3 cost-effective ways to grow your business

05/03/2018

One of the biggest challenges for small business owners is trying to get everything done, whilst staying within your budget and adding as much value to your business as possible.

So we thought we’d share three very simple cost-effective ways to grow your business.

Social media

You’ve probably come across countless articles about why social media is good for business and that’s because, simply, it is. Social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and LinkedIn provide a free stage for you to promote what you do and why we as customers should choose you to do it.

You don’t even have to be tied to your desk to use social media now, the evolution of smartphones means you can be updating on the go and can even schedule posts to go out in the future using the likes of HootSuite.

As well as providing a new channel for you to sell in, social media adds the value of showing you are aware of new technology; that you’re moving with the times and also that you have a human side.

By revealing the people behind the business you can have real-time and ongoing conversations that perhaps traditional sales methods do not allow.

Friendly reminders

Staying in the front of existing customers’ minds is essential for repeat business. Just because they’ve already used your services, it doesn’t mean they don’t need you anymore.

If anything, post-sale is a great opportunity to build even more trust with your customers and urge them to remain loyal to your brand.

Sending informative newsletters is a great way to retain their attention, whilst establishing your business as an authority in your specialist area, but even more blunt emails along the lines of “can we help you again?” can jolt existing customers into reusing your services.

As well as reminding clients that you’re still there, incentivising repeat business and referrals to friends can be a simple and effective way to both maintain and grow your client base.

Client endorsements

Word of mouth is vital for the success of any business, no matter its size, and despite the old adage reading “bad news sells” research found that people are more likely to share good news than bad on social media.

So asking your happy customers to provide a sound bite or endorsement about how they found your services useful can provide a lot of value and, by adding them as cases studies on your website, your press releases or any marketing collateral can really help spread the word about your business.

And if you can ask them to do so when contacting them for repeat business, that’s two very big birds hit with one very cheap stone.