SME Marketing Tips for a Tough Economy

by Willy Lim
(Singapore)

It can be a struggle for SME to bring in new business in this tough economy. Wouldn't it be great if you could generate more leads and clients without having to increase your cost?

Regardless of whether you're just starting your own business or have a well-established business, some of the most powerful ways to grow your business can be free! And these powerful ideas work whether you are making $50,000 a year or $10,000,000 a year in business.

Here are three no-cost, high return SME marketing tips, you may find useful for this tough economy:

SME Marketing Tip #1
Give Away Something Valuable...Free

I use a 7-day e-course I wrote and an audio interview I did with Star newspaper journalist to generate subscriptions to my newsletters. Each week my list of qualified prospects grows. I spent a few days writing the e-course and about 20 minutes to do the audio interview but after that my lead generation costs went to ZERO.

Let your prospects sample your ideas or your products. For example, people who are in the training business should consider giving away 20% of your course content free. It's the fastest way to help people understand the value of what you provide, develop a real reason to believe, and to want to do business with you.

People will start to think, if your free stuff are so good, what about the paid stuff?

SME Marketing Tip #2
Create Compelling Offers

In this economy your offers need to capture your prospect's interest and get them to act right away. Special time limited or limited availability offers are what the retail chains are using which you can use too.

To increase sales, you will need to place your offer relative to your target market's concerns. Only after you have clarified how your product or service meets their concerns, will the value of your offer become apparent. People buy your products and services based on their perception of value. Whether you are charging five dollars or five thousand, your prospects need to be convinced that the benefits you provide will outweigh the cost.

Creating a compelling offer is a combination of science and art. It involves blending the following items together to create a sentence or two which will move people to take action, whether it is contacting you or making an immediate purchase.

Include the following items to create an offer that helps sell:

1) Overt Benefit
What you are selling. The obvious, right in the face problem it solves

2) Real Reason to Believe
How are you going to make good on your promise

3) Dramatic Difference
Why they should be excited and buy it from you

4) Guarantee
Your promise to them

5) Motivation to Act
A reason to take advantage of your offer today.

SME Marketing Tip #3
Get Others to Promote Your Business for You

The goal in marketing is to reach more prospects, get them to trust you and understand the value of your products and services. What's the fastest and least expensive way to do this?

Get others to promote you.
That's right. No matter what you're product or service there are other businesses that offer non-competing products and services to the same target market. The magic question to ask is,

"Who has the same target market as me,
but selling different products and services?"
Go into a joint venture with them and get them to promote your company and you've instantly increased your database of prospects. You can leverage the trust relationship they have built with their list and all you need to do is to put forward clearly the value of your service or products. Of course, to make this work, you will have to also allow them to promote their services and products to your list :)

There are dozens of other ways to position and expand your business in a tough economy, strategies that work whether you're just starting out or you're growing a well-established business.

If you have an SME marketing tip, do share with it with other SME owners by adding your comments to this article.


Delivering Net Profit to Your Business,
Willy Lim