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7 Tried And True Ways to Find Customers Online And Offline

ThinkClever

News

Mar 24, 2017

With the advent of digital marketing, many businesses are putting much less of their focus on offline methods of attracting new customers and putting all of their emphasis, time, and energy on appealing to internet users. And although marketing to internet users is highly effective and it absolutely should be used by businesses, it is also vital to recognize that marketing offline is just as valuable, even in today’s society. In this post, we will uncover seven tried and true ways to find customers both online and offline.

  1. Host an Event: Today, businesses are now able to host events online, particularly on social media platforms. However, in this post we will discuss more heavily the importance of hosting in-person events. If you want to appeal to more members of your target audience and potentially convert those people into customers, try hosting an in-person event. You can use social media to promote the offline event and include the service or product information you want your event attendees to be exposed to. Just remember, while the purpose of the event may be to show those who attend what your business has to offer, you don’t want to be too promotional. The event should be an opportunity for them to have a positive and memorable time. They should enjoy the time they spend at your event, not feel as though they were being advertised to through the entire thing.
  2. Start a LinkedIn Group: You can create your own loyal, target audience by running a LinkedIn group. Starting a group allows you to handpick the people you would want included and members that would most likely benefit from the information you have to share and potentially become customers. In order to build a loyal, active group, you must continuously share relevant articles and helpful tips. Staying in contact with the members and communicating with them are also imperative steps you must take to secure a loyal audience. Also, engage with the members. Let them ask questions or provide you with feedback. Building this sort of community will allow you to not only get your name out there, but establish yourself as a trusted, reputable authority figure in your niche.
  3. Build Your Brand With Community Involvement: Even if you run a 100% online business like an e-commerce website, you can still take your marketing efforts offline in your own community. Get involved in local events such as trade shows, volunteer projects, sponsoring sports teams, fundraising, and festivals. You can build your brand as a company that gladly takes part in charitable contributions while also giving people who attend the event a glimpse at who you are and what you do. When a person you made contact with offline needs a certain product or service, they will be more likely to think of you before any other business or one of your competitors because of that in-person, human element that you established.
  4. Get on The (Right) Social Media Sites: If you are a new business or a business that is new to social media marketing, it may be tempting to hop on every major social media site out there and make plans to build your online presence. There is no better way to burnout than to try this method. Unless you have hired a social media marketing expert and have a lavish amount of money to spend on marketing efforts, this will only tire you out and prove to be less effective than you had hoped. Instead of trying to get on all of the social media platforms out there, get on the sites that your target audience uses. Pick one to three social media sites and focus on building your growth on those sites before moving forward onto any other. You don’t want to waste your time marketing to the wrong audience because you picked the wrong social media website. In order to get on the right sites, you have to develop an intimate, thorough understanding of your ideal customer and study their habits on their social media platforms of choice. Then, you have to determine how you will market to them on those websites.
  5. Don’t Neglect Networking Events: Although social media has provided a great means of networking with literally millions of people, nothing will replace good old fashioned face-to-face networking. While you might not always walk into a networking event and come out with a handful of new customers, in-person networking is a great way to secure some promising leads. Someone you connect with might be aware of someone they know who needs exactly what you have to offer. Or someone you speak with at the event might not be in need of your services and products at the very moment, but if you offer them some free advice or help them with something, they’ll be more likely to remember you when they need you. Not to mention, business cards. There are lots and lots of opportunities to hand out business cards when you attend networking events. This allows you to give prospects something they can physically, tangibly take home with them to remember you by.
  6. Blog in All The Ways You Can Blog: If you are like most business owners, you don’t have a lot of free time on your hands. And even though you’ve been made aware of the tremendous benefits blogging has to offer your business, you still find it difficult to squeeze in the time necessary to build your blog. So what do you do? You hire a writer. Not only will this investment free up your time and ensure that you don’t have to worry about what you are going to write about or how often you are going to put out content, you get consistent, valuable content. A specialized writer can handle a workload of three blog posts a week or a new blog post every day. And they have the expertise in your subject field to write in a way that provides real value to the readers. Now, with that said, churning out consistent, high quality blog content is only one aspect of blogging. Even if you do hire a writer who does the majority of your content writing for you, you still want to get your own voice out there. After all, you are the true expert. Try committing to one expert blog post a week to establish your reputation. Additionally, you should consider connecting with other online platforms, websites, and publications for guest blogging opportunities. Guest blogging allows you to reach an entirely new, untapped audience that could become potential customers.
  7. Cross Promote: The beautiful thing about cross promoting is that you can do it offline and online. Find the appropriate company to strategically partner with for a cross promotion campaign. You’re doing them a favor and they are doing a favor for you. Like guest blogging, cross promoting allows you to reach a new audience of people that you might not have connected with before.

Looking for more tips on ways to connect with prospective customers both online and offline? Don’t hesitate to contact us today or keep reading our other posts. We are dedicated to providing you with the right resources to reach your target audience.

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Happy Holi From Everyone At CustomLogoCases.com! ❤️🩷🧡💛💚💙🩵💜🕉🇮🇳

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Throw Back Thursday! We ❤️ seeing our custom creations featured on social media. Here is a gem from The Bethany School, UK a few years back. #Laptopsleeve #ChromebookCase #NeopreneZipSleeve #computersleeve💻😁🤩🇬🇧🇬🇧

Throw Back Thursday! We ❤️ seeing our custom creations featured on social media. Here is a gem from The Bethany School, UK a few years back. #LaptopSleeve #chromebookcase #neoprenezipsleeve #computersleeve💻😁🤩🇬🇧🇬🇧#repost from @bethany_compsci

Our lucky Year 7 and 8 pupils getting new laptops in September will also get one of these brand new Bethany laptop sleeves!

Fingers crossed for a staff version too 😍
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