Retail has become a competitive industry, with new competition around every corner. Staying relevant in such an industry while controlling your marketing budget can be tiring, but it isn’t entirely impossible. Here are a few budget-friendly marketing techniques that can drive traffic, increase sales, and build customer loyalty.
Launch a referral program
The age-old word-of-mouth marketing strategy is the most effective and powerful. Make your existing customers brand ambassadors, promoting your business to their social circle and offering incentives in return. This strategy is a win-win for everyone, but your company wins.
Offer existing customers rewards and incentives to encourage them to refer friends and family to your retail store and products only if they are pleased with them. Set out percentages depending on customers’ loyalty and frequency of doing business with you; more prestigious customers get better discounts.
You can also increase existing business by enticing people to do more business with you to earn better referral status and rewards (win-win). Simplify the process using easy-to-use tools that track referrals and enable you to reward both the referrer and the new customer, making it memorable for you and your customers.
Host in-store events
Hosting in-store events may sound like a dent in the pocket, but with the right strategy, they can be budget-friendly and help you foster lifelong connections. In-store events can cultivate an environment driven by engagement and community building while showcasing your products to old and new customers.
Add an attractive element, like stand-up comedy or free food tasting, and it’ll be a raging success. Depending on your merchandise, plan and execute social events, like workshops, training, demonstrations, or even a fun hangout for your audience at the store.
Plan activities and attractions that can encourage people to pay their attendance and take charge of retaining interest through interactive activities. A way to promote and encourage sales during the events is to let customers buy your merchandise at discounted rates or offer your audience free samples.
Use social media marketing
Social media marketing is a decisive way to connect with your audience. It is budget-friendly and gives you creative freedom. You can leverage social media platforms to curate a digital persona depending on your merchandise. This gives your business a distinct online personality and builds and strengthens relationships with existing and potential customers.
To boost visibility and try out the elements of virility, consider sharing engaging content that educates the audience about your products since educational content is preferred by onlookers and algorithms alike. For example, for a clothing store, you could create content about your ethical sourcing, how you’re giving back to the community, or even how to extend the life of your clothes (care tips), etc.
You can save on designing by using retail poster templates on PosterMyWall to quickly create visually appealing posts and maintain a polished, professional look while saving bucks. Incorporate various formats for content marketing, like videos, stories, pictures, etc., to keep it engaging and entertaining.
Encourage user-generated content (UGC)
As a retail store, what better way to market your business with minimum expense than to let your customers do the marketing for you? UGC is another form of word-of-mouth marketing that allows customers to share their views of your items and create aesthetic and eye-catching content surrounding them, making the job easier for you.
Encourage satisfied customers to create content using your products and allow them to show their creativity for a chance to be featured on your account. UGC performs outstandingly because many small creators seek a platform to enhance their visibility. Getting featured on business accounts (irrespective of size or popularity) is the easiest way.
Use the content you get tagged in and post to your social media profiles, along with your website, and credit the creators for establishing trust and maintaining goodwill. Never pick up content from small creators without consent or giving them due credit, as this can create massive negative publicity and can even tarnish your brand image.
If you struggle to garner the correct type of content, consider running a contest and using that content on your page in return for some free goodies for the winner.
Personalized customer engagement
Offering a tailored shopping experience to drive engagement will make your customers feel unique and valued at your store. Using what you recommend and how you reward each individual can create lasting relationships with your clientele. For returning customers, use names to greet them and use their existing shopping data to offer them recommendations and show them new products.
You can take it up a notch by securing your new additions for recurring customers if you think something might interest them and inform them of this gesture. Furthermore, consider adding email or text marketing to loyal customers on their birthdays, informing them of discounts and sales beforehand and of new additions before they hit the store.
While these budget-friendly marketing strategies may sound like the answer to all your problems, they also have limitations. You can develop the most innovative marketing techniques that are budget-friendly, but they will still fail to perform if your products and services lack quality.
Hence, a retail business must provide high-quality products that make customers want more and genuinely unmatched service. Happy promotions!
