20 Tips for Making or Breaking Marketing
Budgets
1. Track + Measure Your Current Marketing Efforts.
• Ask patrons how they found you. • Document the responses. • Pull reports.
In my retail store we: • Utilized full potential of Quickbooks POS
• No sale was exited without obtaining customer information. • Dropdown menu was created for marketing purposes. • Reports were pulled and analyzed.
2. Discontinue Marketing. • Don’t wait another day, don’t spend another
dollar on something you know isn’t working. • Consider a coupon that’s down right giving
merchandise away without restrictions.
• At Ambiance we did this on the final month of print ads before signing another contract:
FREE $10 GIFT CERTIFICATE….No purchase
necessary…
Only 10 GIFT CERTIFICATES were redeemed on a publication that reached 20,000 people!!!
3. Partner Marketing. Utilize businesses that are like yours, partner with them to exchange: • Physical Advertising Space
• Brochure exchange, bag drops, coupons, drawings, etc.
• Banners on websites • Allow them add space on your site in exchange for ad space on
their site.
• Sharing on Facebook • Simply share, like, and comment on each other’s Facebook
posts from both business and personal accounts.
• Mentions on Twitter • Agree to mention and recommend each other on Twitter
• Reviews on Yelp • Write a Yelp review saying what you like, link the review to other
social media.
4. Facebook. Create a business profile page. • Make a landing page with lead generator. • Brand the page with your logo. • Post at least daily about:
• New product arrivals, events, design job before + after pictures of project updates, customer thank you notes, ask consumers questions, sales, give-a-way, community events + fundraisers for others, photos of in-store displays
• At market, post pictures of product you’re considering buying. Ask your fans what they LIKE and what they’d prefer to see more of.
Social Savior Tip: Read & respond to comments + posts twice per day. Don’t go 24 hours without responding to your audience.
5. Twitter. Create a business profile page. • Brand the page with your logo and company colors. • Tweet 2-3 times daily about:
• New product arrivals, events, design job before + after pics, project updates, customer thank you, ask consumers questions, sales, give-a-way, community events + fundraisers for others, photos of in-store displays
• At market, post pictures of product you’re considering buying. Ask your fans what they LIKE and what they’d prefer to see more of.
• Create Auto-Follow + Auto Mention Campaigns • Geo-target your audience- customers could be passing your door.
Social Savior Tip: Read & respond to comments + posts twice per day. Don’t go 24 hours without responding to your audience.
6. Foursquare. Create a Nearby Special. • Generate a coupon that users will see when they
check in nearby. Reward the Mayor. • Give the Mayor a special deal, freebie, or gift. Ask
them to comment about it or leave a tip. Enter A Tip. • Ask patrons to leave a tip for a discount.
7. Facebook Deals. Create a Facebook Deal.
• Absolutely FREE to create. • Anytime someone check-ins into Facebook places
near your location. Your store’s deal will appear.
8. Blog Find Existing Bloggers. • Ask them to blog about your events, store, products,
recommend your store, services, etc. • Offer them a discount or outright pay them.
Build Company Blog. • Develop a Blogging plan. • Who will write? You? A Ghostwriter? • How often will you blog? • Write content ahead of time. • Post on time or don’t start one at all.
9. Website. Update site with fresh content.
• Keep home page changing • Include links to social media sites. • Utilize social media plug ins • Stream blog content • Change out photos during various seasons • Post events
10. Monitor Keywords. Keywords are used online with every web transaction. Think about it: • People are talking online. • Are you listening? • Do you know what people are saying about your
brand or business? • What are they saying about your competitors?
Monitor, Listen, + Respond = Customers Feel Important
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11. Text Message Marketing. Ask your customers if they’d like to receive text message notifications. • You might be surprised at the warm reception. • Then, you can affordably get into your customer’s
right hands for just cents per contact. • Send promotional & sale information • Schedule automatic birthday, anniversary, or loyalty
customer greetings.
Sign up for your PuTTin’ OuT FREE trial! Add tokens to try the Text Messaging portion.
12. Blue Tooth Marketing. Get passersby in your store. • Don’t let another person pass without stopping in. • Use blue tooth mobile marketing to generate a text
message deal, coupon, or special offer. • Make the deal too good to pass up and for a short
period so they use it right away.
13. Voice Mail Marketing Try calling your entire contact list at once. You CAN! • Record a phone call that will be distributed to a list
of your choosing for just pennies per call. • Use the phone call as a follow up to an email or
social media campaign. • Customers will think you called when they get the
voice mail. • Services such as: Vontoo.com offer measurable voice
reporting services so you know exactly what happened on the call. Did users answer? Hang up? Opt out? You’ll have all the results.
14. Facebook Ads. Develop a campaign for Facebook. • Target your audience by location, age, gender,
birthday, interests, + so much more • Bid on ads based on Facebook’s recommendations.
Social Savior Tip: Check out our presentations to learn more about Faceboook ads.
15. Linkedin. Professionally connect with business partners and clients to find opportunities. • Connect with manufacturers you do business with. • Ask for client referrals known as recommendations
on Linkedin. • Redistribute the recommendations on other social
sites and website. • Direct potential leads to your Linkedin page. • Check for openings and postings for design jobs,
event planners, etc. • Create a company page on Linkedin. • Schedule automatic birthday messages for contacts. • See who’s viewing your profile, interact with them. Social Savior Tip: Interior Designers, you must utilize Linkedin! Search for leads, connect!
16. Linkedin Ads. Another low budget way to hit a target audience. • Works well for:
• Corporate Gift Services • Interior Design Firms • Online Stores • Service Industries • Uniform Services
17. Google Ads Words. Advertise on Google, only pay for clicks that go through to your website. • Nice thing is, your audience was already looking for
you through keywords. • Set a budget and Google will do the rest. • Click here to learn more about advertising on
Google.
18.YouTube. Show off, record, post to YouTube. • Make an interesting how to video related to your
industry. • Create a video that’s relative to your audience. • Post any television commercials • Cross promote on other social media.
19. Get Contact 411. Obtain contact information from current customers, they’re already into your business! Keep them engaged. Contact information should include: • First + Last Name • Email Address • Mobile Phone Number • Gender • Birthdate + Anniversary • Zip Code • Preferred Method of Contact Social Savior Tip for Physical locations: set your POS system up to request the information before exiting the sale.
20. Email Marketing Create an email newsletter. • Provide customers with updates at least once per
month. • Invite them to connect with you and your company
on social media outlets • Insert clickable hyperlinks to social media, websites,
email addresses, and anything else that’s possibly mentioned in the email.
• Use the customer’s first name in the subject line + in the body of the email
• Send an gift certificate email out for birthdays. • Include your logo, make it hyperlink to the website.
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