Building a business isn’t easy. That’s why about 20 percent of small businesses fail within the first year.
As an entrepreneur, you face a great deal of uncertainty, competition and other challenges that threaten to force you to close your doors on nearly a daily basis.
You also have a lot of opportunities, though. There are a lot of free promotion tools out there that allow you to create awareness of your brand, grow a strong customer base and beat all of the challenges and statistics standing in your way.
When you know how to leverage the power of YouTube, generate free advertising by customizing wholesale hats and take advantage of free online marketing tools, you can grow your business without breaking the bank.
And those are just a few out of dozens of potential options! Keep reading to find out more.
Grow Your Online Business with YouTube
With two billion logged-in monthly users and 73 percent of American adults using it, YouTube is a potential promotional tool that should not be ignored.
Many business owners, perhaps yourself included, are hesitant to use YouTube to market their companies because they lack high-tech equipment and professional production capabilities. Keep in mind, though, that some of the most popular videos on the platform are far from professional products. If you have a smartphone, you have everything you need to create a video worthy of sharing on YouTube.
Building a channel that provides value to viewers is the best way to leverage the power of YouTube for your business. It’s not about creating ads. Rather, it’s about creating videos that consumers will actually want to watch.
Spend some time checking out your competitors’ channels and most popular videos. Pay attention to what works for them and then use that information to create your own unique content. In general, videos that are helpful, funny or unusual tend to perform best.
When uploading your videos, include appropriate keywords in the title, description and tags. Using the right keywords ensures people will be able to find your videos when performing searches.
Be sure to include a call to action encouraging people to visit your website, look your business up on social media, subscribe to your YouTube channel or share your video. Don’t directly ask viewers to purchase your product or service, though. Your videos shouldn’t be overly salesy in nature.
Once you’ve created and uploaded videos, share them on your website and social media profiles. You can also promote them by sending out the link to your email list, blogging about your video and, of course, asking other people to share.
Be sure to create new content regularly. Doing so ensures your business won’t fade to the back of potential customers’ minds and allows you to make the numerous impressions needed to, eventually, turn your viewers into customers.
Other Free Promotion Tools for Ecommerce Businesses
YouTube may be one of the most powerful promotion tools for businesses, but it certainly isn’t the only one.
In fact, there are dozens of free tools and techniques you can use to increase brand awareness and attract new customers.
1. Free Advertising from Promotional Items
Just about everyone loves a freebie.
And when someone receives a free t-shirt, hat, etc. emblazoned with a company’s logo, they almost always wear it. While purchasing promotional items to give away does require an upfront investment, you can use them to generate free advertising for your business for years to come.
If you buy t-shirts in bulk for screen printing and customize them with your business info and then hand them out to your customers, everyone who wears them becomes an unpaid advertiser for your company.
Considering t-shirts and hats can be worn for years and aren’t likely to be tossed in junk drawers like keychains or pens might, they provide a lot of free advertising opportunities.
2. Yoast SEO
If you have a WordPress website and want to make it easier for people to find it when performing online searches, the Yoast SEO plugin is a must-have.
This tool makes on-page search engine optimization (SEO) easy, even if you have no digital marketing experience. It can even help you gain a solid understanding of SEO and how it works to promote your business.
3. Hootsuite
With Hootsuite, you can schedule social media posts in advance.
This social media management tool allows you to create and share content on all of your social media platforms in one convenient location.
You’ll need to upgrade to a paid account to take full advantage of this service’s features, but you can still do quite a bit with the free version.
4. Canva
Whether you need to create images for social media, design flyers or even design eye-catching infographics, Canva is a free tool to help you get the job done.
It allows you to quickly and easily create designs in various sizes and for a number of applications. And since it features built-in templates for Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram and more, you never have to worry about not creating an image with the appropriate dimensions.
5. MailChimp
Email marketing is a powerful tool that should not be ignored.
If you’re just getting started in this area, a free MailChimp account could be just what you need. With it, you can send out customized emails to up to 2,000 contacts.
The Bottom Line
Promotion is vital for businesses of all types and sizes.
It’s what builds awareness of your brand, sets you apart from your competitors and attracts customers. While advertising and marketing can be expensive, the Internet has given rise to all sorts of free promotion tools.
Check out the ones listed above today or explore the dozens of other tools currently available. Take the time to try various tools to find out which ones work best for your business.
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