Marketing is not something you just jump into,
however. It requires careful examination and evaluation.
Not every method, after all, will lead to the benefits mentioned
above.
When it comes to selecting the methods you
use with your business, remember to keep in mind your target
audience and your budget, then start narrowing the list
of possibilities. You may also want to try a few of these
marketing methods which have been proven effective for other
home-based businesses:
Affiliate Programs
Almost all home-based businesses can work
with an affiliate program. With this type of program, you
recruit other people to sell your products/services and
reward them with a percentage of the revenue (usually 3
to 10%).
The mechanics of these programs works like
a restaurant franchise. Because your recruits are now associated
with your company's name, you want to be sure that they
are maintaining your standards of quality and professionalism,
so many affiliate programs include ready-made web sites,
sales materials, and more.
These recruits then attempt to make sales
on your behalf. The benefit is that all of their marketing
efforts (beyond what you provide) are not part of your business's
expenses, and they have the potential to reach new segments
of potential clients and customers.
Giveaways
This type of marketing is one of the most
popular with all businesses and can be handled in at least
two ways: free gifts with a purchase and/or contests.
You have probably come across ads or web sites
that sell e-books or other products and offer a number of
free gifts with the purchase of the product. The lure of
freebies helps people make the decision to purchase. You
can do the same thing with your product or service. Keep
in mind that whatever you offer as a free gift should be
inexpensive to produce so that you don't lose money on the
deal.
Contests can also be quite effective if done
creatively. For example, if your business was selling e-books,
you could hold a contest with the grand prize being a free
copy of one of your top-selling e-books.
But what about second place? Many people don't
realize that there's no rule or law against giving a prize
to every person who enters your contest so why not reward
all of the other people who entered with a significant discount
on the price of that same e-book? Many of those second place
winners will take the discount and make a purchase.
Search Engine Optimization
If you do any business online, an important
part of your marketing efforts should be search engine optimization
or SEO. SEO essentially means that you tweak your site so
that it appears near the top of search engine results for
certain keywords.
Generally this involves repeating those keywords
frequently and placing keywords in headlines, meta tags,
and introductory paragraphs. While it may sound easy, most
businesses turn their SEO efforts over to professionals.
If bringing an expert in fits your marketing budget, you
may want to enlist their assistance.
Referral Reward Programs
Another type of program aimed at bringing
people to your site is a type of referral reward program.
During the Internet boom, many sites had these type of programs
which paid a few cents for each person who visited a site
from a link listed at your site or through some other means.
Now, however, they simply are not as popular,
but they can still be beneficial. Instead of offering a
cash reward, allow your customers to earn your products/services
by referring new business to you.
For example, you may want to offer a free
e-book to customers who refer five new customers to your
site. These new customers may have to make a purchase, join
the referral reward program, become a member, or sign up
for the newsletter. People will do a great deal if the reward
is right.
Whether you elect to use one of these marketing
methods or choose one of your own, the key is to test its
effectiveness. Try it out for awhile and see if the results
are satisfactory. If not, return to the drawing board. If
so, then implement it on a larger scale. With careful planning
and testing, your business will experience the benefits
of marketing firsthand.
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Vishal P. Rao is the editor of Home
Based Business Opportunities - A website dedicated to
opportunities, ideas and resources for starting a home based
business. He also runs the Work
at Home Forum - an online community of folks who work
at home.
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