For any business to succeed, it must master marketing to its target audience or demographic. Small to medium businesses or SMBs especially have to market to outperform their competition and capture as much traffic as possible from limited customer pools.
*Updated 9/29/2024
If your SMB marketing needs a bit of a boost, you’ve come to the right place. Today, let’s break down how to create an effective SMB marketing strategy step-by-step.
Shortcuts:
SMB marketing is the process by which small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) create strategies to promote their products and services.
Unlike large corporations, SMBs must tailor their marketing efforts to budget constraints and their specific customer base. This often involves a mix of both traditional and digital marketing methods to maximize results.
If you strategize your marketing efforts, you’ll be much more likely to:
All businesses need marketing strategies to thrive. For example, a dental office might use a marketing strategy plus tools like GetWeave to maximize its attractiveness to clients and patients.
Now that you know the importance of an effective marketing strategy, let’s break down how to develop one step-by-step.
Firstly, you need to set the right goals for your SMB. Small to medium businesses like yours often need to target specific metrics to grow effectively and on schedule.
For example, most SMBs want to increase their revenue or get more leads. Regardless of the goals you choose, remember to keep those goals S.M.A.R.T.
Source: Indeed
SMART goals for most small to medium businesses are things like increasing revenue by a specific percentage, getting a certain number of leads, and so on.
Keeping your goals specific will help you use the right marketing strategies and tools for your needs.
For instance, you may target customers, leads, and website visitors or redo your website or online store for better performance and search engine optimization (SEO).
Bottom line: figure out what goals you want to achieve through your marketing, then move on from there.
The next major step is to identify the right marketing metrics and a baseline or starting point against which you can measure them.
A baseline, in a nutshell, helps you determine which of your marketing tactics or tools generate the right numbers or improvements for your overall goals mentioned above.
Say that you aim to increase website traffic by a specific percentage or visitor count. Your baseline could be your current visitor count or all-time high visitor count, as previously recorded over your business’s lifespan.
Now that you have a baseline, you know what improvement looks like should your marketing efforts be successful. You should also determine key metrics, or KPIs, to help you measure that success, like revenue, visitor count, total traffic on a single day, etc.
These metrics depend on your goals and your business, of course. So take a while to think of the metrics you want to focus on before moving to the next step.
When it comes to small business marketing, a one-size-fits-all approach rarely works. Each industry has unique challenges, audience behaviors, and competitive landscapes, making it essential to develop tailored strategies.
Now that you know what to look for and how to measure success, it’s time to pick out the right marketing tactics to achieve that success. Broadly speaking, most marketing tactics are one of two types:
For example, retail businesses may benefit from social media ads and influencer marketing, while service-based industries might focus more on SEO and content marketing to educate potential clients.
Generally, most SMBs need to combine both digital and traditional marketing tactics to see success. There's one exception: e-commerce businesses.
Source: Shop OnCloud
The next major step is selecting the right marketing channels for your brand and overall business goals.
If you aren’t sure what marketing channels to leverage, look at what your competitors use. If they work for your competitors, odds are they will also work for you since you are competing for the same target audience.
Lastly, you can improve and optimize your SMB marketing strategy by measuring long-term results. As you put out your first ads and bring your first customers to your site, gather as much data as you can and determine:
Analyzing your marketing results and improving is the number one way to master SMB marketing overall. It’s also the only way you’ll be able to wring as much value from every marketing dollar you spend as possible.
For example, say that you put out a bunch of Google PPC ads. Over time, you should measure the performance of those ads and figure out which ones bring the most people to your website.
Then you can design future advertisements like the most successful ones you already have up and running.
Here are some key small business marketing ideas to ensure you get the most out of your efforts:
Source: LinkedIn
To implement your small business marketing plan effectively, using the right tools to streamline tasks, enhance productivity, and provide measurable results is important. Below are some top marketing tools that can help you optimize your marketing efforts:
Managing multiple social media platforms can be time-consuming. Social media management tools allow you to schedule posts, track engagement, and analyze performance across various channels, saving time and effort.
Email marketing is one of the most effective ways to nurture leads and retain customers. A good email marketing platform allows you to create, automate easily, and track email campaigns.
For any business looking to grow its online presence, SEO tools are essential. They help you optimize your website content, monitor keyword rankings, and analyze backlinks to improve search engine visibility.
Running successful pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns requires proper tracking and optimization. PPC tools help businesses create, manage, and analyze campaigns on platforms like Google Ads and social media networks.
High-quality visuals and engaging content are essential for effective marketing. Content creation tools help businesses create everything from social media graphics to videos and infographics.
For small businesses that need to scale their marketing efforts, automation platforms allow for efficient management of repetitive tasks like email follow-ups, social media posts, and lead nurturing.
SMB marketing is the process where small and medium-sized businesses promote their products or services to a specific target audience using various marketing strategies.
To create a marketing plan for small businesses, start by defining your target audience, setting measurable goals, selecting effective marketing channels, and tracking progress for adjustments.
Effective digital marketing for small businesses includes strategies such as search engine optimization (SEO), social media marketing, and email marketing.
Marketing tools for small business can include CRM software, social media scheduling tools, and email marketing platforms to improve efficiency and effectiveness.
Small businesses can increase brand awareness by utilizing social media, content marketing, and influencer partnerships to reach a broader audience.
Marketing is crucial for SMBs because it drives growth, increases visibility, and helps them compete in a crowded market.
Some of the best free marketing tools include Google Analytics for tracking website performance, Mailchimp for email marketing (with a free plan for smaller lists), and Canva for designing graphics and social media posts.
Free tools can often be sufficient for small businesses with limited budgets, but as your business grows, paid tools typically offer advanced features, better analytics, and greater customization that can significantly improve your marketing efforts.
Creating an effective small business marketing plan is key to ensuring that your business can compete with larger enterprises.
By identifying the right audience, setting clear goals, choosing the appropriate channels, and tracking your results, you can build a marketing strategy that drives growth and builds lasting relationships with your customers.
Lee Li has a decade of experience in the Chinese fintech startup space as a PM for TaoBao, MeitTuan and DouYin (now TikTok).
She was born in ShenZhen, China and got her Bachelor's degree of Economics at the Shanghai Jiao Tong University and my Msc at Investment and Securities at Antai College of Economics & Management, Shanghai Jiao Tong University.