So. Can a business survive without marketing? Coming from yours truly, a highly dedicated social media manager and outspoken marketing connoisseur, I’m going to be biassed and say no. No it can’t survive.
But ‘marketing’ doesn’t always mean an expensive active campaign.
How businesses can survive without a marketing campaign
- Having contacts who will spread the word
- Previously established online presence
- Referrals from friends
- Loyal customer base
- Foot traffic
One thing all of those have in common? They are in fact, forms of marketing. Ironic right? We market our business every single day without even knowing that we’re doing it. So whether intentional or not, marketing will always play a pivotal role in your business’s success.
Marketing isn’t just useful and informative: it can also be fun! Maybe that’s the nerd in me truly coming out but there aren’t many things in the world that give me more satisfaction than working with new businesses and seeing how marketing can bring their brand alive.
I work with a lot of small businesses and particularly in their early stages of building brand awareness – it’s critical to establish, at the very least, foundational principles of marketing to get that initial exposure.
The best sales tactics in the world will fail if your potential customers don’t know that your business exists.
Unless you make people aware of what value you bring to them, it will take a lot more work (and in some cases, luck) for customers to find you.
This is where marketing comes into play. You have to spread the word! There are SO many ways in which you can do this.
10 ways to market a small business
- Digitally – through online social media platforms
- Verbally – word of mouth can be a powerful thing
- Physically – go on, hire a plane and write it in the sky!
The more effectively you promote your product or service, the more people will become aware of it and the better your chances are of turning them into loyal, and sometimes more importantly: paying customers.
Another reason marketing is crucial to a business surviving is simply being a point of difference. From opening a little corner store in your local neighbourhood to owning Apple – you’ll ALWAYS have competitors. Regardless of what sort of business owner you are.
Nowadays, customers have a plethora of choices when it comes to purchasing a product or service. Unless you are the only organisation that can provide what they want, they may have no compulsion to do business with you. And let’s be real – most of the time you will have other organisations to compete with.
If you don’t make an attempt to catch people’s attention, your competitors will. Marketing often plays a role in why a particular brand stays ahead or falls behind.
