1. Put your best ad on a postcard and mail it to people in your targeted market. A brief message has a higher chance of being read. This type of ad can drive a high volume of traffic to your web site and generate sales leads for a small cost.
2. Keep changing your marketing plans by rotating several marketing tactics and vary your approach. Customers will get bored with the same marketing approaches. Not only that, you get bored. Make marketing exciting and benefit from the opportunities available for communicating your value to customers. Plan your marketing tactics carefully, get feedback from customers and adapt your efforts.
3. Use buddy marketing to help promote your venture. For example, send out brochures that include a pamphlet or card of another business, which will be doing the same for you. You can reach a whole new group of clients this way.
4. Answer the phone differently. Try announcing a special deal instead of your normal greeting. You could say, “Hello, this is Suzanne with … ; ask about our special promotion.” The caller will want to know about the offer. Make sure this isn’t an automated recording, it must be a live person to have the maximum response. Your offer should be aggressive to increase the caller’s urgency by including an impending expiration date.
5. Use stickers, stamps and handwritten notes on all of your direct mail to clients and daily business correspondence. A sticker can act as a miniature billboard. It will catch the eye of your customer before anything else; however, the message should be to the point so it can be read in a few seconds.
6. Send second offers or coupons to customers immediately after they’ve made a purchase. Send a note to your customer thanking them for their patronage and let them know that if they return with this note they may benefit from this special offer, such as a discount off their next purchase. Create an expiration date to create urgency.
7. Print newsletters. It costs six times more to make a sale to a new client than to an existing one. Newsletters focus your marketing on past customers and keep costs down. If newsletters are too costly, try e-mailing newsletters to people who have joined your web site.
8. Have a seminar or open house. By hosting an event you can gain time with clients and prospects and get your name out there. If you do it right, you’ll be gifted with a nice turnout and even media coverage. If doing a seminar, limit the number of people attending and charge a small fee. Charging a fee gives people the impression of value.
9. Bartering/trading. This is a great way to promote your company and get others to use your product and services. By trading your product for advertising space or for another company’s product, you can save money by this exchanging of services.
10. Mail outs. By enclosing your ad or brochure in your outgoing mail, more business will be gained by people who need what you are offering.
