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15 marketing ideas to boost your creative business sales
“Effective advertising…must be used to get your name out to the public. If your name is not familiar to people, they will not come to you.” - Jay Abraham
As a small business owner you are doing so much that marketing often gets overlooked or you struggle to come up with new ideas all the time. Well don’t worry, I got you!
Here are 15 effective ideas that you can use in your marketing to boost sales:
Create a company brochure that you can automatically send to prospects when they contact you. This should include a short description of your business, what you do and what makes you unique (your story). Don’t forget to include client testimonials, case studies, samples or photos of your work to help really showcase to people how great you are.
Create a clear value-orientated ad for the Yellow Pages or Alignable. Both are online listing directories that many small businesses use for advertising. More than 80 million people visit YP.com, and there are more than 20 million businesses listed. The Alignable network now has over 7 million users in more than 35,000 communities. Websites with that kind of traffic are worth considering as a marketing opportunity for your business.
Focus on giving value through newsletters and use them as a way of educating and informing customers about your industry and services offered. This is a great way to keep in touch with past clients and be able to send them new offers or opportunities to work with you again.
Offer a free seminar, webinar or masterclass to build awareness of your business, but make sure the information provided is related to your target market. An amazing bonus would be to have additional speakers who are well-known in your industry. You can also create paid for events that potential clients and current clients can come to.
Use direct mail marketing to expand your business. I share lots of ideas in this previous blog post.
Offer incentives such as loyalty card/ points or referral programs when clients pass your details on to someone else who then becomes a client.
Approach large firms who may need your services and negotiate a deal to be their exclusive expert in your field or offer exclusive products to their company and/or employees. You can even offer to give workshops to their employees, investors or management.
Donate time or materials to local charities/ your community to show support in your area, and spread awareness of your company.
Approach local newspapers by offering to write a weekly column about your area of expertise. Don’t ask for money, just a byline and bio.
Why not create a course or membership for your clients? A lot of business owners often don’t think about this option - if you’re an art teacher then why not offer an online art course teaching people the foundations of art so that they can get more of your in-person classes? Or if you’re a photographer why not have a monthly membership where local business owners can pay a monthly fee and get X number of professional photos each month from you to use on their social, website or marketing promotions.
Just starting out and don’t have a lot of budget for marketing? Why not offer products or services in lieu of payment but in exchange for testimonials or for another business to promote you with their audience.
Join your local Chamber of Commerce and attend the networking and other activities throughout the year.
Continually consider what new products and/or services you can offer to current customers and/or clients. Are there add-on services or products that would really suit your current business? For example as a florist you could add on upsells of candles or chocolates to an floral order.
Develop a mail order/ online ordering division of your company.
Offer a “you-choose-the-price”. This is especially good for stale inventory.
Advertising should never be your only method of marketing. There are a myriad of ways to get your name out there in a way that feels personal to potential customers and/or clients.
If you’re not sure where to start with your marketing plan or how to reach out to your local community, competitors, customers and/or clients, and others who could influence your business in a highly positive way, reach out to me to get the proper tools and resources to boost your business to the next level.
