According to some sources, nearly 50% of the American workforce is employed by small businesses. Every day that the pandemic remains to linger it only threatens to widen the divide of prosperity between corporate business tycoons and small business underdogs. Many small businesses have stopped all market spending, others have gone in house, and others have given up in light of new financial obstacles.
This is a terrible new discovery. Small businesses are struggling to stay open with lower revenues due to dwindling traffic numbers. What these businesses don’t know is that a lot of this lower traffic has a lot to do with ignorance. The people who want to visit your business don’t know you are open.
Restaurants need their customers to know that they still have take out and outside dining. Trainers need to tell their clients that they are still doing 1-on-1 sessions. Doctors need to tell their patients that it is still safe to come to the office for chronic and life-threatening problems. Crime hasn’t stopped, cops are still arresting people, court proceedings are still continuing. Lawyers need to keep targeting their prospects like they have before.
How do we let our prospects know that we are open? Marketing. You’re going to have to do it.
The consequences of not doing so can be drastic at worst, and at best your competitor who is still marketing is going to steal your market share. Let’s not let this be you. You need a plan and you need a plan quickly.
Phase 1
A marketing plan is going to do exactly that. You’re going to decide your goals. You’re going to analyze your strengths and weaknesses, opportunities and threats. This first area of study and research is going to recenter your focus. Whether that be quantified by revenue, profit, or sales numbers. You’re then going to understand where you are better than others and then where you can improve. Then you will identify threats to your business and then research the opportunities that you can take advantage of. Lastly, you’re going to set a budget. If you can’t afford to hire someone, you need to do it yourself. Just be careful not to waste any money and poorly designed paid advertising campaigns on Facebook and Google.
Phase 2
In the second phase, you’re going to research who your customer base is or predict who they will be. You need to determine gender, age, geography, relationship status, and interests. When doing that you will then develop different buyer personas that match those descriptions and then find out where they are online. Are they on social media? Which channel? Do they use email? Do they listen to the radio or read the newspaper? Are they searching for you on Google or Yahoo? These are the questions that you should be asking.
Then you will set some marketing goals. Similar to your business goals, but for marketing. Your marketing goals are things that you need and that you suspect will help you achieve your business goals. For example, click on your Facebook advertisement that sends a user to your website where the user will hopefully buy your product, fill out a contact form, or call you.
Phase 3
This phase is simple: you’re making a plan of action and a scheduled calendar. By this point, you should know if you are going to use Google Ads, social media, email marketing, SEO, SEM, blogs, or Youtube — or all of it. Once you’ve decided which tools you’ll use, you’ll set your campaign plans and schedule them by date, and by time.
After all your hard work, don’t forget to track your campaign and make adjustments as necessary. If you need any help setting up a marketing plan, give us a call at (760) 723-7319 or click here contact us.
