Many problems confront start-ups, but none is more severe or life-threatening than the effort to remain cash positive. As a result, many cash-strapped start-ups forego marketing investments. That is a big error because marketing can provide the cash they need, and it doesn’t have to be expensive. Sure, higher-budget marketing methods may provide more exposure and consistency in their long-term results, but there are lots of very successful – and free – marketing strategies you can utilize to help your startup grow. But to achieve this
There are two golden rules, which you must know and these are:
1. You must spend time if you cannot spend money.
2. Promote your value (rather than your services) to potential clients first, and they will come begging for your services afterward.
The first hack I’ll provide today is,
EFFECTIVELY LEVERAGE THE POWER OF NETWORKING TO ACQUIRE CLIENTS.
You don’t need to do anything special or very technical to accomplish this; simply follow these super basic steps and you’re ready to go.
1. Make certain that at least all of your friends and family are aware of what you do.
It may not seem like much, but If you go through your contacts on WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social media platforms you are on, chances are, you have direct access to thousands of people who would be willing to know the services you offer. Not only that, some of them will be eager to share your message with individuals they know would be interested in what you do.
2. Join groups and forums where your potential consumers are likely to be (the crucial phrase here is “where your potential customers are likely to be”). You can always find a plethora of groups on Facebook, WhatsApp, Telegram, Instagram, Twitter, and other social media platforms, as well as a number of forums where you may provide value.
There is one golden rule here: don’t sell, don’t pitch, don’t advertise your services in any way; instead, supply value in the form of your knowledge wherever possible. As you know, the admin will most likely toss you out if you try to sell or pitch, but if you simply focus on assisting out with important information and giving value whenever the need arises as regards your expertise, it will present you as an authority in your profession. You’ll be surprised at how many people will d.m you for additional information and learn more about what you do. In this manner, you easily attract a lot more consumers from there.
3. Just like number 2. Start groups for your potential customers.
Leveraging all the platforms (and more) mentioned in the 2 above, you can also create groups channeled to educating potential customers on simple ways to overcome some of their challenges that relate to your expertise. The golden rule here is to not sell all the time, but rather give out value 80% of the time and sell your services to them only 20% of the time. Because your goal is for them to see you more as an authority in your field rather than just someone who wants to sell products to them.
4. Create social media business pages.
This follows from point 3, except that now, you can promote your brand more effectively by sharing your value-giving posts across other social platforms to get more followers. but still keeping to the 80 / 20 rule of giving value versus selling your services to your audience. Remember, when your audience sees you as the number one authority in your field because of how much you have shown to know, they will be more willing to patronize and refer you to others.
Next, I’ll cover leveraging s.e.o (search engine optimization), in which I’ll provide basic SEO tactics to enhance your business’s growth without having to spend a dime.
Remember, after you’ve established a stronger stream of steady revenue, you’ll have more funds to invest in larger, more expensive techniques, or you may pour more resources into the best performers from your previous experiments.
