As a start-up business, how do you build a brand, and boost it effectively? Your funding may be low, and perhaps, your brand has low recognition. So how do you get your startup business the exposure and attention it deserves?
Here are some ways to achieve maximum online exposure:
• Focus on your target market : Focusing on your TG is the first step to creating online exposure, specially when your budgets will be limited. You have to focus your marketing efforts on the customers, who will help your business grow in the short term. So, there are a number of factors to consider when narrowing down your target market: Who are they? What are their demographics? What kind of blogs do they read or what social networks are they on? How are they buying products (online vs offline)? Get to know them and their online habits, how do they search and what do they need.
Thus, you can get to know your audience by finding out who they are and you can tailor your content to appeal to your target audience, and focus on reaching that smaller market before expanding to other audiences.
• Leverage email marketing: Spend what limited resources you do have on email marketing, as nearly everyone you are trying to reach uses email. Also, to fully leverage email marketing, you can look at some things: make subscribing easy, tell readers what to expect, send welcome emails and keep it consistent, for readers should not forget about you.
• Do social media engagement correctly: Of course, social media is must for any business on a budget – for, it’s not just enough just to be on social media, but you have to engage your target audience. You have to get it right for your social media marketing campaigns to be effective.
Limit your social media platforms to only the ones that will be most beneficial to your business. Share quality content that’s both insightful and entertaining. Be active with your users by commenting and sharing. Contests are a great way to quickly gain followers and create exposure. Visuals and videos can also be powerful ways to communicate. Both help to build your brand by giving users a glimpse at the “human” side of your business.
So, it’s important to develop social media goals and always keep an eye on competition too.
• Reach out to influencers: Find influencers in your market and reach out to them. Having a relationship with a few influencers can have a dramatic impact on your online reach. Why do consumers look to these people for information and advice? Influencers tend to have dynamic personalities, and have built reputations that allow them to impact consumer decisions. Search for ways you could bring value to them too. Remember, it’s about forming a relationship, and not selling an idea.
• Try crowdsourcing: Today, crowdsourcing is a great way to encourage engagement and attract a large following on a limited budget. If you don’t have the funds to perform extensive market research, why not ask the market what they want and allow them to help make decisions?
While crowdsourcing it would help to keep in mind some points. It’s important to be clear and to-the-point. Tell your customers exactly what they need to do and exactly what you want from them. Offer incentives, something that will get users excited to participate. The preparation is critical, as ideas are going to pour in, so be ready to handle them. Also have a plan in place.
• Form strategic partnerships: Forming strategic partnerships with others in your industry opens many doors and come with many different benefits. When you align your brand with other well-known brands, it helps you build credibility. Partners can help you do things, they can help you reach a wider audience, can help with market research. They can certainly give you a jump-start on your social media marketing! So, do identify trustworthy partners that you know you can work with.
Finally,
It’s clear that many creative marketing solutions can develop, even when resources are limited. The idea is to get creative, and get on to developing unique marketing solutions that will help your start-up business perform better.
Avtar Madan
Himanshu
Shree Lahiri
