12 Tips on How to Increase Sales for Your Small Business

A small business finds itself in an unenviable position. It doesn’t have the same sway that larger companies do, but it may also not have the budget to invest in the same marketing practices that their larger equivalents would. Increasing sales for your small business is the most important component because it will encourage more people to look at your product, but it will also give you the confidence to further invest in your business. Here are some vital methods to try out.

1. Audit Your Content

Is your content effective at promoting your services and products? If it is not, you will have to conduct an audit to make some significant changes in how your company comes across. The best place to begin is to address your website and decide if the content focuses on the benefits rather than the features. You also need to address the overall journey of the website. If it is not customer-friendly, a small business web design company can help you to fine-tune each aspect of your content to improve your customers’ lives.

2. Optimize Your Social Media Profiles

Your business needs to be on social media as this is where your customers and prospects congregate. If you haven’t conducted a deep dive into the demographics of your business, this will give you a shortcut as to what platforms you should be using to promote yourself. You may make the assumption that your demographic uses Facebook as the main platform, but you cannot take this for granted. For example, if you are promoting to a male demographic between the ages of 30 and 49, Twitter would be a better platform.

3. Attract Customers With Free Trials, Deals, and Packages

Anybody that uses a streaming service is very likely starting their journey with a free trial, and you can do the same! If prospects are aware of your services, you may need to package the offering differently to transform prospects into customers. You can do this through a number of deals to make it cost-effective, for example, bundles of products or services.

4. Be You-nique

Transforming your content and streamlining your services is crucial, but every prospect is inundated with messages promoting the latest and greatest products, so you need to cut through the noise by being different. You don’t need to be louder, but you just need to be more interesting. Creating funny content, scheduling a unique event, or being the first company in your industry to do something specific are ways to make sure you are different by being you.

5. Increase Positive Reviews

Trust is pivotal as consumers will trust what others have to say more than they would trust you, at least at the outset. Reviews are often the deciding factor in choosing a service. If you can achieve a 5-star rating next to your search result on Google, this is going to increase sales in a very natural way.

6. Use Email Marketing

The journey from the ad to the sale is not always a linear one. You need to find potential prospects and lead them along a path that culminates with your service or product. Email marketing may seem obsolete in the age of social media, but it is still the most powerful marketing tool you can have. When you have an email address, you can keep in touch by an automated campaign, so you can provide a tailored solution and promote specials and deals.

7. Understand Customers’ Motivations

We can certainly become overwhelmed with a variety of methods out there, but if we learn what motivates our prospects, and take the time to understand the challenges, needs, and concerns, we have a direct line to them. People purchase products or services because they have a need or, more accurately, a pain. If you understand what your customers need and solve it, you will have a better chance of making a sale.

8. Use a Call to Action (CTA)

Every page on your website needs a CTA. This will direct the visitor to do something, whether it’s signing up for a newsletter, or contacting you for more information. But when you decide on a CTA, you have to determine what you would like the visitor to do. You need to make sure the instructions are clear, the CTA stands out, and you are looking to convert visitors into prospects, and them into customers. An effective CTA can do a lot for your business.

9. Generate Word of Mouth

Your prospects are already on different social media platforms, and you can generate that buzz about your services or products through a number of practices:

  • Joining relevant social media groups and contributing to the discussions.
  • Engaging in conversations on chats, for example, on websites like Quora.
  • Creating blog posts and providing links to highlight your areas of expertise.

10. Ask for Customer Feedback

It is always a good idea to ask your current customers for any feedback. Increasing sales is not just about getting the attention of prospects, but it’s also about the customers who have already purchased from you. Customer feedback can identify a number of opportunities you had not considered. Listening to what your customers have to say through feedback forms can help you to diversify your offerings, which will improve the relationships with the customer, and increase your sales.

11. Partner With Other Businesses

Making connections with other providers in the industry can be a simple way to offer the olive branch to another company that’s in the same position as you, but it’s also an amazing way to promote each other’s services. It’s best to find a company that compliments your business rather than one you are in direct competition with.

12. Provide Amazing Customer Service

The last point is so simple, yet consistently overlooked.  Rather than constantly trying to sell, you can work on serving people better. When we consider our existing customer needs, or someone is purely browsing providing excellent customer service there’s a lot outside of the sales experience. This shows people, including prospects, that we appreciate them, which will improve customer loyalty. Excellent customer service consists of a variety of practices. For example:

  • Personalized delivery of services.
  • Responding to queries as soon as possible.
  • Offering useful information.

Offering useful information is incredibly simple, but we have to remember that selling is not about bombarding people. If we can be genuinely useful, this is one of the simplest ways to cut through the noise.

Adam Hansen
 

Adam is a part time journalist, entrepreneur, investor and father.