Take Your Small Business Marketing to the Next Level in 5 Easy Steps

Take Your Small Business Marketing to the Next Level in 5 Easy Steps

We can all agree that the year 2020 was unlike any other.

It was a trial by fire for many businesses. Some people ascended to the top and made record earnings. Others drowned and never came back.

What makes certain businesses flourish while others failed in the same industry?

How are business owners faring today – in a “new normal” market – among those who survived and even prospered amid adversity?

Do they have faith in their ability to face new problems and plan for the future?

Call Rail surveyed 600 small business owners in the United States in the summer of 2021 to determine the current state of marketing in this rocky "new normal" period, yielding a powerfully insightful look at how marketing agencies can fulfill new needs and goals of small businesses in a post-pandemic era.

Important Findings

·         Eighty percent of firms claim they're completely operational again, with the majority citing a complete recovery from the pandemic.

·         Small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) are seeking for marketing agencies to help them boost their post-COVID activities by 94%.

·         96% are willing to increase their marketing budget and pay their agencies extra for their services.

The data from Call Rail reveals a unique possibility for marketing firms and small businesses to collaborate and develop long-term strategies to address future difficulties. For a more in-depth look, read the entire report.

Marketing for Small Businesses: What the Future Holds

All of the business owners that took part in the Call Rail study employed fewer than 200 people. COVID-19 had a negative impact on 56 percent of respondents' businesses, while 11 percent reported growth and 33 percent said the pandemic had had no effect.

The future appears to be brighter: 80 percent of respondents believe their company has fully recovered from the epidemic, and 71% believe their company is currently positioned for long-term growth and success.

What do the majority of these companies have in common?

You guessed correctly, it's a marketing plan.

Only 3% of the companies polled said they don't have a growth strategy in place. The remaining 97 percent have a strategy in place for at least the next six months.As part of their core approach, respondents cited the following marketing strategies:

·         57 percent of marketers use social media.

·         OFFICIAL WEBSITE OF THE COMPANY: 49%

·         Email marketing has a 43 percent success rate.

·         35 percent on the blog

·         32% of people subscribe to the newsletter.

·         Landing pages created specifically for a campaign: 29%

·         28 percent of reviews and testimonials

·         26 percent referral program

·         Technology for customer relationship management (CRM): 20%

·         Paid search, often known as pay-per-click (PPC), accounts for 17% of all searches.

·         15 percent for SEO (local search optimization).

·         Because of financial restrictions, timing constraints, and a reliance on word-of-mouth advertising, there was no marketing at all: 6 percentage points

·         1 percent for other

Small businesses might benefit from a strategic partnership with a marketing agency in five ways.

After more than a year of lockdowns, mask laws, restrictions, and consumer apprehension, most businesses are finally going in the right direction.

Consumer confidence has been stable, and there are encouraging signs of a revival in discretionary spending.

However, despite the upbeat outlook, the market remains shaky and vulnerable. Nobody knows what the future holds, especially given the ongoing possibility of new case outbreaks and more contagious variations.

Businesses haven't yet made it out of the woods.

Marketing firms have a great chance to become a significant strategic partner for small businesses by assisting them in navigating these difficult times and developments.

Here are five reasons why a small business owner should work with a marketing firm:

 

1. Free up time and resources for the company.

 

Time and funding were the two biggest hurdles for business owners in creating a marketing plan, according to the CallRail survey:

·         44 percent of respondents indicated they were pressured for time, overwhelmed with running their firm, and lacked the financial resources to hire someone.

·         74% stated they'd prefer spend their time on essential business obligations rather than marketing.

Many entrepreneurs have a do-it-yourself mentality and try to do too much on their own.

A marketing agency brings more experience to the table while also freeing up an owner's time to focus on other vital duties that may have slipped between the cracks.

2. Keep an eye on trends and make recommendations based on your past experiences.

COVID-19 was a huge hit on the market. Most businesses had no idea what to expect and were left floundering as they tried to negotiate the new market.

While a professional marketing agency would face the same obstacles, they would also have the benefit of years, if not decades, of marketing knowledge to guide them in making strategic judgments.

During the COVID-19 epidemic, 81 percent of small business owners felt that having a marketing strategy was crucial to their company's success. A long-term experience-based strategy can be the difference between survival and extinction.

Businesses are missing out on money if they don't focus on smart marketing.

3. Save money on payroll while gaining more resources

67 percent of those polled indicated they wished they had engaged a marketing firm instead of employing internally.

One prevalent misperception is that employing in-house saves money and meets a pressing need. But that doesn't account for the additional costs of recruiting, onboarding, training, and ultimately retaining the employee, which include things like health insurance, matching retirement plans, vacation and sick days, payroll taxes, life insurance, disability coverage, tuition reimbursement, and so on.

When everything is said and done, the cost of employing a new employee is typically 1.25 to 1.4 times the base wage range, plus the time spent training and familiarizing the new employee with the company.

What happens if the employee decides to leave? A significant investment has been squandered.

Even if an outside marketing agency appears to be more expensive based on their hourly fee, it is frequently a more cost-effective choice than employing in-house, not to mention the extra benefits of having a professional team on call with a plethora of additional resources and manpower.

4. Bring the Marketing Strategy into the 21st Century

We work in a fast-paced environment. New apps, trends, SEO upgrades, and best practices appear and disappear on a regular basis.

Is it possible for small business owners to stay on top of everything and maintain high conversion rates?

 

In addition to more typical outbound marketing approaches like commercials and PPC ads, a modern marketing plan employs inbound marketing techniques like high-performing web content.

Keyword research, graphic design, multichannel campaigns, social media, call volume, email, and everything in between are all part of today's marketing plans, all leading up to data measurement and analysis.

To be successful, the individual in charge of marketing activities must be knowledgeable about the latest marketing tactics. What worked a year ago, or even a month ago, might not work today.

5. Take a look at the long-term results

According to CallRail's survey, 71% of respondents thought their company was currently positioned for long-term success and growth. However, 25% of respondents were unsure about their company's future. And 4% admitted that their company would eventually fail if it remained on its current path.

Building and maintaining a firm necessitates a long-term strategy as well as the flexibility required to deal with short-term issues.

Marketing agencies add impartial, independent assistance to a company's strategy. In order to make informed judgments, they look at the broad picture and analyze the market niche to see what competitors are doing and where the industry is headed.

They also provide crucial analytical data that allows small businesses to better understand and target their audience, determine which marketing initiatives were successful, and plan future campaigns based on past results.

Small Business Marketing with CallRail: The Right Tools & Resources

As the post-pandemic marketing landscape recovers, many small business owners are revisiting their marketing methods. In the future, 94 percent stated they were very or somewhat likely to use a marketing firm or professional.

It is critical for agencies to understand what their customers require in order for those partnerships to succeed.

Following a bad experience with a marketing firm, small business owners indicated the following areas for improvement:

·         55 percent are assisting in the improvement of customer service.

·         51 percent vetting and recommending new technology to help the company expand

·         43 percent of marketers and salespeople want to improve their workflows.

 

 

·         Contributing to the refinement of the value proposition: 40%

·         Increasing the company's ability to track leads: 38%

·         Going above and beyond the call of duty to aid a company's understanding of its customers: 29% of the population

·         Providing the means for the company to better handle leads: 29% of the population

·         Including company enhancement services as add-ons, such as sales training or brand coaching: 25%

·         enabling the company to engage with leads more effectively: 9%

Agencies  who can successfully identify and resolve these pain points for their consumers are well positioned to become a valuable asset that can aid their small company partners in both short- and long-term survival.

The majority of small business owners (96%) are willing to pay more for extra services.

In order for a firm and a marketing agency to work together successfully, analytics are essential. Not only does data fuel targeted marketing strategies, but it's also essential for demonstrating to a client how much ROI they're getting out of the connection.

Call Rail provides a number of tools for tracking analytical data, which is essential for calculating ROI and designing campaigns.

·         Call tracking: Find out which ad, campaign, or keyword prompted a caller to contact your company right away. Call monitoring software allows you to track the performance of your marketing initiatives so you can figure out which ones are producing results and which ones aren't. Measure both online and offline marketing assets, such as social media postings, emails, PPC advertisements, and so on.

·         Lead Center: With so many channels for customers to use, it's becoming increasingly difficult for small businesses to keep up with the influx of leads. The Lead Center on Call Rail streamlines the procedure. Incoming, current, and recent chats, emails, phone calls, and texts are all filtered into a single inbox. You'll see a timeline of a customer's experiences with your bra every time they contact you.

·         Conversation Intelligence: Highly efficient AI-powered software analyzes your calls and provides recordings, transcriptions, and actionable insights so you can troubleshoot common website issues or other problems, compile frequently asked questions, improve your service, train your staff, and get more bang for your buck with your marketing budget.

·         Form tracking: Track which ad or keywords resulted in a lead hitting "Submit" on a contact form to monitor your ad campaigns and illuminate your lead activity. All of your touchpoints are kept in a unified chronology. Form Tracking will show you all of the steps a lead took, such as clicking on an ad, downloading a report, submitting a form, and calling your customer service number.