At the early
stages of business development, free publicity can be a such a saving grace for
start-ups, helping them save cost and drive sustainability, while giving the
business much needed public exposure at the same time.
free.
Take Advantage of Free Guest Blogging Communities
You
can write and publish guest posts on well-trafficked sites in your niche, and
take advantage of free guest blogging communities and use them as a good
starting point for publicity. Try to refrain from making the article you intend
to guest post too promotional, but make it clear enough for anyone who reads to
come away knowing one or two vital things about your business.
Join
Forums Relevant to Your Company’s Niche
Join these forums, join their
conversations and offer useful and insightful answers to questions asked. Try to
be as active as you can on these forums so that you can use the platform to give
your business good and needed exposure.
Volunteer Your Company Leaders
for Interviews
Try to leverage on some of your media or online contacts
to get as many free interviews as you can for your company leaders. The
interviews should of course be on subjects related to your company’s niche. This
might be a bit difficult to get at the get-go (well, no one actually said it
will be easy), but if you remain persistent, your efforts will eventually pay
off. It’s really all about networking, building relationships and leveraging on
that to get what you need.
Put Your Products or Services on Online
Marketplaces or Classified Advertisement Sites
Take advantage of popular
online marketplaces or classified advertisements sites related to your company’s
niche, and sell your products, as well as market your business there. If it’s a
hotel you’re running, you can consider putting your hotel up on popular hotel
booking sites like Jumia Travel, to help market your business and increase
exposure for it. Of course, these online marketplaces or booking portals collect
some commission for this, but it is nothing compared to what you will spend on
publicity and advertisement. You can also consider listing your business in
business directories and local business listings.
Be Active on Social
Media
There’s really no better way to get free marketing for your
business than through social media. You need to actively put out interesting,
unique and viral-worthy content that can help you build a large following and
get more exposure for your business. You can also ask friends, family and even
employees to regularly re-post your content. Constantly engage with your
followers, answer their questions and solicit their feedback. Embrace social
media as a tool for marketing your business, and dedicate time to build on it to
get some much needed exposure for your business. Occasionally, you can also hold
contests and give one or two things away to your followers. People love free
things and this can easily help you with free word-of-mouth marketing, because
people are bound to talk about it.