So much is made of the whole online marketing thing these days that it’s hard for small business owners, like you, to find useful information that pertains to offline marketing, which is marketing performed strictly in the offline world.
The idea of offline marketing can definitely be a misnomer in this day and age, due to the fact that social media and other web-based marketing channels are always beneficial to offline business. But that doesn’t mean you have to go that route every time you’re developing a marketing plan for your latest customer-acquisition project.
You can, in fact, cross-promote your online and offline marketing.
The five following offline marketing channels can pertain to both new and established businesses. Granted, there’s nothing particularly ground-breaking, but perhaps you’ll see something that has been long forgotten and consider adding it to your bag of tricks once again.
1. Networking
There is a whole world full of people out there who are either:
- Eager to buy your product or service, if you can only just find a way to get it right in front of them where they can see it.
- Willing to help get your product or service in front of the people who want to buy from you.
Focus your attention on the following groups that pertain to your business:
- TV and radio personalities (actors, musicians, reporters, etc.).
- Marketing experts that have a better reach/more knowledge than you do.
- Bloggers and social media celebrities (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, etc.).
- Business owners who sell related products that would mesh well with yours.
2. Flyers
Flyers have been around forever. Now that most marketers have taken their game online, you might find that there’s a significant opening in your area to hand out, post and downright shove your business’s name right in people’s faces.
While that might seem a bit dramatic, think about hiring some young, energetic marketing-minions to stick a flyer on every car windshield in a local mall parking lot. Oe on every telephone pole within a certain area or simply drop your flyer off at local businesses that could use your services.
Consider flyers in your local newspaper for an additional offline marketing option as well.
3. Business Cards
The real ones not the digital kind. This is particularly effective for your “old school†customer or business contact. There’s something that’s just so tangible about having a well made, snappy business card with your name on it.
It’s also one more avenue that could pay off indefinitely, with very little expense. You can print them off yourself quite cheaply these days (use good material) as opposed to going to a local business depot like you would have in the days of old, and paying out the nose for the service.
4. Newsletters
Newsletters can be just as effective as flyers to the right crowd of customers, or like-minded business contacts. Think outside the box here. When we choose to read something, we’re looking for something that pertains to our interests and that provides value of some sort.
Try to make the newsletter an “indirect†selling tool, where you give the reader some useful information that they don’t have to pay for.
For instance, say you’re in the pest control business. Your newsletter could be about how readers can “pest-proof†their home for the winter months, or how to keep their pets safe from diseases that are spread by vermin.
See where this is going?
If they respect you, they’ll likely buy from you. Especially when they don’t want to confront the ‘rabid’ raccoon in their attic, or the ‘scary’ snake under their daughters bed.
5. Sponsorship
Who says chivalry is dead?
We live in an era of cost-cutting, particularly in public and private school systems. You can sponsor almost any person or cause that needs money and it will help expand your marketing reach.
Look at sports teams. Let’s say baseball, children or adults. Watching a little league game at your local baseball diamond, do you notice how the player’s uniforms have the names of their sponsoring companies on the back? How about your local hockey arena? There will be local and national sponsors advertised all over, in BIG BOLD letters.
Sponsorship gives your karma an instant boost, too.
Your Mission for Today
Give some of these offline marketing avenues a try once again. See if one of them doesn’t increase your business’s reach. Just like fashion, marketing trends fade in and out - and back in again.
Whether they work is all a matter of luck, timing and a little knowledge.
Marketing Concept Photo via Shutterstock
