It’s one thing to run your own business. It’s quite another to have an engaged customer base. What’s a businessperson do when their client platform can be counted on one hand (and no fingers)?
If you find yourself in this situation (of having legitimate value to offer even though no one knows your business name), there’s hope. You just need to start marketing to bring your offer to the people who want it the most. In most cases, your target audience will fall into one of two categories – people who are already seeking support and those who have yet to realize that they would like your help.
If your target audience is already looking for the value you provide, the goal of your marketing can be simplified. You’ll want to place advertisements for your offer wherever potential customers are likely to look for support. When posting your ads, remember to consider both physical and online locations. These places could include:
- Bulletin Boards – Depending on your target audience, it can still be effective to post paper notices at grocery stores, churches, college campuses, libraries, etc. in your area.
- Online Business Directories – Currently, Google My Business, Bing Places, and Yahoo! Local are some of the popular free options in this category. However, with a bit of searching, you’ll likely find industry-specific registries for the businesses in your field.
- Question Groups & Forums – Places to consider include Facebook groups, Reddit, and Quora. By providing useful information to individuals seeking help in your niche, you can indirectly advertise the availability of your business offering. Rather than hawk wares in every post, you might find it more helpful to include your business information in your signature line and mention offers only when it’s appropriate to the situation.
- SEO For Your Website/Blog – You already know that your potential clients are likely to search the internet for support. As a result, it becomes worthwhile to use search engine optimization to increase the visibility of your business website. If you aren’t sure where to start, visit Google Trends and enter a few of the terms that you think potential clients might use to search for help in your field. The database will tell you how popular the search terms have been while providing “related queries” used in similar searches. This information will begin to tell you which search terms are more likely to bring customers that are looking for your business offer. Also, remember that you can visit websites with similar offers to yours and learn from the terms that you see repeated on their site.
If your target customer happens to fall in the second category, they don’t yet realize that they want the transformation that you have to offer. Thus, your primary goal must be to make this potential client aware of your offer and its ability to accomplish their long-desired change. Your advertisements will have to meet this potential buyer where they are – because they aren’t (yet) looking for your business services. In addition to the options listed above, your strategies for grabbing the attention of this potential client include:
- Social Media Posts & Marketing – This approach leverages computerized algorithms to place your business posts in front of the people who are most likely to find them helpful and engaging. However, it is important that your business ensure that the content is just that – helpful and engaging. To decide which social media platforms to use, you’ll want to try to match the demographics of the platform to your preferred customer niche. This approach will save your business from trying to sell business marketing services on a social media platform that displays short-form videos to teens and young adults. Finally, when in doubt, remember that (at the time of this post) Facebook and YouTube are the two most popular social media platforms.
- Referrals – Word of mouth referrals can come in two forms. First, your business may be able to collaborate with other ventures to assist would-be clients that they are unable to serve. For example, as a wedding cake designer, you might collaborate to accept redirected customers from local bakers and pastry chefs who prefer not to serve at wedding ceremonies. Later, as your customer base grows, consider including a link in your signature (and business card) to the most popular review site for your enterprise. Encourage your customers to add their own enthusiastic reviews and spread the word that your business is available to help.
- Press Releases – There are many free and paid options for press release (PR) promotion, some of which are even indexed by search engine news feeds, like Bing and Google News. At the time of this post, PRLog.org and PRFree.org are two reputable PR services known to have a free distribution package. While there’s no guarantee that a news release from your business will be picked up for promotion, there’s also no harm in promoting the noteworthy achievements of your venture. If your release does end up being selected for publication, your business will have earned another opportunity to grab the attention of a new subset of potential customers.
- Blogging – This option actually breaks the rules for this group of potential buyers – because for most people to find the blog for your business, they will probably have to search for it (or a relevant search term). However, once a potential customer becomes aware of your business, there is a reasonably good chance that they may search for your internet website. In this case, an up-to-date blog (full of useful and engaging information) is likely to make a winning impression. If your business has a website and you’re willing to invest the time or money required for its upkeep, consider starting a blog.
While these aren’t the only methods for promoting your business to potential customers, they represent solid solutions to the problem of bringing awareness of your enterprise to your preferred client base. Whether your ideal buyer is seeking your support or is totally unaware of their interest in your business offer, the combination of these strategies will position you to meet your customers wherever they happen to be.
“Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others.”
– Philippians 2:3-4 [NKJV]
D’Loreyn Walker, MD is a Bible-based business and finance coach, the author of The Proverbs 31 Millionaire, the founder of Momma’s Money Tree, a retired General and Child-Adolescent Psychiatrist, and a health educator.
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