A look at five popular promotional techniques for small business

When it comes to promoting a small business many people are at a loss as to how they can best go about promoting their business. There are so many different things that you can do to promote your small business that sometimes picking the best choices can be rather hard. But the good news is that there are some promotional techniques that are more popular than others when it comes to promoting your small business.

Here is a look at five popular promotional techniques that you can use for your small business.

Idea one:
One thing that you can do to promote your business is to offer something else for your customers that your competitors don't offer. This does not particularly pertain to the products you are selling, but when you are advertising your business you are going to want to include in the advertisement that you are giving away free hot dogs for the day or will offer something else for your customers. So basically what you are doing is providing something to help the customer stay at your place of business longer or to bring in the customers. For example IKEA and other malls provide free child care or low cost child care so that parents can spend a longer amount of time finding what they want without having to worry about kids. If you have a business online you can offer customers certain incentives to return again such as free shipping for return customers, discounts, etc. What you are trying to do here is get your customers to come back and spend their money at your place of business.

Idea two:
Something else that you should consider doing would be to have a newspaper or news teams do a review or an editorial on your place of business. This works best for business that offer services, but it can also be done on businesses that are selling specialized products. Editorials and reviews carry far more weight in marketing then paid advertisements do. People who write these reviews are reporting what they have discovered about your business which can help draw in even more customers. For example a restaurant that gets a five star review will most likely get more customers from the newspaper than a similar restaurant that only got a two star review.

Idea three:
Another really popular event that small business owners enjoy doing is to combine business with pleasure by planning an event for a charity that you like. This is actually quite similar to how politicians work, except for the fact you are trying to draw in customers so you most likely won't be charging each person an amount to enter. A great thing to do is to do a donation type of event. A really popular charity is Toys for Tots and many stores will offer their customers an incentive for donating to Toys for Tots at their store rather than somewhere else. By doing this you are going to meet lots of new people and can get a chance to promote your business which can bring you more customers. At the same time you are able to prove your leadership skills which can cause people to have more confidence in your company, which can lead to word of mouth referrals.

Idea four:
Create business cards that your customers will keep. Traditional business cards tend to get thrown out the minute people leave the store or clean out their wallets because they are tiny pieces of paper that are just taking up room. Rather than handing out business cards you can create notepads that have your business information on them, magnets, pens, and a variety of other items that can be used by the customer. The more useful the business cards are the longer the customers are likely to keep them, hence getting you many days of exposure.

Idea five:
Make your customers feel special. With our busy life style and wanting to get the lowest prices personalized customer service has gone the way of the high road. But the thing is customers still want to be recognized. By taking a little bit of time and possibly spending a few extra pennies you can make your customers feel special. This is a simple task to complete, for example you can send them a personal thank you note or enclose a small gist in with their purchase.