8 Successful Low-Budget Marketing Strategies for Startups

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Every ambitious startup began from humble beginnings. With a tight budget to start with, what marketing strategies can you do to succeed? Here’s our list.

Eight Low-Budget Marketing Strategies:

  1. Social Media
  2. Lead Generation
  3. SEO/SEM
  4. Commercial Photography
  5. Graphic Design
  6. Videography
  7. Market Research
  8. Commercial Scripts

Low-cost Marketing Strategies

From small-scale transactions into international trades, the entrepreneur’s ultimate dream is to start small then go big as a Fortune 100 company. Yes, THE ultimate business scorecard.

Impossible? We have seen it happen time and time again.

Little efforts are always underestimated, yet they always yield huge results –if you repeat it day in and day out like a growing youth having a wolf in his belly that is!

Your small business strategies now may be millions soon. Your startup now may be the next wolf of Wall Street.

But before that happens, how do you go around with low-cost marketing? How do you get more clients and exposure for your startup on a tight budget?

In a bigger picture, how should you, as a startup owner, make good use of guerilla marketing and advertising that it won’t bite you in the future?

Look no further! We will guide you on the budget-constrained ways to successfully market your growing business today. Here are our low-cost marketing tips for small business 2021.

Read more below!

Social Media

Did you know that there are about 3.5 billion users of social media worldwide? Not just that, they spend an average of 3 hours per day on it too!

Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter, are just some of the most used platforms on the internet right now. And we tell you, using those for marketing your brand is a must!

Around 73% of today’s marketers believe that it has been effective for their business. And how much does it take? A single press of a button or click in the mouse.

Social media, when utilized properly can:

  • Build lasting brand awareness
  • Create consumer traffic
  • Generate warm leads
  • The best part of it all is that social media marketing costs less yet returns more than traditional marketing, by almost twice as much!
  • At least 90% of current marketers testify that it is today’s most effective content marketing tactic.
  • So if you want your business in the eyes of billions without spending too much, you better invest in social media for your brand as soon as possible.
  • Here is another short list of what you can get if you do:
  • Better customer engagement
  • Transparent marketing results
  • Wider audience reach
  • Cheap yet effective
  • Bottom line is, social media is the new trend your business needs to ride, top shelf in the list of inexpensive marketing ideas for small business.

Lead Generation

  • What is lead generation? I mean, we know what it does but what is it really?
  • You can send thousands of emails, connection requests, and messages to potential clients or consumers –but does it ultimately close the deal?
  • In an ever-competitive market, generating leads is not merely about regularly nudging-off prospects with what you have to offer.
  • Lead generation of today is an art.
  • A craft to persuade, capture, and enamor your future clients through stimulating their interest.
  • The methodology of doing so has changed over the years. It has now adapted to cope digitally, appealing to constant engagements via the internet.
  • You now see blogs, vlogs, newsletters, email campaigns, etc. that just get wittier and creative as the days passed by. Why? Because the audience thoroughly filters them.

“Customers are now smarter, more connected, more informed, more influenced and influential socially, and less likely to respond to campaign-bait. Marketing has to create content people actually want.” – Tim Barker, CEO, DataSift Inc.

If you want a boost in sales, you need to come up with creative ways to market your business and fresh marketing ideas that will pass hard scrutiny.

And if you do it well, you will earn:

  • Increase in qualified leads
  • Scheduled appointments
  • Acquiescent clients
  • But of course, how much does that affect your budget? Certainly much less than traditional ways.

SEO/SEM

  • Search Engine Optimization and Search Engine Marketing, the “new era” of marketable content.
  • How to market your business online? Invest in Google search. For the sake of those rare few that do not know what I am talking about, I will carefully explain what it is and what it does.
  • Simply put, it is a search engine that indexes and catalogs multiple websites in a browser. It puts the order in your searches by providing you with the closest ideal content you are looking for.
  • So if you search “Optimum Advantage” in Google, the result will be a list related to what you searched. Sounds simple right?
  • But what if there are millions of results? How do you rank and filter them? That is where SEO and SEM come in.
  • SEO ranks your content among thousands or millions that are similar to it and SEM is about marketing that content in the form of advertisement.
  • Here is a simple analogy of how they differentiate:
  • SEO, Search Engine Optimization, raises content visibility through unpaid organic means.
  • SEM, Search Engine Marketing, raises content visibility through paid advertisements. Okay, one is paid and the other is not. How does it then reflect on my budget?
  • The difference is not as much as you think it does. SEM of course will cost more than SEO to appear in SERPs (Search Engine Results Page) but the effort equalizes it.

SEM is capable of:

  • Pay-Per-Click (PPC)
  • Immediate effects
  • Targeting specific audiences

While SEO is more on:

• Organic research

• Builds value over time • Wide audience

To understand their differences better, we suggest you continue reading SEO vs PPC for a much detailed analysis. You’ll also get to learn more about all essential terminologies and approaches.

The process may be a little complex at the beginning, but as you progress further, the benefits will eventually stack-up. All gain and no waste!

Photography

Everybody needs a visual aid. After all, the appeal to the sense of sight will never get old. Do you have an achievement you want to show the world?

Is there a mission or vision you want to develop and impart?

Got something aesthetic to share?

Take a photo and brand your company with it, the impact will speak volumes as to the atmosphere you bring to the market and your clients.

Photography aids in:

  • Sensual appeal
  • Image branding
  • Forming engagements
  • Catching attention
  • You can learn how to take pictures yourself or have someone do it for you professionally. Either way, it will save you money for something built to last.

Graphic Design

  • Similar to photography, but this one deals more with the customization and personal touch.
  • You can create yours via different image editors or graphic creation tools widely available for use just by scouring the web.
  • Some examples of these are:
  • Adobe Photoshop
  • Adobe Illustrator
  • Adobe Spark
  • Affinity Designer
  • CorelDRAW
  • Canva
  • The software will cost you a negligible amount for a lifetime of use. If you fancy making art, then this one is perfect for you.

Videography

Remember when I said vlogs? Or aka video blogs or video logs?

It aids in creating a community that follows your brand. The uses are versatile and flexible. You can either utilize videos for endorsements, advertisements, or simply sharing living imagery.

The appeal is completely different. You get to stimulate the sense of sight, hearing, and even artificially induce touch, smell, and taste!

You can also apply more content by congesting it in a single video.

How much does it cost? Aside from the editing software and camera, the price is absolutely little compared to the results.

Market Research

This is an absolute must-do when entering the market as a startup. You can never skip this essential part if you want to succeed.

The key here is to identify competitors and capitalize on gaps. You can do this by performing a feasibility study and then plot an appropriate business plan and action.

Why is there a need to do so? Because doing a market research will:

  • Alleviate risks
  • Make you understand what your clients/consumers need or want
  • Determine the flow of venture
  • This small business strategy is more on in-depth analysis and risk management, it less on the money as it deals with how your brand can gauge growth in the market. The results are priceless.

Commercial Scripts

  • Last but not the least, the proven and tested commercial scripts.
  • This ingenious strategy is probably the most practical among all as you can create them via a word processing program or even actual pen and paper.
  • What would you gain?
  • Better persuasion in what you offer
  • Better explanation in what you do
  • Better hook by applying testimonials
  • And that is it! That wraps our successful guide for low-budget marketing strategy for small businesses.
  • Stay tuned and connect with us for more helpful tips in your startup business.

Best of luck from Optimum Advantage!