If you’re like most freelancers or small businesses, it’s likely that marketing is one of the last things on your mind. After all, there are so many other tasks that need to be done: building a website, writing content for it, doing research for blog posts and social media updates, setting up Google AdWords accounts—the list goes on! However, no matter how busy you are with these other tasks, if you don’t have an effective marketing strategy in place then chances are good that your business won’t grow as quickly as it could. So while marketing may not be at the top of your priority list right now (and maybe even never will be), here are some tips to help you create a plan:
Define the goal(s) of your marketing strategy.
Before you can begin to develop a marketing strategy, it’s important to define your goals. You must understand what you want out of your marketing efforts before setting out on the journey. If you don’t know where you’re going or why, how will anyone else?
Define Your Goals:
- Identify the problem(s) that need solving
- Set measurable targets by which success can be measured
- Be ambitious but realistic (you can always adjust later)
- Identify your target audience.
The first step in creating a marketing strategy is to identify your target audience, or the people you want to reach with your product or service. This can be done by using either demographics or psychographics.
You can use demographic data (e.g., age, gender) to segment your market into different subgroups based on shared characteristics such as age range or gender. Psychographics is more focused on lifestyle factors (e.g., hobbies) and interests (e.g., sports).
Research and review your competition.
- Research and review your competition. You need to know what your competitors are doing, what their target audience is looking for, and how much money they’re spending on marketing. You can use this information to inform your own strategy and make sure it stands out from the crowd.
- Know how much money you can spend on marketing. If you have a limited budget but want to reach as many people as possible with an effective ad campaign or social media posts, then consider using a paid ad platform like Facebook Ads Manager or Google Adwords instead of investing in print materials (such as brochures). The right digital tools will help maximize ROI while keeping costs low–and if there’s one thing we know about businesses today: It’s that they need every penny they can get!
Develop your brand identity.
A brand identity is the sum of all the components that make up your company and its products, including:
- Logo
- Color scheme/colors used in marketing materials (print, web, etc.)
- Fonts used on packaging/advertising materials
- Tagline or slogan
It’s important to have a strong brand identity because it helps customers recognize your business immediately and associate it with positive things. This makes them more likely to choose your product over one made by another company.
Create a content calendar and newsletter plan.
Once you have your audience in mind, it’s time to create a content calendar and newsletter plan. These two tools will help you stay on track with your marketing efforts by keeping you focused on the right topics at the right times.
- Content calendar: This is a list of topics that need to be covered over the next quarter or year. You can make one for each month or quarter, depending on how much detail is required for each item on your list–you may want separate calendars for blog posts and social media updates, for example. It’s important that this document be reviewed at least quarterly so that no important issues fall through the cracks!
- Newsletter plan: This document contains all the information needed by someone who wants to write an article about something related to their business (or even just an interesting topic). Having this information handy ensures writers won’t have trouble creating content under tight deadlines; it also gives them freedom within limits because they know where their story fits into larger themes already established by other staff members’ work surrounding similar topics throughout different mediums such as print magazines versus television shows versus podcasts…
Determine where you’ll market and promote yourself, including social media outlets that work best for you and the types of posts you’ll share there.
After you have a list of the social media outlets that work best for you, it’s time to determine which ones will be the most effective in marketing your brand. You can do this by analyzing what kind of content is shared on each platform, as well as how often users engage with it. For example, Instagram has more than 300 million active monthly users and an average user spends more than 30 minutes per day browsing through photos and videos (Instagram 2018). This means that if your audience spends their time on Instagram rather than Facebook or Twitter, then it might make sense for your company’s marketing strategy to incorporate Instagram into its plan.
If one social media channel seems like a better fit than another from an engagement standpoint but doesn’t align with where the majority of your target audience spends their time online (or if there isn’t enough data available), consider using A/B tests on different platforms until you find one that works best for both parties involved–you’ll need this knowledge later when we get into measuring effectiveness!
Find ways to reduce expenses and cut costs in areas where you can so that you can put more money into marketing efforts that will pay off for you in the long run.
It’s important to set a budget before you start planning your marketing strategy. A good rule of thumb is to set aside 20% of your revenue for marketing, but this may not always be possible given the circumstances.
If you are an entrepreneur or small business owner, you will have to look for ways to reduce expenses and cut costs in areas where you can so that you can put more money into marketing efforts that will pay off for you in the long run. You could also increase revenue by raising prices or offering new products/services with higher margins (e.g., consulting).
A good marketing strategy helps drive business growth for freelancers or small businesses
When you’re starting out, the hardest part of running a business is getting customers. You need to get your name out there and make sure that people know what you do. A good marketing strategy helps drive business growth for freelancers or small businesses, but most freelancers don’t have the time or money to hire someone else to create one for them–so here’s how you can do it yourself:
- Define your target audience
- Identify their needs and pain points
- Decide what kind of content will resonate with them
Conclusion
If you’re a freelancer or small business owner, it’s important to have a solid marketing strategy in place. This will help you reach new customers, keep existing ones coming back for more and allow them to refer others who might be interested in doing business with you too.
