From the WHY Vault*

On a Shoestring: How to cut costs and market through a recession

Join the Marketing 2.0 Revolution: If marketing means billboards and phone book ads to you, shift your thinking. Today, everything is online: online ads, search results, blogs, websites and social networking. All these tools can help boost your sales, and they’re a lot more affordable than the outdated print alternatives. In fact, some options, like social networking (think LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook) and blogs are free.

Take Your Newsletter Online: If you’re spending money on printing a physical newsletter, you’re wasting your money. People quickly read it (if they open it at all) and trash it immediately. Consider an online alternative. Email newsletters are easy to set up (try Constant Contact) and they’re next to nothing to send ($15 a month for up to 500 contacts). In them you can link to your website, which will get you more traffic.

Can’t Beat a Blog: Blogs are essentially expert resources. Whatever field you’re in, you likely know more about it than the average person. Use a blog to give readers free information, while establishing yourself as an expert. Link to your website(s) and cross promote. If your company is offering a special promotion or has news, blog about it. Blogs are easy and free to set up, although you can take them to the next level and make income from advertising on your blog (for more info on this, check out this month’s feature, Now You’re Talking).

Hot Off the (Virtual) Press: My favorite form of affordable marketing and PR is a press release. They’re short and to the point. And these days, you can get your news out in minutes online. Sites like PRWeb send your news to hundreds of news sites as well as sites in your industry. This boosts your placement on search engines and helps editors, bloggers and customers find you. Editors and bloggers may contact you to write a more in-depth article on your news or may simply post your press release on their site, getting you more exposure (the good kind).

Pay-Per-Click Ads: Forget print glossy ads. The average local business gets nothing out of them. However, a strong presence online can multiply sales exponentially if done correctly. Sites like Google and Yahoo! offer affordable advertising where you only pay for clicks on your ad. You select keywords that people would choose if looking for your company, then write a compelling ad that will cause them to take action and click. Clicks can cost anywhere from $.10 to $1.00.

--culled from an article written by Susan Payton in WHY magazine's july/august 2008 issue

*From time to time, I'll present info from past WHY articles or WHY Xtras in case you missed them the first time around. :)