Category: Marketing blog

If you are just about to start your marketing campaign, and are working in an industry that serves other businesses, you will need to have a detailed plan. Your approach will need to be different from businesses that sell products and services to customers directly. You will need to stay flexible, think about volumes, customer values, and customer acquisition costs. Find out more about the principles of business to business marketing below.

Look Professional

When building your online and offline presence, it is important to create a strong and reliable brand. Your company will be judged by important decision makers in other firms, and this means that you have to show off your expertise, build on your existing reputation, and showcase your portfolio and awards in your marketing communication.

Offer More

To win business customers from your competition, it is important to offer more than other companies. Added value services should be in the focus of your online marketing. Answer your website visitors’ question: “why are you different and why should I order from you?”. No matter if you are in the Gas Oil Drums industry or would like to get more accounting customers, you have to stand out and show how much more value you offer than other companies.

Do Your Competition Research

To win the marketing game, you need to build your messages around your company’s features that are different from other companies. For this, however, you will need to find out as much as you can about your marketplace and competition. You can conduct the research online, or obtain different quotes on services you also offer on review sites and directories. This way, you can identify gaps in the market and build your company’s competitive advantages.

Offer Guarantees

Whenever creating a marketing campaign, you should offer guarantees for companies. No matter if you are an entrepreneur trying to design training for companies or the head of a larger organization in the manufacturing business, companies will be looking for reassurance that you can do the job well and fix whatever goes wrong. Communicating money back guarantees and terms and conditions in your marketing communication will suggest that your business is transparent.

Pay Attention to the Needs of Business Owners

Most business owners try to juggle different tasks at a time. They are short of time, and their attention span is short. Therefore, to capture their interest, you will need to create straight-to-the-point marketing messages that address their most important problems. Don’t bore your business customers with complicated infographics, or long videos. You have to answer the questions your business customers have not yet asked. For this, you have to do your market research and tailor your marketing communications to the needs of your potential clients.

Marketing for business customers is different than capturing the interest of individuals. Your corporate clients will have a higher expectation of transparency and clarity. You will need to communicate clearly and provide guarantees and reassurance in your marketing communication to win the trust of your marketplace.  

Running a small business can be tough. Especially if you’ve started up on your own or have no experience of management. When you manage a large company, you have training, or you build up from the start, you may even have a degree and a team around you to help. When you start up on your own, you can come from a totally unrelated background, with some fantastic ideas but no idea about taxes, insurance and all the other things that come with running a business.

There’s a lot to think about, and a lot more than simply selling products or services do. It’s important to spend time on design and marketing and to make sure your products or services are of high quality and priced correctly. But, there are other elements of business that small business owners spend far too much time stressing over needlessly.

Accounts

Small business owners, bloggers, freelancers and anyone else that makes money for themselves instead of as an employee can be absolutely terrified of their accounts. They panic about what they need to record, who they need to tell and how to keep their money.

There’s no need. Accounts Lab can help if you need it or if you’ve got yourself into a mess by not recording things correctly. But, you can keep track of your accounts yourself with just a little organisation. Set up a spreadsheet with all of the basic details on and make sure you record everything as soon as you get paid.

Taxes

After accounts, there are taxes. Many people worry needlessly about filing their first tax return only to find that as long as their accounts are well organised and up to date, it’s much easier than they thought.

If you are anxious about making a mistake, hire an accountant to help you instead of letting it stress you out.

Another problem with taxes is paying them. When you are an employee, your taxes automatically go out of your wages; you don’t have to do anything. So, it can come as a shock the first time you are hit with a big bill. File your return as early as you can to give yourself time, and try to get into the habit of putting a little aside each week or month ready.

Invoicing

New small business owners often worry about actually getting paid. They hate asking for money or even negotiating a fee. But, if you are offering a product or service, you deserve to be paid for it and paid your worth.

Instead of worrying, prepare an invoice template including your payment details and any stipulations, such as when the invoice needs to be paid. Keep it simple and professional and send it out as soon as an order is made. Don’t be afraid to raise an issue if you are not paid on time, or to impose a late fee.

The main things we worry about tend to be financial. But, there’s no need. Keep on top of things, and it’s easy, and there is always help available if you need it.

Efficiency is important

If you’re running a small business, it’s the most important time to make sure your workflow is as efficient as possible. It’s the hardest time to stay ahead with your finances, and the least forgiving time if you fall behind. You need to make sure that every purchase you make will work out for the best, and you’re not being risky with large investments, else if the risk doesn’t pay off, your business can take a heavy hit. With everything you do, there’s always an effective method you can use to improve it, you just need to make sure you’re planning with your budget in mind.

Outsourcing

When it comes to spending as little money as possible, outsourcing is a great method you should look at when dealing with labour. A lot of the time when a business doesn’t need to hire people for a specific job, it can be much cheaper to look at third-party companies for their services. For example, if you need tech assistance or web development, you don’t want to go hiring a web designer as your employee, but instead, you’d look for someone else to fulfill your need. Check out small business best practices for some extra information. But if you’re looking to save money and time on your labour, then outsourcing is a great method to try out.

Social media

When it comes to self-promotion and image building, social media is a great place for you to look. Not only can you sign up for it for free, but you can gain easy and convenient exposure to large audiences. Many businesses have their own social media accounts, and it’s one of the easiest ways to keep in touch with your customers. With that in mind, it’s worth considering how visible your feedback will be, as customers will be able to post it on your page. This can be either a good or a bad thing, depending on the experience your customers have when they buy from you. For example; you don’t want customers to be posting negative reviews where everyone can see them. If the service they’ve received was satisfactory though, then the feedback on your page is a free promotion to your business.

Market research

It’s never been more important to keep up the trends. When you’re a small business, you need to make sure people have reason to come to you and see what you’re offering. Something to help you stand out from the bigger competitors, so if you can find an interesting and appealing niche, then you might have great success. If you don’t keep up with the times though, it can be very detrimental to you and your revenue. It’s not uncommon to see businesses fall behind and have to shut down when they no longer know how to appeal to customers, so make sure you’re in touch with your audience!

Running a small business is almost like a race, except you might just be racing the bills. If you’re financially insecure, then there’s no better time to start optimising your cash flow. Make sure you know how to monitor it, and predict where your money will come in and out so you can better plan for the future.