Recently, we’ve talked about marketing solutions for your small business. Previously, we’ve talked about both technology and in-store promotions to help you attract and retain customers. Today, we’re going to discuss a way to increase your marketing and promotions without increasing your budget, co-marketing. Another way to help your budget, is to use our free inventory management system for small business. It's free and will save you time and money. That's a win-win-win my friend.
All too often, small business owners make the mistake of believing that they have to do things on their own. While you do have the ultimate responsibility for the success or failure of your small business, that doesn’t mean that you have to do everything by yourself. In fact, you are far less likely to succeed if you take that approach. In the past, we’ve talked about how important it is to delegate. Co-marketing doesn’t mean asking your own employees to help you, it actually involves contacting other businesses and creating joint marketing efforts. You can even track promotional materials by using our free inventory management system for small business. This way you know where every shared resource actually is.
Co-marketing can be as simple asking other local businesses to display your business card and offering to keep a supply of their cards in your business. This works particularly well if your businesses complement one another. A party supply store that recommended a bakery, a stationer and a caterer could be very helpful for customers. Even if the businesses are unrelated, there can be benefits for cross-advertising. Someone out shopping is likely to get hungry. If your gift shop advertised the sandwich shop down the street they could decide to give it a try. Similarly, if sandwich shop patrons are reading the signs near the register and see a card for your gift shop they may decide to stop in and check it out.
Taking this idea one step further, you could share wares along with a small card that identifies which business they came from. For example, the bakery down the street could display their wares on a cake stand from your gift shop. Your gift shop could feature a tea table with coffee and cookies from the bakery. Now anyone visiting either shop is exposed to product from both.
Looking for an even bigger marketing bang? Consider organizing the other businesses in your area to create an event. Events are great ways to draw large crowds, but they can be very expensive to produce. Splitting the cost among several businesses not only reduces the cost significantly, it also reduces the chances of event related complaints. If the other businesses are included in your event, they aren’t going to complain about the crowds, parking problems, or noise issues. They will be on your team trying to solve these issues to make next year’s event bigger and better!
There are so many things that you can do to co-market. Want to paper the town with fliers that advertise your business? Get a few companies to go in with you and you can afford as many beautiful, professionally designed fliers as you’d like. Creating a loyalty program, but worried about the cost? Create a card that works at multiple businesses. Your customers will appreciate having fewer cards to keep up with and you’ll appreciate not having to foot the entire bill yourself.
Free Inventory Management System for Small Business by Canvus Applications
Don’t worry about losing track of your inventory through co-marketing. With Stockpile, our free inventory management system for small business, you’ll be able to track inventory at your location and when it’s on loan to other businesses. Don’t have Stockpile yet? What are you waiting for? If you’ve been following our small business tips business is about to be booming. Try Stockpile today! See what others are raving about. Where else are you going to find a tool that's easy to use and saves time? Stockpile by Canvus Applications is the world's best free inventory management system for small business for a reason!
