Small Biz, Big Name: 5 Marketing Strategies for Small Local Businesses

Running a local business is tough if you’re relying just on foot traffic and drivebys for customers. So tough, in fact, that 50% of small businesses fail within five years. However, you can succeed with smarter digital marketing strategies that work for local businesses to attract more sales.

If you don’t have an online presence, this is your first move. Engage a digital marketing team that can set up a local SEO website for your business. Targeting local customers that can visit you in-store and purchase your offerings online takes a team of marketers that know how to set up keywords in your site content to attract the attention of search engines like Google.

Paid Advertising and Marketing

Most of your site traffic will come from organic search, and ideally, your site’s top pages will show on page 1 of 2 search results for your keywords.

Your website will be mobile-friendly, optimized for search, and loaded with relevant, unique shareable content to reach this goal.

People spend a lot of time looking at their phones. If your small business website is not optimized for mobile, you are putting yourself at an immediate disadvantage.

Always double-check all website pages to make sure they look as good as they can on all devices. Make sure that your site loads fast – use PageSpeed Insights to check the speed of your site on mobile and desktop.

Once you know your target audience spends time on your site, reads your blog posts, and shares them with their followers on social media, you can target some of your marketing budgets to long-tail marketing strategies like SEO content.

If you need to boost leads and sales, immediately use paid adverts. Consider the following paid adverts strategies for more targeted sales conversion, including:

• Google’s PPC (Pay Per Click)
• Social Media Advertising (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn)
• Display advertising (ads on websites)
• Influencer Marketing
• Video marketing
• Mobile Marketing

1. Facebook Ads

If your small business does not advertise on Facebook, reconsider if you know it’s where your target audience is when they’re online. Facebook says they have over three million businesses advertising with them, so there must be something!

Facebook ads are an inexpensive way to reach a broad audience – when you know what you’re doing. Use an expert Facebook marketer to set up ads and target your preferred customers.

Creating a Facebook ad is also pretty quick and easy and does not require specific skills. You have to make a regular Facebook post with images or videos to upload, and away you go. However, it’s too easy to burn through your budget by getting it wrong, so use a marketer who specializes in Facebook advertising.

2. Instagram Stories

Instagram marketing is an excellent way for small businesses to showcase their products and services. Your business may already be using it as a social media tool, but Instagram is continually adding features that you might not be aware of.

Instagram stories are a perfect way to take your customers “behind the scenes” of your business and build up a genuine rapport with your followers.

There are many fun features in the stories platform that can make your posts really eye-catching, and it is an excellent way to live-blog events and product launches.

3. Video Marketing

The statistics for video marketing are impressive so if your business does not have video marketing strategies, you could be missing out.

YouTube is an excellent platform for product demonstrations, “how-to” videos, and even holding Q&A sessions. They can increase brand awareness and help customers get to know the story behind your business.

4. Email Marketing

Using emails for marketing is not a new idea. However, if you have been using the same old templates for a while, it could be time for your small business to upgrade its email marketing strategy.

Modernizing your email content can be a really effective marketing strategy and demonstrate to your customers that you are a forward-thinking business and one that should remain relevant to them.

Keep the written content short and snappy, including images and videos.