At Direct Capital, we see a lot of requests for financing. Our working capital programs can be used for everything from seasonal hires to marketing, but I?m going to focus on the latter today.
You see, a Staples National Business Survey relayed by the Huffington Post finds that a staggering 67% of small business owners will be spending $2,000 or less in their marketing budgets in the next year. That?s?not a lot of money.
Part of this is due to the changing face of marketing strategy. No longer are you taking out ads in the local paper, getting in the Yellow Pages or riding a stegosaurus to the tar pits to bang the drums for your business. All these methods are fast becoming fossilized, with e-mail marketing (which is not new) and social media (which is relatively new) taking their places. I won?t lament their passing.
Frankly, this means you can get by marketing on a small budget. You just have to be willing to embrace free and low-cost online means of marketing, which means learning. We have a lot of advice here, and you can also check out great sites like Small Business Trends and SEOmoz, who have a ton to say about online marketing in today?s world. Ultimately, though, you have to know what you?re doing or you?re going to damage your brand.
There?s also just a post-Recession (capital R!) willingness to find success without pouring a ton of money into improving small business exposure. Time will tell if that?s a wise choice or not, but it?s very difficult to blame your average business owner for being unwilling to kick off a campaign that?s going to cost thousands of dollars when consumers are still opening their wallets by increments.
Ultimately, as they always do, small businesses will find a way to make this work. I look forward to seeing how they do it.
How much money will you spend on marketing in 2012?
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Source: http://blog.directcapital.com/misc/smallbiz-marketing/
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