Marketing techniques your small business can’t afford to not use

Discover why storytelling, omnichannel, and live chat lead the way for small businesses to influence customers.

The best techniques for your marketing strategy

For any business formulating a marketing strategy, it makes sense to adopt tried and tested techniques, especially as a small business needing to establish itself in the industry. So, keep reading to find out why and how live chat, storytelling, and being omnipresent as a business, are paving the way for a new approach to customer engagement.

1. Live chat

Many businesses tend to see live chat as a mundane question and answer platform, but the truth is that it can end up fueling your company’s profits and can go a long way to establishing brand trust. So much so that findings from eMarketer revealed that 38 percent of online purchases are directly related to live chat.

Additionally, 62 percent of the customers who took to live chat to engage with businesses, said that they’re more likely to purchase again from those who offer this service on their website. Simply put, live chat is a big hit with customers when adding value to their shopping experience or inquiry.

For example, if a customer is browsing a particular product, a smart way of making use of live chat is to offer them support in finding other products related to what they’re browsing, thus using customer insights to drive the communication.

Tools like Clickatell Touch make it possible for businesses to enable their customers to contact them via their favorite messaging app or channels including website live chat, and social media. Messages from all inbound channels can be responded to from a single web-based interface, unifying your response teams and cutting costs.

The benefits of live chat

The benefits of using live chat are almost endless, not only is it a simple and effective way of communicating with your customers — since you’re messaging them on the very platform they’re browsing or shopping on — it also gives you insight into the customer mind and experience.

So, if you’re a retailer and you’re noticing that more frequent queries are coming in asking for a specific product that you don’t stock, it may open your eyes to a business opportunity or solution you weren’t considering.

Live chat will give you valuable insights about your audience that can be used in future marketing efforts.

Live chat channels also simplify the effort needed by customer support teams while saving your business money. Rather than having a team of customer service staff waiting on every customer call or email, invest in technology that allows you to engage with your customers in real-time, via the channels they already love and prefer.

2. Storytelling

Being able to grow your engaged customer base and audience with great storytelling is another successful marketing tool that your small business can use to its advantage, and it’s an essential part of marketing.

Storytelling is used to evoke an emotional response which is used to encourage your audience to engage with your business in one way or another. These stories which your brand chooses to share will speak volumes about your business prioritizes and values.

While many businesses really struggle with authentic storytelling, the quality and creativity of your storytelling are crucial.

How to use storytelling for your small business

The power of personalization speaks for itself, and there are many ways your business can share personal stories. From anecdotes about your business journey and sharing an employee’s history or recent growth at the company to client and customer testimonials — these are all part of what makes customers connect with the human aspect of your business.

Studies by numerous agencies and organizations have found that personalization is one of the key drivers of a customer experience strategy, and remember — when you combine personalization with storytelling, you have a recipe for brand trust and business success.

3. Become omnipresent in an omnichannel landscape

As a small business, it can be overwhelming to begin to unpack what it means to be digitally omnipresent when your efforts need to be spread across various areas of the business, which usually means limited manpower and budgets for marketing.

Your business can take steps to secure its omnipresence by doing the following:

Choose the platforms or channels that are relevant to your business. When it comes to your strategy to increase your digital omnipresence, consider what makes each platform or channel unique, and whether it’s compatible with what your business is wanting to offer customers. Choose a platform based on its features and whether it will benefit your business offering. Additionally, consider whether it requires minimal effort from your audience or if it’s a time-waster.

Choose the platforms that your customers love. Social media is booming, and with the majority of consumers set to be made up of millennials, it’s important to have a presence on at least one social media platform to engage with customers. That said, if your customers are more likely to have value-added by receiving a curated WhatsApp message with products you’ve selected for them versus being able to shop on Instagram, or contact you for support via Facebook Messenger rather than Twitter, then you’ve got to pay attention to these insights which will ultimately drive their spending.

Making messaging unique and different. This cannot be said enough. No customer wants to see a carbon copy of messaging across different platforms. Make sure that your message is tailored to the channel’s features and that it serves a purpose. Each platform has the ability to increase sales, so treat it as a campaign with a goal that can be measured.

Don’t repost or spam. Customers who are bombarded with branded communication either unsubscribe or unfollow after. Audiences become desensitized to spammy company marketing and will start ignoring any messaging with your brand attached out of avoidance for irrelevant content.

Customer engagement is key

The ability for customers to interact with your business in real-time via live chat and their preferred messaging channels along with personalized storytelling, all elevate and deepen customer engagement exponentially. If you’re interested in learning more, read this recent article on the topic. It takes a look at how successful entrepreneurs are using customer engagement to grow their businesses — and how you can do the same.

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