Almost every small business we've worked with has started with a limited budget for marketing - ourselves included. Thankfully, there is a meaningful amount of marketing you can do that costs nothing but time and a bit of know-how. In this post, we'll run through just a few of them. You won't need to spend a penny on anything that follows, but it will require a good amount of commitment and consistency - both of which are easy to underestimate.
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Set up the right social media profiles (not all of them)
Having some sort of presence on social media is non-negotiable for businesses these days, considering that almost everyone reaches for their phone the minute they need a product or service. There is a common misconception, however, that to have the most success online, you need to be present on every social platform, which often leads to businesses trying to run five different profiles, and running them badly.
The better solution is to think about where your actual customers spend their time (rather than which ones you most enjoy using). Instead, just pick one or two, and invest your time in them properly. From our experience, tattoo studios or beauty businesses are usually better served by Instagram and TikTok, both built around visual and video content. On the other hand, a business-to-business company might be best served on LinkedIn. It's really all about where your customers are.
Become a source of knowledge
Sharing what you know, be that in Facebook groups, on Reddit or on Quora (again, wherever your customers ask questions), builds trust before anyone visits your site. It's also a brilliant way of indirectly helping your SEO, since useful answers get shared and linked to. Something important to remember is that the businesses that do this well take the time to answer the questions properly and provide value, instead of simply dropping a link and leaving - which often gets flagged as spam and is ignored.
Collect email addresses from day one
An email list is one of the few marketing assets you own fully. Social media platforms have the power to change their algorithm, their rules, or even their existence, should they wish to. Your email list remains yours. The correct way of doing this is to collect addresses through a 'sign-up' option on your website, a booking flow, or in person, and you must be upfront about what people are signing up for. If you're collecting emails from anyone in the UK or EU, it's vital to be familiar with GDPR consent requirements before you start.
Put that email list to work
Once you've built up a list, email marketing is one of the highest-return channels available. It can also be free thanks to platforms like Mailchimp, which can handle the basics well at a small scale. When it comes to email content, simplicity works best. Updates when something changes, occasional useful content, and special offers that reward people for signing up to your mailing list are all valuable topics. Email recipients usually prefer consistency to frequency too, so a monthly email is more likely to be read than a weekly one - which is more likely to be deleted.
Claim your Google Business Profile
If your small business serves a physical area or particular location, having a Google Business Profile is pretty much essential - and it's entirely free. A completed profile with accurate opening hours, photos and categories is what will put your business squarely on the map, and it's one of the few places genuine local intent shows up directly in search results. This is also where the bulk of your reviews will live, which is the next thing worth getting right.
Make sure you ask for customer reviews
Reviews are one of the strongest trust builders a small business can have, and thankfully, Google Business Profile, Facebook and Trustpilot are all free. Unfortunately, happy customers tend not to leave a review unless asked, so asking at the right moment (usually straight after a good experience) will have a far bigger impact than using any review-request tool. Having a steady stream of positive, recent reviews will read far better to both customers and search engines alike than a sudden rush of old ones.
Build relationships with complementary businesses
Striking up referral relationships with other businesses who serve the same customers, but aren't direct competitors, costs nothing and is a fantastic way of generating leads as well as building rapport and trust. A tattoo studio and a piercing studio, or a beauty clinic and a hairdresser, will naturally send each other customers if a good relationship exists. Businesses that operate this way tend to produce more genuine backlinks and social mentions over time too, helping SEO at the same time, so it is certainly a win-win.
Repurpose what you already have
Most small businesses already create more content than they realise - a set of before/after photos, a client testimonial, or a process video for social media. Getting a second, or even a third use out of each one, as a social media post, an email or a piece of website copy, is completely free and often overlooked because there is no single person dedicated to doing it. A good thing to remember is to treat what your small business already makes, does or contributes as content in its own right, and the rest will follow.
Of course, none of this can fully replace a properly built website or the SEO and analytics that tell you which of it is working, but it's certainly a solid foundation - and it's one your small business can start on today with no budget at all.
