Apparently, small businesses have been letting their marketing slip and this worrying trend could be set to cost them in the long run. Reports have shown a disparity between planned marketing and what is actually carried out, with the average business only achieving around 39% of their planned activity. Businesses have cited time and money amongst the reasons behind their marketing efforts slipping.

However, we all know that businesses can’t sit back and do nothing and an increase in marketing activity always helps to boost sales – so what is the answer? Well there are ways to improve your marketing without spending large amounts on costs or resource. Digital Marketing is one area that is potentially ‘low cost’ – improving the company website, writing a company blog, sending out frequent email newsletters, enhancing the company profile on social network sites such as Facebook and Twitter are all relatively low budget activities that can have a positive effect on ROI.

We know some business owners that have shied away from using social media, the reason they usually give is that they have trouble getting a true measure of how social media will benefit their company, and it is unclear what the true return on investment (ROI) would be. In fact, social media for little or no cost will promote your brand to countless individuals and allow you to network with other companies for potential partnerships.

Along with social media, blogging can be one of your best weapons when it comes to marketing your brand. If you haven’t really paid attention to your company blog recently, it’s time to change that. A business blog can be the ideal tool for you to optimise your business’s online presence. By attracting readers to your blog you will in turn attract them to your business website and product offerings, thus increasing your brand awareness. It can be a great way to bring in new customers via informative and entertaining content. Other reasons why blogs are great for attracting new customers are:

• SEO – having an active blog does have a positive effect on your search engine ratings, and it also gives you the room to keep expanding your content.
• Keep customers coming back – if you write interesting & entertaining posts on a regular basis then you will entice readers to keep coming back to your blog and also your website.
• Viral Potential – make sure you post your blogs on Twitter and Facebook as well as your website and they are more likely to be seen plus people may ‘retweet’ your content.
• Show off your expertise – if you write regularly about the line of business you are involved with an authoritative voice, you will gain readers and credibility.

So now you can see there are ways to market your business without breaking the budget – there no excuses and you can’t do “nothing” right?!