Internet Marketing Strategies for Small Business Growth
10 Free Internet Marketing Strategies for Small Businesses
For small businesses, it is so valuable to learn and leverage the free tools and strategies available to you online. There are also paid ways to generate revenue and grow your reach, but there are some things you can do right now to begin establishing yourself as a player in your industry. Here are ten free and low-cost strategies for small business internet marketing for small business owners with limited budgets, time, and expertise.
TL;DR: 3 Tips to Leverage Small Business Internet Marketing
There are many paid ways to grow your small business online, but there are also many tools and strategies you can implement right now to begin growing your reach and your sales.
- Optimize your Google Business Profile listing and keep your information consistent across all of your other listings online.
- Use networking meetings as not a way to sell, but as a way to learn who are the great referral partners for your business and build a relationship where you know, like, and trust each other.
- You don’t have to create different content for each social media platform, you can create one piece of content and share it to all of your accounts.
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10 Free Strategies for Generating Revenue from Internet Marketing
1. Location, location, location
For many years retail stores aimed to have the best location for their business. A corner spot where traffic would come from every which way. If you had the best location in town, you had the best opportunity to do business.
In today’s world when it comes to online marketing for small businesses the most powerful location is to be right at the top of a Google search for your product or service. This is the best place to start! Google continues to change how it looks, but we generally have 4 PPC ads at the top, then we got 4 Google Business Profile location listings (GBP) followed by 10 free SEO results.
If you haven’t yet, take these steps to have your GBP optimized:
- Claim your business
- Keep your name, address, phone number (NAP) consistent across all listings
- Focus on getting as many reviews as possible
TIP: There is a short link in the backend of your GBP account that you can send customers to direct them straight to the review page.
“When you put a focus on your GMB (now GBP) and optimize the items above, your website visits and phone calls are very likely to increase,” said Jay Berkowitz, Founder and Partner at Ten Golden Rules, during a #BizHackWebinar. Jay believes GBP is one of the most important social media for business.
2. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Below the GBP location listings mentioned above are your traditional, organic search results. Search engine optimization is also a verb, which means you can optimize your website to appear in this free section. This is a very important tool for small business internet marketing.
There are over 600 factors that Google is going to go through to pick who gets which position in this free section. You really want your business to be on page one.
The three main things you want to focus on to improve your SEO are the ABC’s:
- Architecture – the structure of your website
- Your website needs to be simple from a coding standpoint
- Site speed needs to be fast
- Site load time needs to be fast
- Domain expiration- tell Google you’re in this for the long run
- Use 302 redirects to your homepage
- Have custom 404 page
“If you’re looking into a new website, I always recommend putting WordPress at the top of your list,” said Jay.
- Back Links – other sites linking to your site are a vote for your website and make your site look more important in Google’s eyes
- Content – newsletters, articles, press releases on your website
- Answer the questions that your customers and prospects ask you as blog posts on your website to benefit your SEO.
- Keep a list of questions people ask you that you can answer on your website.
- Answering new questions that are yet in Google give you a huge shot at being at the top of the search results.
3. Build Your Personal Brand
Ask yourself, what is unique about your abilities and how can you market them? Think of your resume as your personal brand packaging. What have you done to improve your resume?
Your resume, website, and social media should reflect all you are doing to be an expert in your field. Make sure everything is consistent from your business card to your website to your branding.
4. LinkedIn
You want to build as complete a profile as you can on LinkedIn.
Here are a few things to consider as you optimize your LinkedIn profile:
- Have a professional headshot as your profile picture.
- Your header image is a great opportunity to talk about your business, who you are, and what you do through imagery. Canva is a great tool you can use to create a header image that speaks to your audience.
- Your description (what appears below your profile image) shouldn’t just be your job title, have an introduction to your brand value.
- Improve your contact information
One fantastic thing that we recommend doing on LinkedIn for small business internet marketing is answering questions that your customers are asking all the time as a LinkedIn article. LinkedIn notifies your connections of your new published articles.
5. Social Media
Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter are what we call The Big 4.
A lot of people get hung up thinking they need to be good at all of these, but really you just need to be kind of good at one of them. Take one piece of content and cascade it on to all your other social media.
6. Cascade Content
Everyone should have a newsletter. It is free, powerful and the most overlooked marketing tool that businesses fail to leverage. It is easy for people to forward as a referral of recommendation for your company.
“Every month I send out my newsletter and I get inquiries,” said Jay.
Every week answer a frequently asked question on your website as a blog entry, video, or your preferred type of content, and then simply add them to your social media. At the end of the month send out a newsletter linking to those 4 pieces of content.
You don’t have to do something different for each platform, you can create one piece of content and repurpose it for several accounts. For example, as a realtor, you can take a video of one of your properties, put it up on YouTube and share that link on all your social media.
Just remember to be consistent in your execution across all of the social media accounts you choose to have your business present on.
It is called cascading content because it cascades like a river from the river down to the waterfall.
7. New Social Media (Be Kinda Good)
When a new social media platform comes out, you have a new interesting opportunity. Let’s take DJ Khaled and his motivational Snapchat’s for example. When Snapchat came out, he began posting 4 to 5 times a day short motivational videos on the platform. Now, almost everyone knows who DJ Khaled is and about his motivational video clips.
Another great example of how just being good at one social media platform can help you grow is “Dr.Miami.” His graphic surgical content on Snapchat landed him a plastic surgery reality TV show.
The power of their network was very, very valuable.
8. Your Network is Your Net-Worth
As previously mentioned above, the power of your network is very valuable. If you can go to networking events and build your network, it is one of the most powerful free ways you can build money and income for your small business.
Right now, due to the pandemic, most of our networking has been moved to all digital. One of the most powerful things you can do is build a network of people who know that they can trust you and they will send you business on a regular basis.
“One of the things I have done [since COVID-19] is not only doubled down, I quadrupled down on networking,” said Jay.
In the olden days, a good networker would try to do 2-3 lunches a week with good referral partners in their network. The good news is, Zoom meetings can take you less time to do than setting up in-person lunches. You can also participate in networking Zoom events, meet 1-2 connections who are great for your business, with a similar client set but don’t do what you do, and have a 1:1 follow-up meeting.
TIP: You don’t want to try and sell during a networking meeting, you want to learn who are the great referral partners for your business and build a relationship where you know, like, and trust each other.
9. eBook
You can also answer the 10 most frequently asked questions about your business or industry in an eBook and have this as a lead generator on your website. Think about the 10 most frequently asked questions or questions your customer should be asking about your business/industry and answer them in an eBook where they can receive the answers to all of the questions in one place. For $5 you can get someone to design your eBook on Fiverr.
TIP: Put some of the questions you will be answering as bullet points in addition to the title on your opt-in. To show some of the value of your free eBook resource.
10. Subscribers
It is so important to build your database with the right people that you can continue to reach out to over the next several months or years.
In today’s world, online marketing for small businesses is not an option, but a necessity to stay competitive and relevant. These free tools can set you up for success as you aim to grow your small business online.
