We know that growing your small business isn’t easy.
As an entrepreneur, you already have so much on your plate. You have to recruit, hire, train, and manage employees. You have to manage inventory. You have to run your business!
All of these things take time, effort, and money. Lots of money.
With all the costs of operating a business, the last thing you want to do is shell out more for expensive advertising.
The good news is, you don’t have to. That’s right. We’re here to tell you that you can grow your small business without spending a penny on marketing.
In fact, spending money on marketing might actually hurt your business more than it helps it.
Why Spending Money on Marketing Can Hurt your Small Business
Not every business is ready to spend on advertising. If you’re struggling with your operations, you should do everything you can to fix those issues first before trying to grow.
When you’re struggling to stay afloat, of course all you can think of is bringing in more customers to make more money. But this can be a bad long-term move.
If your customer service is lacking or you just can’t get things running smoothly, any customer who walks through your door is going to have a negative experience.
Not only do you risk losing them as a future customer forever, but chances are they might also leave you a negative review. And those negative reviews can lead to even fewer customers in the future.
The more customers you bring in, the more those issues will compound.
And when you keep losing money, you’ll be tempted to spend more. You’ll get deeper and deeper in the cycle, and won’t be able to climb out.
Even if your operations are solid, if you’re struggling with cash flow, spending money on marketing needlessly could lead to issues down the road.
Luckily, there’s so much you can do to market your business for free that you don’t even have to worry about spending money most of the time.
Why Free Marketing is Better than Paid
In fact, free marketing is often better than paid. That’s because many of the best free marketing strategies for small businesses involve getting to know your customers and building real relationships.
Paid advertising can of course be effective when done right. But it often takes building a really strong foundation through all of these free marketing techniques first to get to a point where you’re ready to target customers effectively through paid strategies.
For some businesses, the relationships and word of mouth generated through free marketing ideas will mean they never have to spend on paid ads. These techniques lead to sustainable growth and lifelong customers—not one-off shoppers who won’t spend much and will never return.
How to Market your Small Business for Free
So what are these magical free marketing strategies? Most of them won’t come as a surprise to you.
If you run a small business, you should be familiar with at least some of these tactics. Ultimately, it’s how you approach them that determines their effectiveness.
These cost-effective marketing ideas are easy to implement. Some are free online marketing ideas. Others require you to get involved in your local community and put yourself out there. But with a little time and effort, any small business owner can figure out how to do free marketing.
40 of the Best Free Marketing Ideas for Your Small Business
- Social Media: Create profiles on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and LinkedIn. When leveraged correctly, social media can be a great way to help grow your business online.
- Create a Website: Your website is one of your biggest tools for growing your business. Sites like web.com make it easier than ever to build one for cheap. There are plenty of free options, too!
- Content Marketing: Start a blog or YouTube channel to share content related to your industry with customers and start being seen as an expert in your field.
- Email Marketing: Build an email list and send out newsletters with promotions, tips, and updates.
- Referral Program: Create a referral system where customers get discounts or rewards for referring their friends.
- Partnerships: Collaborate with other local businesses for pop-ups, promotions, and cross-marketing.
- Online Reviews: Encourage your customers to leave positive reviews on platforms like Google, Facebook, and Yelp.
- Customer Testimonials: Share success stories or testimonials from satisfied customers on your website and social media profiles.
- Community Involvement: Participate in or sponsor local events, charities, or community projects—or host your own!
- Guest Blogging: Write guest posts for industry-related blogs or websites to reach a broader audience.
- SEO Optimization: Optimize your website to show up higher in search results on Google and other search engines. Bonus points for focusing on Local SEO to show up first on Google Maps and in other local searches.
- Online Listings: List your business on free online directories like Google, Yelp, and Bing Places. Your online listings are key factor in your business’s online visibility.
- TikTok: Share videos about your business on TikTok. Viral TikToks have catapulted small businesses to success.
- Social Media Groups: Join and engage in relevant Facebook or LinkedIn groups to connect with potential customers. Just make sure to follow the rules! Spamming Facebook groups is one of the biggest mistakes small business owners make on Facebook.
- Free Workshops/Webinars: Host online workshops or webinars to showcase your expertise and reach new customers.
- Business Cards: They may be old school, but sharing business cards with your website and contact information can help people in your local community learn who you are and how to contact you.
- Network, Network, Network: Attend local networking events or join business organizations to make connections. Find groups on sites like meetup.com or through your local Chamber of Commerce.
- Press Releases: Write and distribute a press release for your next newsworthy event or important business update. Securing press coverage can be a really powerful tool for building trust with customers and growing your business.
- Contests/Giveaways: Organize social media contests or giveaways to boost engagement and attract new customers. Just make sure to follow all the appropriate rules and laws when organizing a contest. And use this sparingly—while you’ll definitely attract new customers, you’ll also get a lot of entries from people who just want to win!
- LinkedIn Outreach: Connect with potential clients on LinkedIn and send personalized messages. Again, be careful not to spam anyone. But this technique works particularly well in B2B industries.
- Online Forums: Participate in online forums and answer questions related to your industry. Reddit can be a great tool for small business owners—and there many industry-specific forums and sites you can get involved in to build your presence as an expert.
- Guest Speak: Offer to speak at local events, libraries, schools, or even online webinars related to your industry.
- Facebook Group: Start a Facebook group about your industry in your local area to engage with your community.
- Create a Google Business Profile: Optimize your Google Business Profile listing to ensure you show up at the top of Google searches.
- Online Calendars: List your business on local event calendars and directories. Depending on your industry, mommy-and-me sites like Mommy Poppins can be great for this. Local news organizations are also a great source of event calendars.
- LinkedIn Articles: Publish articles on LinkedIn to showcase your expertise and build a following.
- Create a Podcast: Start a podcast to discuss industry trends, interview experts, and show off your own expertise.
- Customer Loyalty Program: Create a loyalty program to reward repeat customers with exclusive discounts or offers. Remember, it costs a lot more to bring in new customers than to keep your existing ones.
- Holiday Promotions: Create special promotions for holidays and highlight them on social media, your website, and in-store.
- YouTube Tutorials: Share knowledge or demonstrations through YouTube videos to further showcase your expertise and build a following.
- Employee Advocacy: Encourage employees to share your business on their social networks and promote you via word-of-mouth. Employee advocacy can be a powerful way to expand your network and build trust in your community.
- User-Generated Content: Share customer-generated content on your own platforms and website. Photos that customers take at your restaurant, reviews they leave on your Facebook, or Instagram reels they film at your boutique are all great sources of free marketing. And the best part is it takes almost no effort on your part to create—you just have to ask for permission to re-share!
- Pinterest: Create Pinterest posts with content related to your business. Pinterest can be a great way to bring people to your website. It’s especially helpful for small business that sell products or services online.
- Create a Yelp Profile: Claim and optimize your business profile on Yelp. Make sure to ask your happy customers to leave a review!
- Answer FAQs: Create a FAQ section on your website to address common customer queries. This will help customers get to know you while improving your website’s SEO.
- Facebook Live: Go live on Facebook to engage with your audience in real-time.
- Create an Ebook or Guide: Write and offer free ebooks or guides related to your industry. This can be a lot of work, but can go a long way to helping you establish yourself as an expert.
- Leverage your Signage: This isn’t completely free, but your signage is one of your business’s best marketing tools. Considering how long your signage can last, the long-term cost is minimal, and it’s an underrated way to grow your business.
- Survey your Customers: Retaining your customers is just as important as attracting new ones. Survey your existing customers to find out how to keep them happy. You might also get ideas on how to market to new customers!
- Give Out Free Samples: If you own a small business like a restaurant or a cosmetics shop, giving out free samples can be a great way to show potential customers what they can expect from you. It’s not completely free, as you’ll have to eat the cost of the product, but for a relatively low cost you can get customers hooked on what you sell.
Growing your small business doesn’t have to be expensive. There are plenty of cheap marketing ideas, and many you can implement completely for free. With a little bit of effort, you can attract new customers and keep your existing ones—without breaking the bank.