Let’s face it, you only have so many hours in a day and you can’t spend all that time marketing. You have just a limited amount of time for that one activity. How do you spend your time marketing? Should you be on the social networking, optimizing your website, buying banner ads, link building? What activities should you put your time and budget into?
That’s a good question and one that, inevitably, every business owner will face. Many small business owners just brush it aside and never answer it. Then they wonder why they go out of business a year or two later.
Marketing is important. Today and tomorrow. You’ve got to define your marketing funnel and the sooner you do so the better. Who is your ideal customer? What does he or she want? How are you going to help that person achieve their goals? What do you have to offer him or her? Better yet, how are you going to reach him or her?
In order to reach the ideal customer, you have to know a little something about him. You have to know what he desires and what he needs. But you also need to know where he hangs his hat. Will you find him at the local barber shop or down at the mall? Once you define who your idea customer is and where you’ll find him + what his most heartfelt need is then you can start marketing. Spend your time in the same places as your ideal customer, participating in activities that will allow you an opportunity to build rapport. That’s marketing 101 and it hasn’t changed.
My wife and I are just a small mom and pop sewing shop in northern Minnesota. We make parking meter bags and sign covers. canvaswork.com. My question and concern is that we are spending a lot of time blogging and trying to trackback to other blogs but aren’t having much luck in moving up in our search engine rankings. Is there something else we could be doing to better market ourselves and climb in google?
Hi David,
Thanks for your comment. Nice website at canvaswork.com!
A couple of things come to mind in terms of ranking better with Google and the other search engines — first, making sure your website is well optimized for keywords that your ideal client actual uses when they look for your products. Then, use those keywords on social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, etc. to bring targeted people into your blog or your website, encouraging them to leave comments on your blog.
Just a couple ideas that are working wonders for me and for my clients. You’ve got great material on your blog that will drive interest on social media sites — the Minnesota Timberwolf photo, canning beets, all good for building relationships which is what social media is all about.
Keep up the great work!
Caroline