As a small Business or solopreneur when you see certain big size businesses spending hundreds of thousands or even millions in advertising, sometimes you feel frustrated because you don’t have the budget to run paid advertisement campaigns and you start believing that this is the single most responsible difference between their success and your failure.

It’s true that advertising helps you to constantly get your business out in front of your potential customers in order to keep a steady flow of customers calling/emailing you, but advertising does not necessarily have to be paid if you know that there are some free, yet super effective ways of advertisement that you can begin implementing right from today.

Having struggled with the same kind of challenges that you’re facing, I’ve discovered some super effective, realistic to implement and yet free advertising ideas that work and help you get your phone ring/email ting. While it’s possible that you’re already using some of these for your business, there surely are many others that you haven’t tried yet.

1. List your business on ‘Google My Business’

This might sound simple, but despite knowing that  Google is by far the most used search engine in the world, only small percentages of businesses have claimed their business on ‘Google My Business’ yet.

According to a study conducted by  LSA  more than 56% of Local Retailers Haven’t Claimed Google My Business Listing still. If you’re one of those, you’re leaving money on the table by not registering your business there yet.

According to James Parnwell, Managing Director, TheOnlineCo

The most effective free digital marketing method that you can implement in about 5 minutes is to set up a Google My Business profile. You simply need to input your name, phone number and address, as well as a few images and you, are all set… well almost!

Google wants to verify that your address is a real one and the way they do this is to send an old-fashioned postcard to the listed address with a pin code on it. You simply enter the pin code and your bonafide Google My Business account will turn up Google Search results. Once this is done you need to get your favorite customers to give you a Review, the first target is to get five so the gold stars appear on your listing, but the more you can get the better.

2.  Offer rewards for referrals

If you do not have big bucks for running heavy priced advertising campaigns, you need to do only two things – provide great service/products and ask your customers to refer you to their friends and family.

What you can do to further inspire them is to associate some kind of reward as a thanking gesture for referring.

Research says a company, for instance, offers 3 months of Netflix subscription free for each online purchase people refer and Brings in over 500 new product sales each month.

Truly, If done well there’s no better and more effective way than referral programs to quickly multiply your customers and boost sales.

3. Give reviews and testimonials to your suppliers

Giving testimonials and reviews to the products and services that you use is actually a great free way of advertising that works.

Say that your small business sells marketing services to e-commerce websites. All you have to do is identify products or services that you use and that your ideal e-commerce clients use as well. Then, search online for ways to leave public testimonials for that product. Most companies have a feedback section where you can leave your testimonials or you can email your testimonial/review to management and it’s quite possible that the company will list that on its website for free. Also, you can find free public review/testimonial sites where you can publish your opinion.

When writing your review, be sure to include information that may be helpful to your ideal client as well as your business’ name and contact information.

 Survey: 90% of consumers say buying decisions are influenced by online reviews

A new survey from research firm Dimensional Research provides an interesting look into how reviews on sites like Yelp, TripAdvisor, and other online listing sites impact consumer buying decisions.

According to the survey, which included responses from 1,046 respondents in the US, 90% of consumers who recalled reading online reviews claimed that positive reviews influenced their decision to buy. On the flipside, 86% said that negative reviews had also influenced buying decisions.

The survey also found that while negative reviews are most commonly found on popular review sites, positive reviews are most frequently seen on social media—with 44% coming from Facebook.

Bottom Line: If you own a small business, you’re probably already aware that online reviews play an important role in how customers are finding your business online.

Today more than ever, consumers want to know they can trust businesses to provide a positive experience before deciding to make a purchase, sign up for a service, or even visit your place of business.

As a business owner, the best thing you can do to get the most out of online reviews is to encourage the people who know you best to share their feedback. While it can be intimidating to ask, the reviews and recommendations from your best customers can have a major impact on your business.

4. Send cold emails

One of Lead Genius’s clients ended up increasing their response rate from zero to 28% with one cold e-mail.

Here’s the e-mail template they used:

Here are a few reasons why this worked so well:

• Intriguing headline. Adding a time constraint to achieving the desired result makes the proposition seem more appealing. For example, “15 minutes to get [company] more customers” sounds more compelling than “Get more customers for [company].”
• The introductory sentence. The first sentence of the e-mail says: “Would you like to hear an idea for a 15-minute hack that could significantly increase [company’s] conversion rate?” The word “hack” and “15 minutes” both make it sound like something that won’t take up much of the prospect’s time.
• Credibility. The e-mail builds credibility by sharing a quick case study of a B2B client who saw a 47% increase in signups.
• Call to action. The call to action for a 15-minute call sounds much more appealing after the recipient sees that they’ll get a “15-minute hack” to increase their conversion rates. Nobody wants to get on the phone and be sold to, but they would want to hear about how they can improve their conversions.

It’s important that the IDs you’re going to email are well tested before actually sending the email or it may backfire. Find emails of your target customers from the web and create a qualified list of emails before actually messaging them. Also, consider offering something free to invite them to your website.

5. Do guest blogging

If you can write good content or get it written on low cost 

you can do guest posting on the websites that are either working in the same area your company works or you think your content can benefit its audience. Guest posting is normally free and if you manage to get websites that have a large readership as well as big social media following, expect an avalanche of free and qualified traffic coming on the way that you can convert into your customers.

When writing a guest post, it’s important that your content is really useful to the audience of the respective site. Also, make sure to include an enticing call-to-action such as a free report/ free ebook in the post in order to further encourage the reader for taking actions.

Mobile developer and entrepreneur Silvio Porcellana recently did a study of his guest blogging efforts to learn that his traffic increased by 20%.

He published 44 guest blogs on 41 different platforms over the course of 5 months to achieve this.

After seeing the benefits, guest blogging became a regular part of his content marketing plan.

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