You know it’s going to take a marketing push to meet your sales goals this year. But your budget is tight and you’ll need to use your imagination to make it. Where to start?

For many business owners, marketing doesn’t come naturally. They lurch from one tactic to another without a clear idea of whether the efforts are going to pay off in higher sales.

If that description sounds familiar, here are some time-tested, low-cost techniques to improve your marketing and help you reach your goals.

1. Conduct a survey

It’s critical to create a marketing plan before moving on to tactics. And the first step in developing a marketing plan is to understand who your target customers are and what they want from your company.

A good way to gain a better understanding of your customers is to conduct a survey about your products or services. If you can’t afford to hire a research company, do it yourself by creating a short questionnaire and recruiting existing and prospective customers to participate.

2. Pamper your existing customers

It’s typically five times as expensive to make a sale to a new customer as it is to an existing one. So make sure you’re not neglecting the people who already know and trust you.

Consider, for example, taking your best customers out to dinner or golf and using the opportunity to ask them about how to improve your business. You could also personally write to your top 10 customers to thank them and tell them they’re part of your new loyalty program or invite them to sneak preview your latest product.

3. Commit to online marketing

The Internet provides you with an inexpensive 24-hour virtual storefront. You can build relationships with prospective customers by offering them high-quality content on your site such as blogs, how-to articles, videos and a newsletter.

You can also extend your reach by using social media. One word of caution, however: If you’re not willing to devote six to eight hours a week of an employee’s time, you’re better off going with a simple, well-designed website.

4. Use all your real estate

Your building and surrounding land or sidewalk are great places to put up signs and banners. And don’t forget to use your vehicles as moving billboards. But remember: Your images and messages should focus on what you’re selling, not your company’s name.

5. Work at public relations

A media story about your company is generally much more valuable than an advertisement because of the credibility it confers on your business. But in this era of media cutbacks, it’s harder than ever to attract journalists’ attention. Keep in mind that they’re looking for a compelling story to tell. So help them by letting them know about your innovative product, unusual customer contact or high-stakes gamble that paid off. And keep at it—building relationships with the media will pay off.

6. Turn employees into ambassadors

Your employees are part of the community and have all sorts of contacts that could help you. How about inviting employees and their extended families to a fun event at your business? You may find you get new word-of-mouth business or hear about a potential new business partner. At the very least, your team will come back to work on Monday feeling energized.

7. Give back

By sponsoring a hockey team or participating in a charity drive with a cheque and a collection jar in your lunchroom or by the cash register, you’re not only doing your part for the community but also generating goodwill with customers and prospects.

A good customer loyalty program can generate significant gains in recurring revenue for your business by improving the return on your marketing and sales budget.

Here are some facts:

• Keeping an existing customer costs up to five times less than winning a new one.
• It’s easier to persuade a customer who already knows you to buy again and/or buy more from you.
• 20% of customers are typically responsible for 80% of a company’s revenue.

Is a loyalty program right for your business?

Before developing a customer loyalty program, you need to know whether this will be a useful tactic for your business.

The first thing to determine is the value of a customer to your company and how much it costs to acquire one. This will help you decide whether to invest more money in developing new customers or on retaining and developing the ones you already have.

The value of a customer

Let’s say a good customer at a B2B company buys $30,000 worth of product in a year.

At the same time, you spend $175,000 a year in marketing and business development activities that yield, on average, 10 new customers a year. Therefore, your average customer acquisition cost is $17,500.

If you have several existing customers who don’t spend $30,000 with you in a year, why invest $17,500 in finding a new customer? With a good customer loyalty program, you will most likely boost your sales to existing customers at a much lower cost.

Steps to develop a customer loyalty program

1. Study your current customers

Here are some questions to ask about each customer:

• How much does this customer buy in a year?
• What type of products do they buy and how frequent are purchases?
• How long have they been a customer?
• Can we sell them other products?
• Do they use other suppliers, and, if so, who are they?
• How much profit do we earn on their purchases?
• How fast do they pay?
• How satisfied are they with our company?
• How could we improve our business relationship?

2. Prepare your customer loyalty program

Before launching a loyalty program, you need to assess your customers’ current level of satisfaction through such techniques as surveys, interviews, and monitoring customer comments.

Then, identify employees who are good at dealing with customers and who will be available to participate in the program. You will need to target customers who purchase frequently from you but could become more profitable, according to your analysis. If the purchase cycle is long (more than three years), this type of program is generally not recommended.

3. Set goals, and measure them with a CRM

Set your goals for the program from the beginning. For example, if your customers purchase on average three times per year, set a goal of 3.3 times a year. This will increase your sales by 10% with few additional expenses. Use CRM software to manage this program. If you are looking for a low‑cost or free CRM solution, you may want to consider our list.

4. Set a budget

Set a budget for managing customer retention and a separate one for developing new customers. To do so, consult your industry average if you are looking for above‑average growth, increase your budget accordingly.

5. Decide which customers to target

Based on the study described above, categorize your customers (e.g. A, B, C) according to evaluation criteria that are adapted to your needs and objectives.

1. Volume of purchases
2. Ability to purchase more products and services
3. Speed of payment
4. Customer profitability
5. Loyalty over time

6. Choose tactics that will encourage client loyalty

Choose loyalty enhancing tactics that are related to a customer’s purchases, but also to the quality of your business relationship. Here are some examples:

1. Monthly visits from a sales representative.
2. Annual visit and business lunch with the vice president of sales.
3. Personal invitation to a seminar and dinner given by the president.
4. Premium service—guaranteed 24/7.
5. Emergency phone line and secure website access.
6. Additional discounts when purchase milestones are reached.
7. Sponsorship of an annual event.

2. Prepare your customer loyalty program

Before launching a loyalty program, you need to assess your customers’ current level of satisfaction through such techniques as surveys, interviews and monitoring customer comments.

Then, identify employees who are good at dealing with customers and who will be available to participate in the program. You will need to target customers who purchase frequently from you but could become more profitable, according to your analysis. If the purchase cycle is long (more than three years), this type of program is generally not recommended.

3. Set goals, and measure them with a CRM

Set your goals for the program from the beginning. For example, if your customers purchase on average three times per year, set a goal of 3.3 times a year. This will increase your sales by 10% with few additional expenses. Use CRM software to manage this program. If you are looking for a low‑cost or free CRM solution, you may want to consider our list.

4. Set a budget

Set a budget for managing customer retention and a separate one for developing new customers. To do so, consult your industry average if you are looking for above‑average growth, increase your budget accordingly.

5. Decide which customers to target

Based on the study described above, categorize your customers (e.g. A, B, C) according to evaluation criteria that are adapted to your needs and objectives.

1. Volume of purchases
2. Ability to purchase more products and services
3. Speed of payment
4. Customer profitability
5. Loyalty over time

6. Choose tactics that will encourage client loyalty

Choose loyalty enhancing tactics that are related to a customer’s purchases, but also to the quality of your business relationship. Here are some examples:

1. Monthly visits from a sales representative.
2. Annual visit and business lunch with the vice president of sales.
3. Personal invitation to a seminar and dinner given by the president.
4. Premium service—guaranteed 24/7.
5. Emergency phone line and secure website access.
6. Additional discounts when purchase milestones are reached.
7. Sponsorship of an annual event.

If your customers are businesses, there’s a good chance this type of program is good for you.

But a customer loyalty program doesn’t mean you can neglect new business development. It’s a never‑ending job to increase your portfolio of loyal customers.

Contrary to popular belief, customer relationship management (CRM) is not just another type of business management software; it is a business strategy to acquire, grow and retain profitable customer relationships. This distinction is important. CRM can only succeed if the CRM technology supports a truly customer-focused strategy and fits your unique requirements.

How does CRM help?

CRM brings together information about customers, sales and marketing from across your organization. As a result, CRM can help you:

• retain existing customers by improving customer service
• sell more to existing customers by uncovering opportunities
• automate marketing and sales processes
• better track and manage business performance
• close deals faster by centrally tracking key information
• streamline account management by tracking all interactions with each customer
• enhance pipeline management by tracking performance against sales quotas
• save time by improving team communication and
• empower your field sales force with information on their mobile devices.

What does CRM software do?

CRM software captures and organizes information from current and prospective customers in an integrated system. All employees gain a single view of prospects and customers, allowing them to better cooperate and coordinate activities.

Free and low-cost CRM tools

CRM solutions fall into different categories, from online solutions to complex multi-site implementations. If you are looking for a low-cost or free solution, you may want to consider the following. (SaaS refers to “software as a service.”)

• 1CRM
• ACT!
• Copper
• e-soft MasterSales
• The Fish Tank
• Freshsales
• HubSpot CRM
• InfoFlo
• Insightly
• Less Annoying CRM
• Nimble
• Nutshell
• PipelineDeals
• Prophet CRM
• Sage CRM
• Salesboom
• Salesforce
• SalesNow

This table lists applications alphabetically and isn’t exhaustive. Hyperlinks to external sites do not constitute an endorsement by Aaron Wealth Management of those websites or any information, opinions, products or services expressed or described on them.

Furthermore, the list is only a starting point and excludes applications that are neither low cost nor free. When assessing CRM solutions for your organization, you will probably consider many other factors.

I’ve previously written about content marketing and its importance to small businesses trying to connect with customers.

An associated concept is marketing automation. It’s a term that gets thrown around a lot these days, but it remains very nebulous for many entrepreneurs. What exactly gets automated? And how does it work? Well, the answer can be confusing, to say the least.

At its most basic, marketing automation refers to software tools that do marketing tasks that small businesses might otherwise do manually.

These tasks include communications with customers and prospective customers via email or social media as well as measurement and tracking of information.

Ease your workload

One example of lessening your workload might be managing social media content on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn with a tool like HootSuite. With it, you can schedule posts ahead of time on all your social media properties from a user‑friendly dashboard.

Another example would be sending an automatic thank‑you email when someone submits a request to you, using the “contact us” form on your website. It’s easy and respectful.

These are very simple examples, but they show how marketing automation tools and strategies can save you time in managing communications and marketing campaigns.

Generate more sales leads

The idea of streamlining tasks is very much at the heart of marketing automation, but there is much more to it. Generating sales leads (or nurturing them) is also at the core of marketing automation.

There are many tools that allow you to communicate with prospective customers when they’re making buying decisions. They help you to put the right content in front of the right people at the right time.

Consider, for example, a customer relationship management (CRM) tool that allows you to identify all your customers in Vancouver who have purchased more than $1,000 in the last year. The tool also allows you to identify who in this group follows you on Facebook. Now you can use that information to target those customers with a Facebook ad offering them 10% off their next purchase.

Deliver segmented email content

Another example might be an email segmentation tool that allows you to send specific content in your email newsletter to subscribers based on what you know about their preferences.

So, let’s say a clothing retailer keeps track of the gender of his or her email recipients. The retailer can now send gender-specific content like deals on skirts and blouses to women and pants and shirts to men. Those individuals only see the things that interest them, ultimately increasing the chances that they will make a purchase.

Examples of automation tools

Here are some marketing automation companies that may be familiar to you.

• Salesforce.com (customer relationship management and marketing)
• HubSpot (inbound marketing and sales management)
• Marketo (marketing automation software)
• MailChimp (email marketing)
• Eloqua (marketing automation)
• Google AdWords (pay‑per‑click advertising)

These tools and many others like them help businesses collect better data and streamline marketing processes.

How much sophistication does your business need in its marketing automation software? That depends on the maturity of your digital marketing efforts and what kind of resources you can afford to devote to automation.

Use the right tools

Do you have a lot of social media followers and/or channels to manage? Do you have a lot of content to generate and publish in the course of a week? Do you have a lot of communication touchpoints with your customers? Are you collecting information from your customers on a regular basis?

The answers to these questions, and others like them, will help you decide what marketing automation tools you need.

Automation tools can provide awesome benefits to your business, but they don’t give you permission to take your eye off the ball. On the contrary, you always have to be reviewing your communications, customer feedback, and online data so you can continually improve your marketing efforts.

It’s not set it and forget it

For example, you have to be careful about the context in which you are automatically publishing content.

You absolutely do not want an automated tweet to go out at the same time that the Twittersphere is exploding over a major disaster or a horrific terrorist attack. Marketing on full autopilot without oversight is a bad idea.

Does your small business use marketing automation tools? Which ones? How are they working? We would love your comments.

When an entrepreneur builds a new website, starts using social media or creates a blog, the same question always comes up: “What should I talk about?”

Creating good content is a challenge for many entrepreneurs who aren’t used to talking about their business or industry in a public forum. So what is content marketing and how do you do it?

It’s all about creating great content as a highly effective way to find new customers and retain the ones you have. Entertaining email newsletters, insightful blog posts, how-to videos, and other online content help you to build an audience and position yourself as an expert in your field.

People filtering out traditional ads

That’s especially important at a time when consumers are becoming increasingly adept at tuning out advertising messages both in the traditional media and online.

And that brings us back to the question of what you should talk about in your content.

A good place to start is to think about the challenges your customers ask you about every day. What are the questions you hear again and again? How do you respond? This can be the basis for a series of blog posts, how-to videos or a short eBook.

Pull back the curtain on your business

You can also pull back the curtain and talk about what’s happening inside your business. Talk about your wins but also be honest about the issues you’re grappling with and how you’re striving to improve for the benefit of your customers. You can also promote the charities you and your staff are supporting in your community.

You might also want to zoom out and discuss some of the big challenges that your industry is facing. It’s all grist for your content mill.

Let’s face it—we collectively have very short attention spans when it comes to the Internet. So you don’t always have to generate a high-production video or an 800-word article to get the job done. Often, a photo with a caption, a quick hit on your blog, a tweet or Facebook update will do.

Knowing your audience and their habits will help you to create the right content.

Reduce, re-use, recycle

There is a huge amount of content being created on the Internet every day. Some of it relates to your business, so why not tap into it?

Sharing good content from others can be just as powerful as creating your own. So if you find a good LinkedIn post, share it and add it to other relevant social media pages.

You should also go through your archives looking for material you can use. Is there an article you wrote for the local paper or a video you made for a presentation? You can reuse these online.

Make a content calendar

Still having trouble scheduling content creation into your day?

A content calendar can help. Pick regular dates on your calendar when you will be adding certain types of content and stick to it. It will help you and your team determine how often you should be posting content and keep you disciplined in doing the work.

Another frequently asked question is: Should I post on a regular schedule, such as once a week, or should I post as often as possible?

It’s important to be consistent

Well, there is no one answer to that. But certainly being consistent trumps communicating too often, (or more likely) too infrequently. It’s important to make sure you stay active in your channels. Don’t suddenly abandon your audience simply because you get busy or, worse, bored.

No one can create stellar content all the time. You may get out of the blocks fast and create a lot of messages over a short period of time. But remember, it’s a marathon, not a sprint and you will get tired.

With a little bit of organization and imagination, you’ll find content marketing is well worth your time and effort.

Follow these tips to gain additional insights about your customers

Are your customers satisfied with your products or services? Do you know what they like about your business? More importantly, do you know how you could improve what you do?

Customer surveys can provide answers to these questions as well as unique insights into the strengths and weaknesses of your business. Unfortunately, a lot of smaller businesses think they can’t do a customer survey properly.

Nothing could be further from the truth. There are a lot of online survey tools—inexpensive and sometimes even free—that make customer surveys doable for all businesses, with templates, sample questions and more.

Here are a few tips for business owners who want to get started with customer surveys or for those who want to improve what they are already doing.

1. Set clear objectives

To conduct a successful customer survey, you have to know from the get-go what kind of information you want to collect.

Start by talking to your employees, especially anyone who works directly with customers. They’ll have good insights into the kinds of people you serve, what they need or expect, and if they’ve noted any “early warning signs” of dissatisfaction that you should know about.

For example, if sales are declining in a certain area of your business, your survey could help you find out why that is. You can build your survey to see if something has changed for your customers that makes your product or service less relevant—maybe it’s a feature they no longer need or a new competitor with a better offer.

Consider having a set of core questions you ask every time you conduct a survey, with other questions that can be changed annually or semi-annually depending on specific things you want to find out.

2. Ask about overall satisfaction, then get to the details

Most customer surveys start by asking about overall satisfaction and then drill down to get to the details.

You want to get a spontaneous response off the top. Do they like you or don’t they? If you start with a lot of detailed questions, people lose that spontaneity. And if you leave questions about overall satisfaction to the end, when people just want to be done with the survey, you probably won’t get the rating you deserve.

Spontaneous responses are highly valuable because they tell you what people really think about your company.

3. Keep it short and simple

Write your survey using clear, simple words people will understand. People multitask when completing online or telephone surveys and are easily distracted. You want to make it easy for them to follow along and answer accurately.

It’s also critical to keep your survey short—it should take no longer than seven minutes to complete. Anything beyond seven minutes and you’ll see a lot of people quitting the survey before they finish.

4. Limit the number of open-ended questions

An open-ended question is any question that requires the respondent to fill in a box with free form text. An example might be, “What do you most want from your shopping experience?”

Research shows that people tend to write everything they have to say in response to the first open-ended question in a survey. Asking many open-ended questions could give you many blank fields or repetitive answers.

Open-ended questions often give you the nuggets, the actionable things you want to work on immediately. You may only need one or two to get that gold from customers.

5. Contact different customers each time

Surveys can be done on a regular basis, even once a week, but it is important not to survey any one customer more than once or twice a year. Otherwise, they get tired and possibly annoyed.

Research shows that if you survey the same customers too often, you start to get higher quit rates, as well as clients who ask to be removed from your survey list, and these are lost forever.

Look beyond your customer base

Customer surveys are just one type of market research that specifically targets your existing clientele.

Broader market research is normally done when moving into a new market or launching a new product. In those cases, you are surveying a sample of people from your target market, and only some of them may have done business with you before.

This broader type of customer survey can be expensive and often requires expert help to objectively study what you need to know.