Elevate Your Marketing Game

For this month’s Lunch & Learn, we had Victoria Simpson – Clarke, Marketing Services Director at Specsavers, with us to give some tips and tricks for marketing small businesses. During the session, she shared valuable advices for marketing small businesses and presented several strategies that could help them grow without having to invest too much time or money. Our members were guided through these key strategies, and the following are the major takeaways from her presentation: 

Marketing is the process of creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large. It involves identifying the needs and wants of a target audience, developing a product or service that meets those needs, promoting and advertising that product or service, and ultimately selling it to the target audience.  

For a small business, the right marketing strategy is an essential pillar. However, it’s not just about paid promotions. There are many factors to consider when promoting your business. Here are some marketing tips for small businesses. 

1. The 7 Ps of marketing are crucial to consider when creating your marketing strategy. These include product, price, promotion, place, people, process, and physical evidence. Ensure that you have a good understanding of each of these elements to create an effective marketing strategy. 
2. Understanding the marketing funnel is also crucial. The marketing funnel has five stages: awareness, consideration, conversion, loyalty, and advocacy. Make sure that you are implementing marketing strategies for each stage of the funnel. 
3. Knowing your customers is vital. You should conduct customer research to create pen portraits of your target audience. This will help you understand their pain points and moments of delight, which will help you create effective marketing strategies. 
4. Content is king, and it’s crucial to create unique and engaging content for your target audience. You should also focus on your USP (unique selling proposition) and create consistent branding across all your marketing channels. 
5. Digital marketing is more than just paid ads. It’s crucial to have an effective website with proper SEO. Utilize social media and PR to create a local presence and take advantage of free tools such as Hootsuite, Canva, and Mailchimp to streamline your marketing efforts. 
6. Finally, measure and optimize your marketing efforts regularly. It’s okay to try lots of strategies and fail fast. This will help you understand what works and what doesn’t work for your business.  

In conclusion, marketing is an essential aspect of any small business, and these tips will help create an effective marketing strategy to grow your business. 

Marketing can be a challenge for small businesses, but with the right strategy, it can be a powerful tool to drive growth and success. By understanding your target audience, leveraging social media, utilizing email marketing, collaborating with other small businesses, and measuring your results, you can create a successful marketing plan that will help your business thrive.