Effective Ways To Promote Your Business Within Budget

What’s the one thing your business needs to survive? Customers! Yes, without retaining old customers or getting new ones, it is challenging to grow a startup into a successful enterprise. To get more customers, you have to promote it, and that is an overwhelming process to do in current times. Why? It's because, in today’s time, we have so many options to promote our brand because of digitalization that the entire process becomes challenging. Gone are the days when you had to choose from one or two methods. Apart from promoting the business through a traditional medium, you also have to worry about digital ones. 

If you are looking for digital marketing methods, then here are a few schemes to follow. These will allow you to market the business without worrying about the budget as the tips allow budget marketing, cheap, and more.

Have a Google business profile

You want people to find your business when they search for it or relevant keywords. Right? For that, creating a Google business profile is necessary because it is responsible for Google showing your business on maps, local search results, and when people type in the name of your business. Even the location of your business comes up due to this feature. A local business will only stand a chance if they make this listing a top priority as Google focuses more on catering the results specific to the location.

Also, to make this work, you cannot stop at just making Google, my business account. You also have to verify the listing, allowing you to have ownership of the listing and optimizing it for your benefit.

Make a website

You cannot have a successful business in today’s world without having a website. A website is necessary for retaining old customers or appealing to new ones. No matter how popular you are on social media. The customers will look at your website to understand the features, functionalities, and more. Thus, work on creating an appealing and functional website, which will always work as a promotional tool for your business.

A website tells people what is the purpose of your business, what makes it unique, and what people can expect from your brand. It has every detail they require to make a smart decision about your product/services.

You can go with a free platform to design your business. Or buy a domain name, host, and design the website from scratch for better results. The former works just fine if you still pay for the domain name.

Have a digital business card

Having a digital business card is a necessary step to switch to digital marketing methods. A business card is necessary for all businesses as it provides details like website name, contact information, and more to every customer. However, traditional business cards are expensive and not convenient when meeting or appealing to global clients or customers. Switching to digital business cards, however, can do the trick.

Try these three essential ways to enter the world of digital promotion, and you will find tons of other tips that work.

 

6 Pro tips for growing your professional network

Several factors are responsible for your professional growth such as determination, hard work, passion, discipline, to name a few. One more thing that can impact your professional growth is a professional network.

If you do not have a strong professional network, it can start to decrease your professional growth. When you connect with people with similar traits and train of thoughts, your chance of success increases.

There are few things that can help you network, like having a digital business card and presence on social media. Other than these tools, here are a few things to try to build a professional network.

Tip 1: Greet people according to their culture and confidently

 

When you meet people the first time, you must leave a good first impression on them. That will happen only when you are yourself. So, be polite, friendly, and shake their hand firmly. Show how pleased you are to meet them through your actions. Also, be confident and greet them as per their traditions. For instance, in India, it is a tradition to greet each other with folded hands. Remembering the culture of people and greeting them is a great way to build a network.

 

Tip 2: Have some distance between you and the other person

 

When you meet someone, whether a second time or initially, it is essential to remember to keep some distance between you two. Do not crowd their personal space as it comes across creepily.

Keep at least a distance of two feet between you two, leaving space for a third person to come and be part of your conversation.

 

Tip 3: Keep your business card handy

 

You meet people at events, and you want to build a professional relationship with them. For this purpose, keep your business card always with you. After a point in the conversation, you would need to verify your information, like the services you provide and your designation. Therefore, carry your digital business card with you always. People often forget to carry their business cards. Thus, it is best to have a smart business card, which you can share with people through emails and text.

 

Tip 4: Do your research

 

When you attend a professional network, do your research about the people coming to the event. Find out a few common interests for initiating conversation.

 

Tip 5: Let the other person talk too

Sometimes when we start talking, we are unable to stop. We keep talking about our likes or want to explain our opinions so well that we forget to listen to other people's opinions. So, keep this in mind and also ask them questions about them to keep the conversation going. Asking about their interests gives you a better chance to build a strong connection.

 

Tip 6: Always follow up

 

Following up after you meet someone at an event is essential. Send a simple mail saying, ‘It was nice to meet you. Looking forward to future collaborations.’ It will place you in their mind, and doing future business with them will be easy.

Share other tips for professional network building that worked for you in the comments below.

Data Security Measures For Your Business

Data is critical to a company. Hence, data security becomes an important part of business operations. A lot of technological advancements have taken place in the cybersecurity industry. Apart from installing state-of-the-art security software, there are other simple measures that you can take to protect your business’s data. Below are some of the methods if implemented, can significantly reduce security risks in your organization. 

Password selection

Enforce strict guidelines for your employees to set strong passwords. Encourage them to create passwords with a combination of lowercase letters, numbers, symbols, and uppercase letters. You can also educate your employees about the risks of sharing passwords through emails, messages, chat forums, etc. Password generators can also be used to generate strong passwords.

Antivirus protection

Malware, spyware, Trojans, etc. can easily get into your computer’s network through other files or links. Install good antivirus software that can scan the entire computer and catch infected files. Another option would be to install firewalls on your business devices. Keep updating this software or firewall so that you have the latest version installed always.

Phishing emails

Hackers have started sending phishing emails to get into a company’s network. A phishing email generally has a link in it, which if clicked gives complete access to the hacker. You should educate your employees about such hacking attacks. Make sure that you conduct security training periodically so that everyone is aware of safety measures.

Data archiving

Hacking attacks, server crash issues, etc. can happen to any business. Thus, it is important to archive the important web pages of your business. This ensures that all the sensitive data is protected and safe. God forbid if any mishap happens, then you can access the archived data to get your business back on track. A lot of third-party archiving solutions are available in the market that you can choose from. Make sure that you get the process automated so that everything happens at the backend.

Security Audits

Most of the businesses generally forget to audit the security systems. Like financial audits, a security audit helps you in finding vulnerabilities in your company’s networks. If any issue is found during audits, then you must rectify it immediately. Regular audits keep you aware of possible threats. You can update your safety systems accordingly to prevent data loss or hacking attacks.

Employee training

Even though you have installed all the latest security measures, employee training is a must to safeguard the business. Create security and integrity guidelines for your company and train all your employees in it. Keep doing refreshers throughout the year so that there are no misses. Designate point-of-contact for reporting phishing emails or suspicious behavior. If everyone in your organization follows a standard protocol, then the safety of your business strengthens automatically.

Conclusion

Protecting the business from malicious attacks isn’t easy, but is necessary in this fickle world. By implementing the security points mentioned above, your business will be better equipped to face any security threat. Do share your ideas with us in the comment section below.

4 ways to update your content marketing strategy

Are you looking for the tips to improve your content marketing strategies? Do you want better content writing process that will help your business to grow more? It’s very important to update your content marketing strategies regularly because content marketing is changing. Promotional methods are not as successful as they were before. Audience don’t like the same type of content over and over, they like to read new and creative content. So now, it’s the right time to think about making your content updated. Here are some tips to get you thinking that what you need to improve.

Hire Expert Writers 

It is more important to hire a expert to write your content. This is especially important in healthcare,finance and legal industries. Suppose if you hire a non-expert for content writing in healthcare industry and he/she mentioned the wrong tips via his content. It can affect the user health adversely. That’s why it is beneficial to hire expert writers who have the complete knowledge about the topic.

Use more videos 

As we all know, video explain the content better than a plain text does. So, include more videos in your post to improve your SEO ranking and add value for customers. And if video consumes more page loading time, then you can also use Gifs in your marketing post. Gifs consumes less page loading time than videos. They seem more interactive and explains your thoughts in a better way.

Offer something beneficial 

Whenever you’re about to post an article, always ask yourself that the knowledge you are sharing is beneficial or not? Don’t offer something that is not related to what your reader want to read. They should see it as a chance to learn more. Do not choose the same topics as your competitors are writing upon. Try to write on those topic which provides additional information.

Put your audience first 

It is the best way to ensure that your content marketing strategies stays successful. Listen to your audience continuously and find out what are their wants and needs. If you and your audience have different ideas than you need to ensure that you update your content as your audience want to read. Put yourself in their shoes then write.

Now go back and review your already published contents and improve your upcoming content marketing strategies while keeping the above mentioned tips in mind.Also don’t forget to stop listening to your audience and be flexible enough to make changes to the content. Comment down your opinions about this article- Is this useful to you or not?