- What are your options?
- Which marketing materials are the most cost-effective?
- Which marketing materials make the greatest impact?
Q: What are the best marketing materials I can use for my small business? Should I focus on digital or physical materials?
A: The best marketing materials for your small business are digital marketing initiatives that you can use to target specific demographics. Physical materials are great and should be utilized, but your focus should be on digital marketing materials for your small business
Modern business owners are in a unique position.
The sheer number of competitors makes it difficult for entrepreneurs to stand out, but in the same vein, the sheer number of digital tools and services makes it considerably easier for the same entrepreneurs to garner attention.
The trick is understanding what kind of marketing materials for small business work, and then using that information to turn consumer attention into brand loyalty.
A recent Gallup article states that nearly 60% of American consumers feel that the companies they’re familiar with have lost touch with the more human aspect of customer experiences.
This isn’t very surprising considering the number of automated phone answering services, chatbots, and wholly online methods of interacting with businesses.
To quell this impersonal feeling in consumers, businesses must understand how to effectively blend human interactions with digital ones while simultaneously building a solid emotional connection.
Naturally, this is easier said than done, but with the right advertising materials for small businesses and the right digital tools, new businesses and established ventures alike can build brand loyalty and increase customer satisfaction.
In this article, we’ll discuss your options for small business marketing items, the most cost-effective options, and which of these materials is the most impactful. Finally, we’ll look at how Alliance can help with marketing materials for your small business.
So, if you’ve been online, searching for “free marketing resources for small businesses” – you’re on the right track.
Keep reading to learn to cultivate your company’s most effective small business strategy.
- What are your options?
- Which marketing materials are the most cost-effective?
- Which marketing materials make the greatest impact?
What are your options?
As Google hopes to eliminate cookies by the end of next year and businesses scramble to determine what will be the most effective form of marketing, your company needs to define a clear path forward.
E-marketing is effective because of the internet’s ubiquity, but that same feature can also make it difficult for newer and smaller businesses to stand out.
Read more: How Businesses Should Use E-Marketing
Effective e-marketing can be the difference between a successful company and one that dies on the vine, but to fully understand this modern form of marketing, you need to know what kind of options you have at your disposal.
Below, we’ve put together a list of some different styles of marketing.
- Business cards
- Flyers and brochures
- Social media
- Email marketing
Business cards
A well-designed business card can be a powerful tool in small business marketing.
It should include your business logo, your name, your title, and your contact information, such as phone number, email address, and website.
With a business card, you have an easy way of presenting yourself during networking opportunities. You can also include any relevant social media links to provide the individuals you give your card to an easy method of finding you online.
Flyers and brochures
Flyers and brochures can be a great way to advertise your small business.
They should be eye-catching and visually appealing. Make sure to include all necessary information about your business, such as the services or products you offer, your business hours, and contact details.
What’s great about flyers and brochures is that you don’t have to physically give them to your peers. If you know other local business owners, you can leave the flyers and brochures in their shops or even simply drop them in mailboxes at relevant locations.
Social media
Social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram can be effective marketing tools for small businesses.
You can create business profiles on these platforms while regularly sharing updates, photos, and promotions to reach potential customers.
Building a strong social media presence will pay dividends over time. The more recognizable you are online, the more recognizable you are offline as well.
A robust social media presence opens your brand up for countless new opportunities that shouldn’t be ignored.
Email marketing
Email marketing can be an effective way to reach potential and existing customers. You can create email campaigns with information about your business, promotional offers, and new product or service updates.
Make sure to have a clear call to action in your emails to encourage readers to take action.
Email marketing is useful because even if cookies are eliminated by the end of 2024, it will continue allowing businesses to interact directly with their target audience.
Not to mention, you can start building an email marketing list now, and the sheer number of different styles of email marketing provides countless opportunities for your company.
Read more: Should You Use Video Marketing Emails?
Content marketing
Content marketing is another approach that involves creating and distributing relevant content, in any form, to attract and engage with your audience.
The main goal of content marketing is building brand awareness, establishing trust and credibility between your business and your customers, and ultimately driving profitability.
Content marketing can come in a variety of different mediums. You can write content, film content, record content, animate content, and more.
Regardless of the medium you pick, you want to release valuable and relatable content to your target audience
Search Engine Optimization
Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, is the practice of using specific keywords and link-building to optimize your website and its content.
The long-term goal of SEO marketing is increasing your website’s visibility, driving targeted traffic, and improving the chances of converting random visitors into customers.
As you can see, countless different marketing styles can benefit your company, but what marketing materials are the most cost-effective?
Which marketing materials are the most cost-effective?
Determining which marketing materials are the most cost-effective is incredibly useful, but even more helpful is understanding how to be flexible enough to shift with the market and change marketing materials when necessary.
Read more: Use Your Workstyle to Your Advantage
That said, you should still do everything in your power to understand which marketing materials are the most cost-effective because to shift with the market, you must first be in line with it.
As it stands, digital marketing materials are the most cost-effective. We’ve put together a list of the ways these materials stand out below.
- Targeted advertising
- Measurable results
- Low barrier to entry
- Reusability
Targeted advertising
With digital marketing, you can target specific demographics and interests of potential customers, ensuring that your marketing efforts reach the right people.
Targeted advertising can help you save money by not wasting marketing resources on individuals who aren’t interested in your product or service.
This advertising style also highlights the importance of collecting data on your marketing initiatives. If you’re not sure what kind of person is responding well to your ads, you won’t know whom to target in the future.
Measurable results
Digital marketing materials provide real-time data and analytics that allow you to track and measure the effectiveness of your marketing efforts.
This enables you to adjust and optimize your campaigns based on what’s working, resulting in a more cost-effective marketing strategy.
The idea is to gather as much analytical data as possible. You want to know who’s responding to your ads, who is following up that response with a purchase, and any future purchases made by that individual too.
The more information you can secure, the better your targeted ads will work.
Low barrier to entry
One of the nicest aspects of digital marketing is its low barrier to entry. Traditional advertisements are prohibitively expensive – just look at the cost of running a Super Bowl ad last year, but digital marketing is relatively inexpensive to get started.
You can create digital marketing materials such as social media profiles and email campaigns for little to no cost.
This allows you to save capital that can then be reinvested into your business to help bolster your business infrastructure.
This low entry barrier doesn’t consider creating marketing materials for small business either. If you’re creative, you can cut out countless costs by making marketing materials yourself.
Reusability
Unlike traditional marketing materials that may only be used once, digital marketing materials can be reused multiple times.
For example, a well-written blog post can be repurposed as social media content, email newsletters, and more. This reusability can help you save money and maximize your marketing efforts.
This is particularly useful if you’re creating materials yourself because you only pay the cost of creating the advertisements once before using them in various mediums.
There are several benefits of using digital marketing materials, only some of which are listed above. The key is determining the most cost-effective method that still makes a great impact on your revenue.
Which marketing materials make the greatest impact?
According to CNBC, a majority of the companies that utilized Super Bowl advertisements have been dealing with falling stock prices since the game.
This isn’t an indictment of using physical advertisements as much as it is a sign that times are changing. Digital advertisements make a greater impact because of the sheer amount of time most individuals spend online.
A 2021 Pew Research article claimed that more than 30% of American adults are almost constantly online.
In recent years, that number has continued to rise.
Tools to captivate online audiences and make business ownership more straightforward for virtual companies have existed for years, but what kind of marketing materials can make a real impact for small business?
Read more: Why Alliance is the Best Virtual Office Provider
Unsurprisingly, digital marketing materials have the greatest impact. Here are some of the reasons that digital marketing initiatives are so effective.
- Personalization
- Mobile optimization
- Interactive content
- Social proof
- Video testimonials
Personalization
Digital marketing allows for personalized experiences tailored to individual consumers. This includes personalized email campaigns, targeted advertising, and personalized website experiences.
Potential customers are more likely to engage with content that speaks directly to their needs and interests.
Running a physical marketing initiative with the same level of personalization would be prohibitively expensive, but through virtual advertisements, whether they’re email, video, website, or social media based, you can save a lot of money while precisely targeting your preferred demographic.
Mobile optimization
With most consumers using mobile devices to access the internet, digital marketing materials can be optimized for mobile, making it easier for consumers to engage with your brand on the go.
A late 2022 Pew Research article states that a little more than three-quarters of Americans buy things online using their smartphones. This number is slightly higher than the 69% using laptops and much higher than the 28% using tablets.
Because so many modern consumers already use their smartphones to shop online and interact with their favorite brands, mobile-optimized advertisements can be one of the most effective marketing styles.
Interactive content
Digital marketing allows for interactive content such as quizzes, polls, and surveys that engage consumers in a two-way conversation.
This type of content can be more memorable and impactful than traditional, static marketing materials.
Interactive content goes beyond passive consumption and receives dynamic responses from consumers, and there’s no limit to the kind of interactive content you can create.
Outside of polls, quizzes, and surveys, you can create interactive infographics, virtual reality experiences, simple or complicated online games, and much more.
You want your customers to feel an emotional connection to your business, and using interactive content is a great way to bolster this connection.
Social proof
Digital marketing provides opportunities for consumers to engage with other customers through reviews, ratings, and social media.
Social proof is a powerful way to build trust and credibility with potential customers and can be a major factor in consumer purchasing decisions. This may look like using influencers to market your brand, platforming customer reviews and testimonials, highlighting good ratings and awards, or any other method that includes using social media content or online reviews to advertise your business.
The best marketing materials for small businesses come from your customers. The average consumer is much more likely to listen to an individual that they deem a third party over someone they think has a vested financial interest in getting them to make a purchase.
Video testimonials
Video testimonials are a combination of self-created marketing materials and social proof.
Typically, businesses will use video testimonials by taking reviews and ratings from satisfied customers and platforming the content to expose more potential customers to their brand.
You can get video testimonials by asking your customers directly, incentivizing them to make content, or even surveying customers after they’ve made a purchase.
The key is determining which marketing materials for small businesses are most impactful, learning how to use these marketing materials for your brand, and being able to change focus when necessary to stay on top of current trends.
How Alliance may be able to help with marketing materials for your small business
In the modern world, digital marketing materials reign supreme. They are both more cost-effective and more impactful.
Having the right branding and business behind the materials is important though, and one of Alliance’s Virtual Offices can help.
A Virtual Office is a service that allows individuals and businesses alike to register a business address without forcing these parties to secure physical space.
High-quality providers like Alliance Virtual Offices give clients access to physical workspaces and meeting rooms and a slew of other amenities. Lower-quality providers are unlikely to provide even legitimate addresses.
Traditional commercial leases are prohibitively expensive and come with long leases and countless other costs.
When using one of Alliance’s Virtual Offices, you can forgo these costs thanks to the low price. This allows you to reinvest in digital marketing initiatives and creating other marketing materials for small businesses.
Better yet, Alliance’s Virtual Offices provide the same amenities that traditional space provides without sacrificing the freedom and flexibility of remote work.
With one of Alliance’s offices, you have access to easily reservable meeting rooms and coworking spaces, tiered mail forwarding plans based on how much incoming business mail you’re receiving, a prestigious and professional address, and more.
The meeting rooms and coworking spaces provide entrepreneurs with a place to work that’s separate from their homes.
If you’ve ever worked remotely for an extended period, you probably understand how frustrating it can be to work in the same place you try to relax. Your Virtual Office gives you access to straightforward ways to alleviate that frustration.
There’s no better way to avoid job burnout than changing your scenery when necessary.
Instead of suffering through the isolation of working from home, you can break the monotony of your routine with a visit to our Virtual Office centers to work in a setting that’s filled with like-minded peers and other motivated entrepreneurs.
Alternatively, you can use our meeting rooms to host in-person and virtual meetings, regardless of size. Hosting meetings at your home or using a crowded, public coffee shop are poor ways to make a quality first impression on your attendees.
But with a meeting room, you show you’re an established and well-connected business owner.
Our mail forwarding comes in four separate tiers that you can utilize depending on the amount of mail you’re receiving. From once-monthly mail forwarding to daily mail forwarding, you have plenty of options to ensure you never miss important documents or sensitive correspondences.
Because a business’s image is so important, your Virtual Office’s well-known and prestigious business address is a huge benefit. Rather than registering your business to an unknown location, you’re able to give your company an air of importance that potential clients, investors, and customers will recognize.
Essentially, a Virtual Office is the perfect companion for the modern business owner. You can utilize our flexible and professional offices while simultaneously reinvesting the saved capital in larger marketing initiatives without sacrificing the benefits associated with traditional space.
Further reading
- How Businesses Should Use E-Marketing
- Use Your Workstyle to Your Advantage
- Should You Use Video Marketing Emails?
- Why Alliance is the Best Virtual Office Provider
Alliance Virtual Offices provides Virtual Office services and countless other digital tools and services to established entrepreneurs, new business owners, and everyone in between.
If you’re hoping to create or purchase worthwhile marketing materials for small businesses, a Virtual Office may be the best way to take full advantage of the internet’s advertising opportunities.
Contact us today to see how Alliance can help craft your small business strategy and check out our Virtual Office Blog for other small business marketing tips.
