Home-based businesses are on the rise in the current market. According to Fundera, there are 15 million businesses in the United States alone. The outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, which made it compulsory for more people to work from home, has further established the basis for the projected growth of home businesses in the years to come.
Hence, there’s a growing need for home-based business owners to learn ways to stand out from the competition that will arise from this surge. In this article, you’ll find some home business marketing tips to try this year:
1. Determine Your Target Market Through Market Research
Having a target market is key to getting the best of your home business marketing. Due to the scale of home businesses while starting out, it’s essential for them to tailor their business marketing to a limited portion of the market from the beginning.
Many business owners tend to favor the uphill task of capturing a broad-based market instead of a target market, which is a smaller group of potential customers within the market. A broad-based marketing approach is often justified on the basis that businesses don’t want to lock out any group of customers which seemingly increase their sales potential.
However, target markets don’t compromise that possibility. Instead, you can focus your marketing efforts on reaching the specific group of people your business is most likely to attract easily. After successfully doing this, you can start targeting other customer groups. Essentially, home businesses should endeavor to expand their reach after establishing themselves properly within a niche.
A target market could be determined by age, earning power, taste, and a host of other prevalent factors stemming from a market research. Market research helps home-based businesses place the necessary emphasis on their strengths over other existing businesses. Surveys, beta tests, and free service consultations are some of the ways to conduct market research.
2. Brand Your Home Business
Home businesses aren’t exempted from branding. Branding provides identity to a home business and improves its public perception regardless of scale. Home businesses can take advantage of logos, creative packaging, and great user experience to create an impressive brand. The right use of these branding elements generates emotive responses from customers which often drives them to make purchases.
Also, home businesses experience a huge amount of human contact. Hence, they can leverage personalized services as a means to brand their businesses. Exhibiting genuine concern about customer welfare and a constant follow-up are ways to create a personalized experience for customers.
3. Create a Business Website
Home-based businesses need a business website. A website is a great link for a home business to the outside world since it doesn’t require a physical office space. All business websites should be created by employing the services of professional web services such as Oregon Web Solutions. This helps you avoid any issues with website development and maintenance.
A business website should have the following in order to achieve better marketing:
- Display the branding elements of your business
- Carry important contact information
- Include reviews from past business clients
- Employ high-quality video and image content
4. Integrate a Blog in Your Business Website
After a proper website has been set up, a blog should be integrated into the website interface. Blogs are effective in content marketing, which is achieved via the routine publication of web content.
Your business blog should include only high-quality content that are related to your business. Blog content shouldn’t be spammy. Prevent website visitors and potential customers from being disappointed. The quality of a blog content should be good enough to drive customers to make further enquiries and make purchasing decisions.
5. Search Engine Optimization
Search engines such as Google and Bing are one of the easiest and cheapest sources of website traffic. Home business owners can learn simple tricks for optimizing their websites such as the use of keywords and metadata. However, the best approach is to employ professional Bend Oregon web design services to help you develop a fully optimized business website. Keyword research as well as technical and non-technical SEO are some of the areas covered by SEO specialists which may be beyond the skills of a home business owner.
An optimized business website does the following:
- It generates more leads which often become conversions.
- It leads to a better user experience.
- It ensures better brand awareness and credibility.
- It provides a mobile-friendly platform for customers.
- It gives your home business an edge over the competition.
Check out this video to find out how SEO can increase your customer base and business revenue: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rLPTlp6iCI.
6. Use Email Marketing
Email marketing is one of the most viable business marketing strategies because of its high ROI. According to HubSpot, email marketing generates $38 for every $1 spent. Businesses can also enable social media integration with their email marketing for better results.
Email marketing is a method that can be used for both inbound and outbound marketing. The inbound aspect of email marketing involves allowing individuals to subscribe voluntarily to your business mailing list, while the outbound marketing aspect enables businesses to send out marketing information to pre-sourced emails from multiple sources. Inbound email marketing is entirely free and more effective for conversions.
Email marketing content can be done effectively through the following means:
- Integrate clean and simple graphic design in email content.
- Add a call to action for recipients.
- Add vivid branding elements in the email.
- Vary email content with new product information, newsletters, celebration messages and promotional offers.
- Be consistent with the delivery of these emails.
7. Use Social Media for Marketing
Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn are great for creating attention around your home business. Home businesses can take advantage of content marketing, influencer networking, and paid advertisements on social media.
Branded posts can be used to boost customer retention with each post from your business accounts. Business accounts must be set up to project your business brand properly. Consider adding cover images and profile photos that display your business logo and official colors. Other tips to put to use on social networks include:
- Associate your business with trending topics.
- Create content on your business operations, new products and the benefits of using your products and services.
- Prioritize responding to comments and messages promptly.
- Display your average response time for visitors to see on Facebook.
- If you don’t have time for social media, employ a social media manager.
8. Leverage Influencer Networks
Creating influencer networks both physically and virtually can help you achieve better marketing results. People are influenced to make purchases by individuals, who they consider as celebrities and role models, using those products. There are several groups of influencers including celebrities, social media influencers, and established professionals.
Connecting with influencers where your home business is based is a great way to market your business. Business owners can arrange several interactions such as reposts, live virtual sessions and physical events with selected influencers to boost their product and service reception.
9. Create Visual Content Around Your Business
Business owners who run their businesses from home can use images and videos to send out their marketing information. High-quality videos and images are ideal for getting the type of promotion you need from visual content. They get better engagement and can be spread on various platforms.
Presently, the quality of phone cameras and webcams do justice to most videos. However, for business owners who want better results, professional videographers and photographers can be employed for the task. Broadcasting your visual content can be done via social media, email newsletters, and your business website.
10. Use Both Digital and Printed Marketing Media
Printed marketing media has been in use for decades and is still very useful. The design of all marketing media should be simple, carrying all the necessary information about your business including website links, emails, and phone numbers.
Home-based businesses can use marketing media more effectively by creating both digital and printed formats. This allows them to send out these marketing media over the internet, and distribute them physically.
The printed ones should be distributed first to individuals within your network. After which you can extend to customers and people making enquiries. Digital ones can go on social media and your business website, or sent to your email subscribers.
11. Consider Guest Posting and Appearances
Home business owners can apply for contributing writer positions on high-authority websites. If such applications are accepted, business owners can offer genuine business solutions and draw attention to their expertise. Readers who are convinced by the information you provide for free will likely do further research on your business, hence, positioning such customers for conversion.
Guest appearances on other media formats such as podcasts, TV shows, and interviews are also effective means of getting some attention to your business. All these guest appearances are rare marketing opportunities. They should be utilized properly with adequate references made to your business.
12. Make Promotional Offers Available
Promotional offers are great for getting existing and new customers to buy into your product. Volume discounts, celebration offers, coupons and loyalty rewards are great ways to offer promotions effectively.
Customers who have been dedicated to the purchase of a product and service for a long period should be compensated for their sheer dedication to your business with customer loyalty rewards. New customers can be attracted by using other promotion methods.
13. Utilize Affiliate Marketing Programs
Home businesses can expand their marketing operations by launching an affiliate marketing program. This is a scheme that pays a registered affiliate a small percentage of your profit for every sale made through them. Affiliate programs help bring your product and services to the view of a new audience within the network of your affiliates.
Many people join affiliate programs because it provides them an opportunity to earn passive income for marketing products at no cost. Affiliate programs are also duly rewarding for business owners because if affiliates don’t make a sale, they aren’t paid and vice versa. Business owners can keep their affiliate program running for as long as they want.
14. Promote Your Business Within Your Network
Promoting your business within your neighborhood is an effective means of getting customers faster. Individuals can leverage their social networks such as family, former office colleagues, club members and religious acquaintances for business benefits. This allows you to achieve more within a short time of reaching out.
Listing applications and platforms that allow businesses to list their operations locally abound. These allow business owners to achieve much better accessibility to customers within the locality. Key business information should be provided on these platforms to achieve the best results of listing your business.
Another benefit of using these listing platforms is that the listing is online and can be found in almost any location around the world. This creates the possibility of getting some interstate and international business in.
15. Promote Few Products Starting Out
Home businesses shouldn’t spread their marketing efforts too thin on too many products at once. Instead, they should choose a few priority products and increase the scope later on. Most home businesses are usually small starting out, so there should be no pressure to offer so many products at the same time.
Expansion can come in gradually as larger demands get placed on your business. Giving customers options at this point will be a priority. Hence, offering more service and product options can be done effectively.
16. Create a Joint Venture
Business associates in a related industry can offer some benefits for your business marketing efforts. You can form a joint venture with such businesses for the benefit of both parties. A joint venture primarily puts your business in front of a new audience and increases the likelihood of getting sales.
For example, a butter spread business can thrive better by putting its products in a supply chain store and offer the supply chain a percentage of its profits. This way both the home-based butter spread business and the supply chain business benefit from the deal.
Conclusion
Home business marketing is very important since they lack the conventional structure of other business formats. Home businesses must ensure their marketing goals are established as early as possible. This way, when they carry out an audit on the effectiveness of their marketing goals, they can determine what’s working and what isn’t. Thus, in a limited period of using marketing tactics, home businesses can see clearly what they have achieved based on an ROI analysis.
