If you are new to entrepreneurship and want to get your small business off the ground, then you need to find a way to attract more customers to your business. The formula is simple. The more qualified leads you get, the more sales you will close. The only way to generate more leads is by implementing an effective marketing strategy.
Many entrepreneurs find the grind difficult during the growth phase, since there’s little to no leads coming through. If they find that their venture hasn’t grown to the point that they want to by the third year, they are likely to give up on their venture when they are within reaching distance of the tipping point that will transform their business.
So what are some of the actions that small business owners can do to quickly transform their business?
Fix their local Google business listing.
SEO 2018: How to Use ‘Google My Business’ Listing to 10x Local Search Traffic Organically
This is probably the simplest fix that you can make to your current campaign. If you are a local business that relies on searches from people in your local area, you can quickly gain leads by fixing your local business listing on Google.
Simply setup an account on Google and register your business’ details so it will appear on geographic searches for related keywords in your area. There will be a panel of information, where you will be able to input your information.
Write helpful content on your website so you can improve your site’s SEO ranking on Google.
Google loves sharing helpful information on the web. Their motto is actually to “Organise the web”. So, if you commit to publishing helpful and valuable information in your industry, your website is likely to be rewarded with a higher listing on Google.
You can easily accomplish this by setting up a blog on your website and answering the frequently asked questions that people type into Google. Make sure that you mark-up the questions as a title in the blog post or as headings in the post, if you decide to create a long, in-depth post.
Unfortunately, SEO doesn’t work as quickly. But the good thing is that, when it does work, it can double or even triple the amount of qualified leads coming into the website. You can click here to learn more about how SEO marketing works.
Get your business listed on Facebook.
22 Facebook Marketing Tips for Business You Can’t Afford to Miss
Facebook has over 1 billion people using their platform. And there’s so much data available on the platform that you are able to reach your targeted audience through the platform to generate leads and sales.
The first place to start is setting up your Facebook business page. You can then optimise the page so it can easily be found when people are searching for relevant topics of interest on YouTube.
The second thing is to set up Facebook for business so you can start advertising to your target group on Facebook. You can do it cheaply through boosted posts, video ads, website ads and more. You may even be able to generate leads for less than a dollar.
Publish informative videos on YouTube.
This tactic is often underutilised by local businesses, as they fail to realise the impact that it will have on their business over the long-term. Publish informative videos about frequently asked questions in the industry, how to advice, behind the scenes or any other type of content that will demonstrate value to your audience.
It is often easier to rank the videos on YouTube and also on the search engines. So they can actually start sending your business leads within hours of uploading.
Implement a referral system.
Encourage visitors to your website to share your content or offering through social media or email sharing. This can be done by promoting an incentive such as a giveaway or a competition. If the business website uses the WordPress CMS platform, a plugin such as KingSumo can be used to promote the giveaway.
Guest blog.
The Ultimate Guide to an Effective Guest Blogging Strategy in 2018
One of the easiest things your business can do is get in front of other peoples audiences. This can be done by reaching out to websites who are looking for content contributors on their platform. A guest blog can be as little as 400 words or it can be over 3000 words. It depends on the value and the outcome that you want to get from publishing the post.
Participate in interviews.
There are also several interview opportunities available across the web. There are people doing their own podcasts or YouTube interview series. If there is a good fit between what you do and the type of information that they want to present to their audience. You can then create a ‘wish list’ of those publications that you would like to feature on and reach out to them to secure any interview spots.
Conduct webinars.
SPI 309: How to Create a Marketing Funnel That Works (with Molly Pittman)
Webinars are another great way to drive more qualified inbound leads to your business. You can create an inbound funnel that drives people to an opt-in page, where they can then choose to participate in a live webinar session. The webinars can be free or paid. However, for them to be successful, there must be a way to drive upsells from the webinar.
Participate in relevant discussion groups.
Participate on Forums
This could be a forum or a blog where your business’s online community hangs out. You want to participate in the group by contributing valuable answers to questions that arise. Over time, your business profile will become a recognised expert and the business should start to attract referrals.
You can do a Google search to try and find these groups or even look for relevant groups on Facebook or LinkedIn. Additionally, you can find forums that have relevant discussion threads.
These are a few things that you can start implementing to get new leads into your business. Review the current activities that you are doing to see how you can start making changes today.