Marketing is crucial to home business and freelance success. But it can be a daunting task if you are not familiar with the ins and outs of advertising, PR, and other forms of marketing. No need to panic though, we’ve asked our experts for their tips and tricks to successful advertising management!
Elise Dopson
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1. Split test, then specialize: Try a range of marketing tactics (including guest posting, Facebook ads, PPC) and measure your results. Which gives a better ROI? This may take 6+ months to yield meaningful data, but once you analyze what’s working, you can focus on that going forward. It’ll help prevent the chance of you wasting time on marketing tactics that
don’t work for your industry.
2. Have a great understanding of your brand. Do you have ethics that mean certain promotion tactics, such as Reddit promotion, shouldn’t be considered? Having a thorough understanding of your brand can cut-down the time you spend researching techniques. Plus, this understanding will help save time on actually carrying out the task. Create a single document that has some key phrasing, images and colors that should be used for each marketing activity. Not only will it save time, but it’ll boost branding and consistency across multiple platforms.
Sid Bharath
- Any campaign starts with your targeting. Without a strong understanding of who sees your ads, there’s no way you can craft a compelling message and offer.
- Test lots and test often. Always be trying out multiple variations of ad copy and landing pages. Drop the non-performers and test new variations of what’s working.
- Understand your economics and double down on what’s working. You need to know what your average customer Life-Time Value (LTV) is and, if your campaign is giving you customers for less than a third of the price, you need to double down on it.
Bryan Clayton
Quick tactic that others may not have suggested on how to gain new customers… Facebook GROUPS. Especially local Facebook groups.
No matter your niche or vertical there is a FB group that you can participate in to contribute to the discussion, answer questions, and develop a presence to refer people to your business, often times when they are looking for exactly what you offer.
FB just also launched a dedicated mobile app to support their groups’ communities so now it’s easier than ever to manage the groups that you participate in, monitor the conversations, and participate while on the go throughout your day.
We have found this tactic to be very effective for our marketplace. We monitor local groups and neighborhoods’ groups , and when anyone is asking for a recommendation on a lawn care service, we kindly let them know about the GreenPal community. We track the success and 60% of the time we make a recommendation, they signup for our service
This tactic can work for almost any business in any niche.
Tracie Stern
Model, Mogul, Mom
@traciestern
- Create brand cohesiveness: Everything you post should reflect on your brand, your service offered or your product. Create a strong following as an expert in your primary field before moving on to other portions of your brand or business. Stay in your lane.
- Create trust with your followers. Sharing information and ideas to create better lives will help your followers and clients trust you more than just a ‘commercial’ style post.
- Use videos to advertise vs long written out ads. Social media is an instant gratification platform. People don’t have time to read long drawn out posts, but a video, they can just pop on and listen to while they walk, or drive or eat. Also, video allows your audience to connect with you on a more personal level.
Meg Brunson
EIEIO Marketing
@EIEIOMarketing
1. Don’t ignore social Media. Facebook is the largest social media platform and both your ideal customers AND your competition is on the platform. You need a Facebook Business Page to represent your business
2. From your Facebook Page you need to post often. Do not only post promotional materials. Social Media is about building relationships and you should be sharing a variety of links/photos/videos from yourself and other related sources.
3. Brand YOU. There are many people who offer what you are offering. You need to discover what makes you unique and different. Consider blogging on topics that are related to your business, and support your business goals. These blogs can help you stand apart from your competition, and be shared across social media. This will also help to personify your brand. People like working with other people (not businesses). Focus less on what your business offers, and more on what YOU offer.
Note from Leslie:
Marketing is one of those things that most self-employed don’t know or understand, and as a result, can waste time and money on it. My recommendations are alwasy:
- First identify the most likely buyer of what you have to offer. It’s never everyone, even if everyone can benefits.
- Next, determine the problem they’re having that your product or service will solve.
- Craft a benefits oriented message that tells how you can solve the problem. People don’t care how great you are. They only care at how your greatness can help them. So focus your message on your market’s problems and how you can help.
- Determine where your market hangs out. Where can they be found that you can put your message. What blogs do they read? What social media do they use, etc.
- Decide the forms of marketing you’ll use. Will you write articles? Make social media posts? Write press releases? Use the information about your market and where it can be found to guide your choices.
