An integral part of business is promotion. However, this is a very broad term that includes hundreds of actions a company can take to raise awareness of its existence among consumers, as well as to persuade potential customers to buy. Small companies and start-ups are often looking for ways to promote themselves that don’t require spending too much time and resources. This is understandable, as long as it is a transitional stage, but over time more marketing will be needed anyway. However, it’s important to make a proper plan first.
How to prepare for marketing activities?
It is not enough to simply run ads on social media or start sending out advertising messages to random people (the latter action is illegal, by the way) to effectively promote a company online. Operating in the dark has almost zero chance of success, and on top of that you may end up burning through your budget. In order to make the best use of company money, marketing should be planned, starting with trying to determine the target audience.
Target group
This is nothing new, but every product or service caters to a certain undefined target group. You can, and even should, try to define this group, but you will never be sure that you have succeeded in realizing this idea one hundred percent. When you run a business accounting firm, you naturally narrow down the group, but there are still many unknowns to be discovered. Who will benefit most from your services: small or large companies? Maybe you specialize in serving companies in a particular industry? Maybe you have the background and the right staff to also provide financial consulting services? To best identify your target audience, you need to answer many similar questions.
If you run a local business combined with an online store, you can still sell all over the country and even abroad – if you decide to go online. Nonetheless, it is the local market – the people who live closest to you – that will matter most. Try to diagnose the needs of the people who already come to your business – pay attention to what they lack and focus on the elements they particularly appreciate.
How to promote a company offline?
There are many methods by which you can increase visibility and promote your business. Here are some of them:
Exposure
If you run a sales or service outlet, you need to get noticed. Make sure you get the right exposure with a signboard or advertising banners. Show off your logo and make sure all the elements match the color scheme you chose earlier.
Outdoor advertising
Also consider buying advertising space – billboards, posters, on bus stops or cars. Choosing the right advertising medium is of great importance and depends primarily on your target audience and what you sell. The location of the outdoor advertising is also important. Advertising a car dealership by the highway is probably a good idea, but announcing a new Porsche model at a bus stop is unlikely to draw too many customers to the dealership.
Participation in events
To take care of your company’s promotion in the local market, it is worth taking part in the life of the community. Putting up a booth at City Days, sponsoring sports competitions, helping organize cultural events or supporting schools – these are all initiatives that, first of all, will show people that your company exists and is close by, but will also affect the image of your company. If what you offer can be part of the daily life of local residents – for example, you run a bakery, sell gardening supplies or manufacture windows – you can count on people remembering your company and being reminded of it at the crucial moment, that is, when a shopping need arises.
Local media
A presence in the regional press, radio or television is another step to reinforce the impression of familiarity. A resident of the locality in which you operate will certainly think more warmly of using the services of a company located in the area than of a company from the other end of Poland.
It’s also worth starting with local media for another, more mundane reason: advertising costs are generally much lower than those of the more recognizable national media. Working with a regional advertiser can also turn into a long-term partnership, allowing your company to negotiate not only a good price, but also more tailored terms.
Discounts, multi-packs, loyalty programs
All of the techniques listed certainly sound familiar, as they are not unique in themselves either. They are simply proven mechanisms that make it easier for potential customers:
- learning about the offer – for example, discounts for new customers or for the first order,
- making a purchase decision – a reduced price for a product when you buy several items usually works out satisfactorily
- brand loyalty – a properly designed loyalty program will certainly help, rewarding regularly returning customers with discount coupons, free products or services, or even permanent discounts.
Promoting your business online – advertising on social media and more
Even the best promotional strategy, limited only to offline activities, is almost doomed to failure (although not in all cases). If you want to promote a local business, you should consider online marketing from the beginning.
There are three elements that make it worth your time and resources to advertise on the Internet:
- First of all: it is the cheapest. At the same time, this does not mean that it is the easiest. Anyone can promote themselves on the Internet, which is both an opportunity and a threat. It’s also easy to burn through the budget by trying to advertise a business without a set plan.
- Second: it is popular. The Internet in Poland is used by 88.4% of the population. This information, juxtaposed with data on steadily declining TV ratings, leads to a simple conclusion: in the coming years, online advertising will only become more important. The sooner you start, the better.
- Third: it is not subject to so many restrictions. You won’t publish video content on a radio station, and you won’t release a video to newspaper readers. On the other hand, on the Internet you can operate simultaneously on all fronts – create blog content in which you introduce users to your products and services, share photos on Instagram and Facebook, or record videos on YouTube or TikTok.
Which online promotion methods are worth looking into?
Website
The role of a company’s website has changed over the years. Today, the website primarily serves two functions. First: it serves as the company’s business card – it’s the place where those most interested in the offer will go, or those looking for direct contact.
The second, no less important, purpose of the page is to concentrate traffic from promotional activities. Information about a new service on social media should link precisely to a subpage where you describe your offer in detail. It is also advisable to use landing pages – simple web pages that you can create yourself, using various wizards available on the Internet.
An important element that can affect the effectiveness of your website is its optimization. Make sure the site runs quickly and does not contain unnecessary elements. Use graphics that are small in size and don’t overload sub-pages with information. Also make sure that users of mobile devices can also view the content on your site without much trouble.
Social media
The equivalent of actually going out to the people, on the Internet, is content creation and social media activities. This is where Internet users spend the most time. They read posts on Facebook, look at photos on Instagram and videos on TikTok. They look for inspiration on Pinterest and read about current events on Twitter (X). If you’re just serious about realizing the potential of online advertising, you can’t go wrong with social media.
However, it is worth returning to the question of the target audience at the outset – for it is not an art to establish a brand presence in all possible channels. It is important to focus on those that can bring the most benefits. Are you organizing training for business? Get interested in LinkedIn and YouTube. Do you run a boutique? The ideal option for you will be Instagram, possibly TikTok.
Also get interested in paid advertising on social media. Each of the big players in the market has its own promotional tool, so you can present your offer to a properly configured target audience. This is why it is important that you know who you are targeting with your products or services.
SEO
The presence of your products high up in the search results can prove crucial to the growth of your business. Search engines (primarily the one from Google) are used by almost all Internet users – this is how they look for opportunities to fulfill their shopping needs. If it is your website that appears at the top of the list, there is a high probability that the user will visit you.
If you’re running a local business, make sure that your SEO efforts are aimed specifically at your local audience. In your content, find room for mentions of the city or region where you run your business. Optimize content on your website and in blog posts.
One of the important SEO activities is maintaining a company blog. If you offer professional, helpful content for users, and on top of that the texts are optimized and include the most relevant phrases, you can count on increased traffic and recognition of your company online in the long run. Remember, however, that SEO should be supported by a long-term strategy. It is one of the most effective methods of promoting your local business, but it requires an unwavering commitment over a long period of time.
Google My Business card, opinion aggregators
Make your presence known where it is most sought after. Make sure you have a Google business card – a card that will be displayed when your company’s name is typed into a search engine. The Google business card will show users the most important information, for example, your business address with directions, reviews, opening hours or photos of the building and interiors.
Internet users often suggest opinions, found on the Internet. For this reason, you should also be interested in the topic of reviews about your company. If you already have at least a few satisfied customers, take advantage of this fact: ask them to write an honest opinion and make it available on popular review sites such as Ceneo, Skąpiec or Booksy. You can also offer some customers to post their reviews on your website – all to show potential customers that doing business with your company is a pleasure.
Summary – how to effectively promote a local business?
Are these all the ways to promote a local business? Definitely not (we didn’t at least mention Google Ads), but the ones we described in today’s article are the ones worth exploring and trying out first.
Any of these methods can prove effective for your business, so it’s worth checking at least a few of them. However, it won’t necessarily be the best idea to try to act on all fronts at once. At first, choose a few offline and a few online promotion methods. Give them some time, expand your knowledge, and after some time, verify their results. This way you will know whether it is worth investing further in these forms of promotion, or whether it is better to go a step further and try other methods.
