Marketing your business or your services offline doesn’t have to cost thousands. Spending money on newspaper ads, TV ads, Yellow Page ads and radio ads might work for some businesses, but many start-up and small businesses just can’t afford to spend that kind of money.
Does that mean you can’t market yourself? Of course not. You can still do very effective marketing, all while spending less than $100 a month. Here are a few ways to do it.
==> Host Your Own Meetup Group
One great way to position yourself right in the middle of the action is to host your own meetup group.
Let’s say you’re an app icon designer looking for more business. You might create an iPhone App meetup in your local area.
Developers, app development firms, business owners who’re thinking about developing an app and anyone else interested in apps might come to this meetup.
They’ll meet you, the organizer, and you’ll quickly become their go-to person for app icon designs. Because you organized the group, you’re automatically seen as someone of authority.
==> Go to Minglers and Professional Events
If there’s a cocktail event or a meetup in your area, go to that event. Even if you don’t think you’ll meet someone who’ll make it worth your time, go anyway.
Minglers and events allow you to meet valuable contacts. Those contacts can turn into clients, or they could introduce you to people who could in turn be clients or marketing partners.
Let’s say you run a restaurant. Why would you go to a mingler? It doesn’t seem like the most efficient way to market.
But through the mingler, you might meet someone who regularly runs a Tuesday Philosophy group. You invite them to do their groups weekly at your restaurant, giving them a 10% discount. Ten people come and spend $40 every week, giving you a nice $1,600 boost to your monthly revenues.
==> Buy or Exchange Leads
If you’re a high end CPA, you might want to befriend and exchange leads with a lawyer. After all, chances are anyone who needs a lawyer is probably going to need a good CPA and vice versa.
Look for industries that share a clientele with your business and see if you can buy leads from them or exchange leads with them.
==> Use Yelp
Yelp is a fantastic source of traffic for offline businesses. If you run a retail shop, a restaurant or any other sort of consumer-facing business, Yelp can bring you a lot of people.
Aim to become the #1 rated service in your industry for your local area. Get people to leave reviews and work hard to get your Yelp rating up. Once you’re at the top, you won’t have to use any other kind of marketing – yelpers alone will bring in tons of traffic for you.