Small Business Saturday – Marketing and Promotion Ideas for Business Owners
As a business owner, you know the value of the holiday shopping season. It is crucial in two ways; helping your shoppers find the right gifts and helping you obtain year-end sales targets. Small Business Saturday referred to as taking part in an annual event, both online and in-person can aid you to obtain each target or goal. Your business website and physical store work in a way to build an excellent experience for customers that force them to visit again. You can make Small Business Saturday a big success with excellent planning and creative thinking. This helps you build a base of loyal customers that would love to visit your website and physical store again and again.
What is Small Business Saturday?
Basically, the Saturday after Thanksgiving is considered as the Small Business Saturday. It has been designated for more than ten years. It is a helpful technique to spotlight small businesses. Small Business Saturday falls between the two biggest shopping festivals such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
It was started in 2010 and the aim was to support small businesses. It was launched by American Express. This method got appreciation from the US president as well as the officials from the 50 states. The main aim was to make Small Business Saturday a notable day for shoppers as well as small businesses so that they can thrive in their communities.
Small Business Saturday has got immense popularity in a short span of time. According to an estimate, shoppers have spent more than 140 billion dollars over the last ten years. In order to keep this momentum, American Express also promotes “Shop Small” which inspires customers to eat and shop at local small businesses.
Small Business Saturday 2022:
Small Business Saturday is going to happen this November 26, 2022. It welcomes all small businesses to participate. According to some communities, it is a fun and festive occasion for shopping and eating. In our business model, we commonly use one-of-a-type promotional strategies such as exclusive offers and special discounts. Small businesses utilize this event to attract local residents by providing meet-and-greet opportunities to both first-time shoppers as well as long-time shoppers.
Pro Tip:
Make sure that your physical store and business website work in harmony for a wonderful shopping experience. On your website, you can give each and every detail about products with visual representations. Your website highlights your store and your store highlights the website.
How to get involved?
If you want to involve with Small Business Saturday then you must find out if there is any organized promotion in your community or town. You can take the help of business groups, local merchants, or the chamber of commerce to inquire if they are planning Small Business Saturday and how you can be part of it. You must be on a map or list of participating businesses. Both online and physical businesses can take part in this event. But, online businesses must give their website address instead of the actual address. It is necessary so that people could easily visit your website. You also need to decide on special offers or exclusive discounts for that day. It can be a giveaway, offer, or activity. Offer something unique because it is good for your business at customers will love to visit your shop. It is also a useful method to stand out in the crowd. It will also help to create a long-lasting impact on shoppers.
Pro Tip:
Enhance Your Customer Service – Whether you are dealing with shoppers online or in person, it is imperative to give excellent customer service to create a wonderful impact. Train your employees to be polite, friendly, and helpful. They must know how to guide customers in making a decision.
How Your Business Can Benefit from Small Business Saturday:
The idea behind Small Business Saturday was to attract shoppers to explore local markets and businesses in person. It is one of the major goals of Small Business Saturday marketing. It was created after seeing the huge popularity of online shopping. This was an offset between online and in-person shopping. This strategy encouraged shoppers to do in-person shopping. New and attractive marketing tactics help to bring shoppers to both online and in-person shopping. Business websites are way more useful than in-person as they help to decide customers what to buy or what to skip by providing complete features, visual details, different aspects, and price comparisons.
It is a fact that shoppers love different varieties. According to SEO experts, many customers read online reviews before purchasing a product. Some people check features online and some compare prices. These factors influence their purchasing decisions. As a small business owner, you must realize that online customers aren’t just making purchases from their comfort zone. They are using other technologies too such as smartphones, browsers, websites, and the internet. They look for everything such as special deals, exclusive discounts, and prices. It is critical for them to keep these factors in mind to boost sales.
Tips for a Successful Small Business Saturday (online & in-person):
In order to get the maximum advantages of Small Business Saturday marketing, you should start taking essential steps from now. You must make your customer experience better. Make sure that there is harmony between your business website and physical store to provide shoppers with an integrated and seamless experience. Then offer exciting promotions and discounts on both places to get the attention of shoppers. In this way, businesses can enhance their consumer base and make loyal customers.
Create a Business Website:
If you do not have a business website, this is the time to create a business website for your small business. You can provide even the smallest of details on your website to customers about products and services. Present your products or services on your website in a more catching way. You can share your store location, contact number, email address, or anything in between to enhance the customer experience.
If you have a strong business website then the following key points will help you attract customers online,
- Test each link by clicking through all the pages. This is important to check out each link is working smoothly.
- Update your page with the latest photos, services you provide, and products you offer. Keep your site up-to-date in order to provide a great integrated experience.
- Add an online shopping feature to your site so that customers can easily get all the products and services. Make a safe and secure transaction method in order to avoid any inconvenience.
- Make your website mobile-friendly because a lot of shoppers or users make purchases through smartphones. This is imperative for online-only shopping.
Small Business Saturday Email Marketing Campaigns:
To encourage shoppers for online shopping, email marketing is one of the most useful methods. You can invite them to sign up to hear about your services, products, special offers, exclusive discounts, and events you are planning for them. For this purpose, you need to use a notable email marketing provider. You must follow all the rules and regulations of your state or community in order to avoid the risk of any nuisance. You need to develop a strong and secure method for protecting customers’ names, address, and contact numbers. Through email campaigns, you can send your messages and notifications to customers. It is a great method for promoting Small Business Saturday offers. Plus, it also helps to secure new customers.
Develop Customer-Friendly Social Media Channels:
When it comes to marketing and promotion, there are so many other platforms other than a catching and well-designed website. You can’t ignore social media’s power in this perspective. It is crucial to have strong and friendly social media channels because they can hit customers directly due to their engaging and catching power. There are plenty of popular social media platforms such as Snapchat, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest. Now, it is up to you which platforms are suitable for advertising your services or products.
Whatever social media channel you choose, you need to complete your profile. You can share your in-store address, location, contact information, and other similar things. The location tag is really vital in the whole process because people can use it to get directions.
After launching your social media platforms, add links and photos with catchy captions. The links will help to invite people to subscribe to your account for getting updates and news from you. Make your social media platforms fresh, updated, and lively by posting the latest photos, data, answers, and questions.
Balance Your Online Presence with In-person Store Experience:
Now, your website and social media channels are running strongly. You are now ready to blend your online presence with an in-person store experience. Here are some promotion ideas for integrating your online presence with a physical store,
- Mount a large monitor in a prominent place in your physical store to show your website and social medial pages with catchy photos and videos. This could be about your products or services. You can also show the photos of your happy customers who are your permanent customers. Special quotes from satisfied customers will also create a great impact. You can also allow customers to add their photos to your products.
- A self-service tablet is another method for blending the online website experience with the physical store experience. They can browse different colors and sizes of the products you sell with other unique options such as pick up or shipping.
- If you want that your customers can connect with you easily, then you must set up a fun selfie or photo corner where they can capture photos and share them with you on your social media pages. For example, a surf shop can dedicate a selfie corner in the shop with an Instagram frame of a tropical theme. Make your social media platforms visible and catchy so that customers can easily tag you when they post their pictures.
- Place brochures, flyers, coupons, and other printed materials at your main door or a service counter. This helps them to know about your business, products, and services. You can also share you’re your address, contact information, and other similar things on these printed materials.
Small Business Saturday Marketing and Promotion Tactics for Online-only Businesses:
If you have just an online presence with no physical location, you can take part in Small Business Saturday marketing. In this situation, your marketing strategy must be based on creative tactics to attract shoppers via digital platforms, like SEO (search engine optimization), email messages, social media posts, and paid search advertising. All these factors will help to bring customers and make them interested in your promotions and offers.
There are so many small businesses that taking advantage of digital marketing. Digital marketing is really crucial for online-only businesses. Here are some marketing tactics for online-only businesses,
- Make your promotions and offers very visible on your home page. You can also provide a direct link to invite customers to accept and see your exclusive deals.
- Make sure that the wording on your website and social media pages clearly describes your business and products. In this way, they can easily find you.
- It is vital to promote your Small Business Saturday promotions and offers on social media channels. Keep them up-to-date so that customers can easily identify when to utilize these offers.
- Share special discounts and exclusive offers via email messages. In this way, you can send updates and news to those shoppers who have signed up.
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