.5 times more visible to customers, which means they’re more likely to sell their products. Luckily, with the inbound technique explained below, there is an efficient (and cheaper) way to lift your cloak of invisibility.
Or more accurately — no niche at all. Many businesses make this mistake at the beginning of their journey. They try to serve everyone which leaves them with serving nobody. They focus too much on selling their product/service and its features.
This way customers don’t know what’s in it for them. They don’t learn about the benefits. Then why would they choose that particular brand? A study done by Contently, states that 61% of customers are more likely to buy from brands that deliver custom content.
The best way to solve the issue is to first niche it down as much as possible, and then decide who the ideal customer would be. After this, it will be much easier to create a strategy to sell to that particular customer.
This is what it all’s about — getting more clients, right? The primary concern for every small business marketing strategy is finding customers, gaining them, and retaining them. Sure, all of them know they should use the power of social media, but it’s difficult if you don’t know where to start.
The marketing method that’s explained in this guide provides everything small business owners need to know about web optimization, blogging, lead magnets, and some free tools to reach a greater audience, and with that, a greater number of prospective clients.
The toughest pill to swallow, no question about it. I can preach about marketing your business until foam comes out of my mouth, but if you can’t afford it, there’s not much use of it anyway.
Again, inbound marketing can be the big game-changer here. Not only does it include cheap strategies, but it also offers a set of some pretty cool free tools that can be used in any type of business.
Let’s see if this sounds familiar: You work your butt off to create the best product or service, you’re confident that it is the best, but somehow the right people aren’t interested in it. In the end, it feels like you’ve become part-time marketers instead of full-time product/service providers.
That’s because you haven’t identified your specific buyer persona. Like choosing your niche, you also have to choose your ideal client. Not only that, a case study in content marketing suggests that having a buyer persona can increase sales by 124%.
Learning about their pains and problems will give you a much clearer picture of how to serve your audience. When creating the buyer avatar, make sure you include both the current AND the desired situation of your ideal customer.
As an introvert myself, I, too, have been overwhelmed by the pressure of face-to-face networking and cold calling. Putting yourself out there as a promoter can be uncomfortable if you’re not naturally born to love the spotlight. Also, did you know that most of the marketing advice is written by extroverts?
Which doesn’t mean you can’t be successful with your business. Remember Bill Gates? How about Mark Zuckerberg, or Elon Musk? How shocked would you be if I told you they are all introverts?
OK, they might not be small-business owners per se, but they’re introverts and they run a business. That’s all you need for motivation. This is where a strategy in inbound marketing can solve your small business marketing problems.
Instead of you doing the PR or talking in front of a camera or just mingling with prospects, you can focus on building brand awareness and credibility. This way the customers look for you — not the other way around. Now imagine what a relief that would be.
Having a strategy is what it comes down to. If you don’t even know where you’re going, how are you going to get there? You’d be surprised how many marketers are struggling with this one — 70% of them lack a consistent strategy.
A business might be spending $$$ on marketing and still don’t know what’s working and what’s not. Or maybe the business owner doesn’t even know what the marketing budget should be, or how to track the potential client’s behavior on their website.
When you have a fully developed marketing plan, all these issues (and tons of other ones) will become more clear and provide you with the appropriate answer. Having a good inbound marketing strategy is key for running a successful small business. Check out what’s the most searched topic since 2020 according to Semrush.
Source: Semrush
Inbound marketing is an approach that attracts potential customers to your business rather than you searching for those prospects. This methodology makes sure that the right clients find you and that they’re more than happy to buy from you because you add value to them.
Why?
Because you’re already solving a problem that they have. The approach is more human, the prospective customers don’t feel like they’re just targets. Also, when it comes to decisions, the inbound strategy can play a massive role because those customers are already welcoming your solution to their problem.
Instead of you shoving your brand in people’s faces when they haven’t even asked for it, inbound marketing works on building real and lasting relationships with the prospective buyer.
source: business2community
One thing you should know, though, is that inbound marketing is a slow-burn investment. Let me demonstrate with some agriculture:
You buy your fruits, your veggies, your milk from the local store, right? Great, you do your shopping and you’re all set for the day. Or for the next 2 days. No-fuss here.
Now think about a farmer who grows his fruits and vegetables and has a cow.
And on top of that, his garden and his milk machine are probably the providers for the whole neighborhood — ka-ching!
The moral of the story: If you make the effort — give your time and patience, plant the seeds, and take care of them — sooner or later, you’ll be reaping the sweet, sweet fruits from that money tree. And this right here is what inbound marketing is about.
It’s not an overnight solution, but give it time and it will give you amazing benefits. All you need to have is perseverance and commitment to engage an audience that will more easily transform into a prospect lead.
In practice, this means that you create content or tactics that will spread awareness for your brand i.e. people will learn about you, visit your website for more information, and maybe show interest in what you offer and then make a purchase. This is organic traffic, and according to Ahrefs, 53,3% of all website traffic comes exactly from there.
But how will I know if I attract the right people?
Well, your best prospects are already searching for your services online — they do an online search for a solution to a certain problem they already have. That may be a product or a service they can buy, or it may be a guide on how to do something, where to find a specific item, or just solve a dilemma. Whichever the case, your content has to resolve their issues, answer their questions, or just meet their needs.
With outbound, the prospects aren’t looking for you. It’s a principle where you, for lack of a better term, intrude with your marketing campaign. The target audience is usually more general, so there can be plenty of people who won’t care about what you have to offer. Moreover, they can get annoyed.
Outbound marketing means that you as a marketer reach out to people hoping that they’ll be interested. And, let’s face it, marketers can be pushy. In other words, they hold control. Think door-to-door sales or cold-calling people who might not even be the right leads.
Newspaper ads, billboards, TV, and radio commercials are also part of outbound marketing. But this doesn’t mean that it’s a bad thing, especially for big companies. They have the budget and can spend thousands of dollars on a single campaign.
With small business marketing, however, you might not have that luxury. A tight budget can’t afford PR agencies, commercials, promoters, and all that paid advertising, can it? While outbound marketing does offer a more immediate profit, for small businesses it usually transforms into covering budget losses.
Yes. Because their budget is usually limited, statistics show that 78% of small businesses plan to increase investment in inbound marketing, while only 19% of them plan to stick to the traditional — more expensive — marketing.
source: Campaign Monitor
And because inbound methodology deals only with organic leads, this means brain trumps budget which is one of the best marketing tips for small businesses — you primarily invest with skills and commitment, less with $$$.
Since inbound marketing is a strategy executed online, it costs way less than all those techniques such as TV and radio promotions, print advertisements, expos, and so on. This way, you have minimal dependence on third parties like PR or marketing agencies, designers, etc. Also, getting leads through inbound will cost you 61% less than through outbound.
For example, investing in SEO will cost you less than investing in advertising because your content will be visible on multiple platforms/search engines. This way your budget does not define your business — you get an equal chance. And did I mention that SEO drives 1000% more traffic than organic social media alone?
And because it’s primarily digital, it’s a matter of minutes — nay, seconds — before it reaches a global audience only by tweeting, sharing, or resharing. If you play it right, here’s why it will shorten your whole sales process:
• you don’t have to start explaining about your product or service going back in time since the age of the dinosaurs: Your prospects already have all the useful information from the content on your website or from your social media accounts.
• your prospects are already “naturally selected” based on the parts of the content they respond to. They may resonate more with your videos or with your blog posts, but in any case, you already have the information about who reacts to what and in what way, so you save massive amounts of time on separate research.
• long-form content can often act as a sales meeting (think sales pages). This type of content not only saves both your and your potential client’s time, but it’s also permanently available.
Regardless of your company’s size, location, or budget, inbound marketing achieves higher ROI than outbound. Studies show that inbound generates 3 times more leads per dollar than traditional marketing.
It may take time to settle in, but it sure gives huge returns. No wonder it combines perfectly with marketing for small businesses.
Thanks to its digital nature, inbound marketing places you on the radar and makes sure you stay there. Have in mind, though, that for this to happen, your content has to be created specifically for your key audience in every step of their buyer’s journey.
And the more often you create quality content for your audience, the likelier it is that that audience will visit your website. This increases your chances to move them down your sales funnel thanks to the offers on your landing pages, your calls-to-action — basically every strategy you’ve compiled for them.
Customers love it when they can engage with you as a brand 24/7. This builds trust and sends them the message that you’re always there for them.
Most buyers don’t like to be interrupted in their daily activities just to hear you talk about your product or service. They want to learn on their terms and in their own time — they don’t like to be forced.
They know they’re in charge. But this shift of power from you (the seller) to them (the buyer) is exactly what you need to maximize your marketing strategy.
It’s crucial that you create high-quality content. It’s the only way to give you a reputation as a credible source. If your audience finds your content helpful, they’ll gladly share it with their connections. More people will continue to turn to you for insights on the industry, thus making your brand an authority in the niche.
We’re not talking about buying email addresses. That never works in the long run. What you need is to focus on the opt-in email list. It’s when your target audience voluntarily gives you their email addresses because they want to hear more from you.
Thanks to your inbound strategy, they’re already interested in your business, and by sending them quality emails, your chances of closing the deal are far bigger than before.
This more targeted approach lets you be as selective as you want when choosing your key audience. With the help of analytical tools, you can have a clear picture of your ideal customer profile and adjust your strategy accordingly not only to gain leads but also to retain existing customers.
For example, if you offer make-up services, YouTube would be a great place to share tutorials on how to apply make-up, which brands are best, etc. On the other hand, if you’re selling CBD oil, in-depth guides on proper dosage, application, etc. would be excellent for your website.
The point is to learn where your ideal audience hangs out, which medium they prefer, and which strategy works best for that audience.
There are tons of tools you can use to measure how successful your strategy is so you can adjust accordingly.
You can make a record of the sources of your income or which content performs the best, and which needs improvement. You can also track how many and which messages get opened, which content is shared by others, or which is getting the most comments.
All of these actions will help you create a track record of everything exchanged between your prospects and your brand. It’s like having a cheat sheet for success.
Sales Artillery has a cool inbound revenue calculator you can use. You can try it out here.
This one is a hidden gem in your inbound strategy which is often overlooked by marketers. All digital channels offer not only creativity but also interactivity that simply can’t be found in the more traditional methods.
Comments, polls, tweets, shares — basically any type of engagement — allow you to be one step ahead and provide your key audience the answer before they even ask the question.
How do you think I came up with this guide?
Yes, they exist — as they do in every strategy for marketing small businesses. But they can also be overcome if you do your homework properly.
Especially if you’re just starting your business and your only experience in marketing is selling homemade lemonade in the front yard 30 years ago.
We’ve all been there. We’ve all felt the wrath of the imposter syndrome. You’re new, you still haven’t developed a sense of direction, you question the quality of your product, you freeze in front of fancy terms like “customer lifetime value” or “revenue performance management”.
Whoa, I even scared myself for a moment there.
The good thing is that all of it has been made by humans, thus it can be learned. And the quickest way to do it is to plunge right into it. Hands-on experience combined with some free content from already established players in your field will get you a long way.
Talking about established players, it can be quite the challenge to rank on the same page with them. The big fish usually eat the small ones. That might be because they’ve been longer in the game than you are, or they just have more resources than you.
It’s easy for a big-shot company to invest mucho dinero in marketing. You wouldn’t expect Coca-Cola to use primarily the inbound method, would you? What you can do is stalk their social media accounts, websites, and what have you, and try to use some of their strategy for your bubbly drink. See what works, read the comments, learn what people like about the drink, and what concerns they might have about it.
Then try to adapt your own product/service to those needs. As you get the hang of it, it will only become easier from there.
Wait, haven’t I already said that it saves time? Well, it depends on which issue is in perspective.
Whether you’re responsible for your marketing or you have a team of content creators, it doesn’t matter — developing different content strategies and then testing them on your prospects takes a great deal of time.
Especially if you want to produce quality stuff that’s useful for the consumer. You always have to be on top of your game regarding meeting your audience’s needs, which means it requires continuous maintenance.
If you’re one of those business owners who want results yesterday, then maybe you should give inbound marketing a second thought. This method only works if you have patience — an inbound marketing campaign is evident at least 3 months after launching.
Like it or not, the time issue is a real double-edged sword here.
Expertise in web design, content writing, SEO — to name just a few — is a must for every inbound strategy. That being said, it’s unlikely that you’ll find all of these in just one person. Many small businesses face difficulties such as a lack of tech-savvy staff or the resources for it.
Remember when we talked about the advantage of being interactive? Well, here’s another contradiction for you: With the opportunity to write comments and reviews, you should develop a thick skin for the negative criticism you’ll face.
Hey, sometimes people have a bad day and it has nothing to do with your product or service, and even the smallest mistake on your part might unleash the negative feedback beast.
The best you can do is to take it like a (wo)man. Apologize for any inconvenience and offer a refund or a freebie if you can.
Another challenge for small business marketing is keeping the focus on the audience’s needs, not on their own. The content that you offer has to resonate with the wants of your target clients — what they want to see, read, or listen to.
You’d be surprised how often it happens businesses lose focus and start pitching again. The trick is to constantly remind yourself how your service is going to help your prospects, not how to convince them to buy it.
If you focus on convincing them, then you’re doing the outbound method. You’re not addressing your prospects’ problems, you’re just placing ads. The best way to avoid this loss of focus is to create your buyer persona and start building your strategy around that. (Don’t worry, I got you covered on that too).
I’ll be honest with you right here: there’s no one-size-fits-all plan. There’s something unique in every small business, so don’t expect to find a blueprint that works perfectly for yours. Each business requires a customized strategy depending on its goals. But it’s good to have a stepping stone — a checklist if you will — to cover the crucial points.
Here’s a visual you can use to keep focus:
Now let’s dive a bit deeper into each section.
Don’t tell me the answer is “To sell my product/service”. That’s too broad and won’t get you anywhere. You need to be as specific as possible because selling that product or service is not a one-time thing. It’s a process that requires different techniques at each step of the way.
You’ve got to know why you need the strategy in the first place. Are you planning to start a business but don’t know in which industry? Or do you already have a business but can’t seem to reach the right people? Or maybe you have your niche, you have your audience, but you flunk at converting them into customers?
Once you identify your main purpose, it will be much easier for you to mold the strategy according to your needs, not the other way around.
Target the people who need your solution. This means you carefully select the audience you sell the solution to. If you’re trying to attract anyone and serve everyone, then your business is doomed.
What you want to accomplish is pull in potential clients by focusing on the benefits for them, not on the features of your product or service. That’s why creating a buyer persona is the next step you take to build your strategy.
Here’s a list of questions to help you define your buyer persona:
1. Who is the audience you want to serve?
2. What is their current situation (pains or fears or problems that you can solve)?
3. What are their demographics (gender, age, location, etc.)?
4. What is the desired situation (what do they want to accomplish?
5. What platforms are they using?
6. Which type of content would be most useful to them?
7. Are there any competitor brands they usually turn to? (What is lacking in their content?)
Or you can try Hubspot’s Buyer Persona Generator to do the work for you.
The bottom line is: when you identify the interests and the problems of your target customers, it will be much easier for you to adjust the overall marketing strategy in a way that best suits this specific audience. You’ll create the perfect content in a language that they understand, and it will be much easier for you to connect with them.
Deciding on the type of content is the pillar of your whole marketing strategy. That’s why it is the most complicated step — you must choose the type of content, the format, the tone in which it will be written, etc.
Remember, you want to position yourself as a thought leader in your industry and just as another seller. Leave the sales pitch and focus on what the customers won’t — listen to their problems and pains and then provide valuable content that will solve their specific issues.
But to know what content to offer, first, you have to identify which step of the buyer’s journey your prospects are on. (A buyer’s journey is the sales funnel you want your audience to go through from being a prospect to becoming a buyer.)
source: copper.com
Here’s a list of types of content for each step of the sales funnel:
*when you make your presence known in front of prospective clients*
• Blog posts relevant to the specific topic (even guest blogs are very helpful at this stage)
• Social media posts and campaigns (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube as leaders of the pack)
• Videos (including podcasts)
• Infographics
• Free guides (preferably related to your business)
*prospects gain interest in your product or service and consider moving down the funnel*
• Email newsletters
• Ebooks
• White papers
• Product reviews and comparisons
• Case studies
• Landing pages
This is the stage where you create your lead magnet — a compelling offer that leads prospects to the bottom of the funnel. Explain why they need exactly your services and offer some guarantee.
It doesn’t have to be anything complicated. Just pick out a thing or two that show you are different and promote them as much as you can. For example, are you cheaper than your competitors, yet the same (or better) quality?
At this point, your audience must engage with your contact. Otherwise, if your offer is weak, the engagement level is low and you lose their interest. The lead magnet can be any form of a free item or a service: samples, consultations, white papers, etc.
*this is the decision stage for making a purchase — reminding them why you offer the best solution*
• Sales pages
• Sales emails
• Testimonials and reviews from customers
• Webinars
• Free trials
Have CTA (Call To Action) for all stages of the buyer’s journey — what you want your prospects to do once they get to the landing page. A CTA can be as simple as “Watch video”, “Download PDF” or “Subscribe”.
It’s the action that the prospect takes to make a conversion. Of course, first, you need to decide what a conversion is at each stage — will it be a click-through, getting information from your prospect, or simply purchase.
Not all platforms work the same for different businesses. Do some research to find out which channels your ideal clients are using. For example, if they are frequent on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or if they prefer Reddit and Quora, or maybe YouTube.
Ask yourself how/where does your ideal customer buy similar products or services?
Check out also industry blogs and websites, online communities, podcasts, or even certain events in the industry — the last one is a special goldmine for getting new leads.
Think about it — who doesn’t want to be pampered? You’d choose the business that constantly has your back, right? Why would your audience be any different? This means that a huge part of your marketing strategy should be having real communication with your clients and building genuine relationships with them.
Don’t make it all about you. Of course, the idea is to promote your business as the best on the market, but you do it by focusing on the needs of your followers. If you have the budget, throw in some Facebook ads or any type of paid advertising on social media.
If you don’t have it, always be on the lookout for problems you can solve in your niche. If you are active enough, the client will come to you when advice is needed. Because you’ve already established yourself as a thought leader in your industry, prospects won’t hesitate to buy specifically from you.
Forget about automatic, robotic messages. A leader in the industry takes time to be genuine in every approach. This means you tailor your message specifically for the intended person. Use their name if you know it.
Keep in touch with all your prospects no matter where they are on the sales funnel. Treat them like friends. Make sure they feel appreciated no matter if they don’t buy from you or have just made a purchase.
Even if there is little or no value to your business, don’t forget to support your clients — at the very least they become your brand advocate. Even if they haven’t purchased from you, raising awareness for your brand might lead to new customers through them. Treat them equally nicely.
This last part of your strategy should come as a no-brainer. What’s the point of putting all the effort into the previous steps if you don’t track what’s working and what isn’t?
Constantly measuring, learning, and optimizing is the only way to get great results and achieve your goals. Find out what type of data is crucial for understanding your prospects, and adjust your marketing strategy on a deeper level.
For example, you can analyze which of your emails get opened by your audience, or how long a prospect stays on your website. Also, you can use analytical tools to find out which of your content is most read or shared, or commented on.
With that said, let’s take a look at the essential tools every small business should use.
Perfect for small businesses — they cost nothing (or very little) so you don’t have to worry about having the budget for in-house marketing or for outsourcing the whole work to a marketing agency.
Unfortunately, there’s no comprehensive course that divides all those tools into categories. And there won’t be because new software hatches almost daily and it’s a pain in the heck to keep track of all of them.
Also, depending on the level of your expertise and the stage of your business, you might not need all the tools that are being offered. There’s no need to overcomplicate things. All you need to know is which are the most important categories and choose whichever suits your business best. As you learn the more complex properties of the tools, you can easily upgrade to a more sophisticated plan.
First, let’s take a look at the two different technologies that get mixed up quite frequently:
CRM stands for customer relationship management and its focus is on sales. It contains customer data such as a company’s website, telephone, direct mail, live chat, social networks, marketing materials, etc.
CRM deals with every part of customer interaction, storing and managing data, reporting, forecasting, customer service, support, marketing, sales — it’s more about gathering knowledge about the prospects and deals with sales opportunities.
Marketing automation focuses on marketing. This means email marketing, posting on social media, ad campaigns, etc. The goal is to lead prospects to a point where they will be approached by the sales team to close the sales.
It’s more about one-on-one contact with prospects in the early stage to lead them to close the sales. Marketing automation generates leads and collects data for personalized communications.
Here’s where it gets more tangled than Rapunzel: both of these strategies contain parts that overlap, such as email marketing, SEO tools, or analytical tools. You can see how I’ve mentioned Hubspot both for CRM and marketing automation.
Now you’re probably thinking Good God, how do I know which one I need for my business? The answer is both because they deal with different aspects of the whole marketing strategy.
Depending on your budget, there are two paths you can take: either choose a complete package that offers all-in-one service tools like Hubspot, or you can choose the tools that you most need at this stage separately.
However, if you can’t afford a package deal, or you’re just overwhelmed by the various technologies you have to learn, you can always use this checklist of essential tools every small business needs:
They help you stay on top of all your projects while maintaining successful collaboration with your team members. The best part is that they’re very affordable and even have free versions of most of their project management tools:
With one of the highest ROI in digital marketing, email campaigns are crucial for the success of your business. The following tools will help you design emails for your marketing and increase the open and conversion rates:
It may seem a bit redundant here, I know — do you need tools to use Facebook or Instagram? Of course, you don’t, but we all know social media is where all the action is, and if you want people to know that your business exists, you better start being VERY regular there.
That’s where these tools come in hand — they help you organize and schedule your content so you never have to worry about posting, and they strengthen your social media presence.
You want to know where you rank compared to your competitors — you need SEO. You want to be on page one in the search engine — you need SEO. If you want to secure yourself a spot among the big players on Google, guess what — you need SEO.
This means it helps you with identifying the right low search volume keywords or phrases, identifying what might not be working well for your ranking, and improving it. Bottom line: if you want to show on Google, you need a good SEO strategy.
Check these out:
Simply put, this is the science part of your marketing strategy. With the help of analytical tools, you get the figures and insights into how your strategy is performing. SEO can also be considered as part of the analytical gang.
Depending on which part you want to analyze you can choose between
and
They help you turn the visitors of your website into leads (prospective buyers). You can always use Google Forms, of course, but take a look at these if you want something a bit more sophisticated:
This one’s a bit wider specter because to do successful marketing your content needs to be top-notch on multiple levels. I’m talking about website design, visuals, blog posts, podcasts — the list goes on.
This means you need a variety of tools ranging from Photoshop to grammar checkers.
Ilys
The best way to attract visitors and turn them into customers is no doubt inbound marketing — especially if you’re a small business owner. Its unobtrusive approach is not just welcomed by prospects but encouraged.
When you understand what your target clients need and what makes them click, it’s easier to create content that resonates with them. This combined with some of the best SEO practices puts you on the map so your prospects can find you — not the other way around.
Once you’ve established yourself as a thought leader in the field, create some awesome email campaigns and a badass website so potential clients will be more than willing to convert into actual customers.
Everything looks scary at the beginning, but when you have the right strategy and take it to step by step, your small business can very easily compete with the influencers out there — especially if you dedicate some time to improving your skills in inbound marketing.
So, use this guide as a blueprint to help you develop your business especially if you’re just at the beginning stage and see it grow thanks to the inbound marketing strategy you’ve mastered.
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