Budget-Friendly Digital Marketing Strategies You Can Implement

Are a shrinking marketing budget, stiff competition, and a myriad of ever-evolving digital marketing strategies keeping you awake every night?

You’re not alone.

The digital marketing space is full of B2B vendors seeking growth and influence, and these businesses are using all kinds of tactics to attract customers.

For the marketer working with a shoe-string budget, competing in these leagues can feel daunting. Fortunately, there are solid but inexpensive practices that maximize ROI while bringing in new customers.

Let’s look at five such strategies below.

1. Adopt Buyer Intent Marketing

According to Think with Google, 89 percent of B2B buyers conduct independent research prior to purchases. 

Now, what if you knew what these B2Bs were looking for, wouldn’t it be easier to target them with the right messages? 

Buyer intent data allows you to do just that.

It provides insights into users’ purchase intent, making it easier for you to know which customers are actively considering your solutions or looking to buy.

Depending on the tool you’re using, the buyer intent data collected may come from the following signals:

• Frequent website visits
• Multiple site visits from people in the same organization
• People who click on your social media ads
• Length of time spent on your site

Okay, do you use this data?

• Buyer intent data provides highly qualified leads for your team to nurture.
• To improve sales pitches. The data provides insights into the visitor’s interests, allowing you to personalize your pitch and increase chances of conversion.
• To enhance customer retention. Existing customers may look up alternative solutions, competitor pages, or visit the “cancel my subscription” page. Monitoring intent signals may help capture dissatisfaction which you can deal with promptly.

There are many buyer intent data tools on the market including Leadfeeder, DemandJump, KickFire, and ZoomInfo. 

2. Cold Calling

This time-honored marketing strategy remains an effective and inexpensive way to reach new customers. 

Today’s cold calling efforts are based on understanding a prospect’s pain points and to what extent your solutions can work.

By the time you’re calling that number, you’re in a position to offer real value, strike up a relationship, and possibly land a sale.

Best practices include:

• Build some familiarity. Going in blind shows you’re only concerned about closing a deal and not offering value to the customer. Research the business you’re targeting, demographics, the industry they are in and pain points.
• Leverage trigger events. Establish when accounts are coming up for renewal or brewing dissatisfaction with their current vendor by looking at publicly available information. You can then reach out before they look at other options.
• Block one to two hours to focus on making calls. Minimize all forms of distraction and be fully present with your listeners. It helps keep the calling flow and you’ll be better placed to discern the prospect’s needs.
• Identify the best time to make calls. Experts recommend weekdays, excluding Mondays and Fridays. We say customers are different, so look at historical data to determine what days and times were most productive and work with that.
• Have an outline of the things you want to talk about. These should include a strong opener, relevant statistics, main challenges you can solve, questions, objections, and suitable responses as well as your end goal.

3. Referral Marketing

One of the main reasons this strategy works is because it relies on the element of trust. 

According to a study by Nielsen, up to 92 percent of people trust recommendations they receive from family and friends.

So what better way to start relationships with new customers than through recommendations from existing or past customers?

Here are tips to help you create an effective referral strategy:

• Be referable. What experience do you offer customers? Are your present and past customers happy with your solutions and the customer service? Client communication and tone, as well as surveys, can offer useful insights here.
• Ask your customers for referrals. If they are satisfied with your service, referring others shouldn’t be a problem. We recommend waiting for a couple of weeks for the customer to see the worthiness of your solution before making the request.
• How do you ask for referrals? There are multiple ways to do this. It can be in person, via phone call or text, through email, or on your website. For your website, ensure the referral form is easy to find and doesn’t contain too many questions. 
• Return the favor. Consider sending referrals to your customers without them asking. They will remember and reciprocate.

4. Email Marketing

If email marketing sounds like a strategy that has outlived its usefulness, boy do I have news for you.

According to McKinsey, email is more effective at acquiring new customers compared to social media. And by 40 times no less.

That’s why marketers continue sending email campaigns. As should you.

How do you stand to benefit?

• Supports relationship nurturing. Email is a preferred communication channel world over. You can use it to introduce your brand, offerings, and share the value you can provide. Being a two-way communication method, the other party can respond with queries or desire to purchase. 
• Can be customized to make communication more effective. With email marketing, it’s easy to segment businesses and tailor messages that speak to their needs or interests. 
• It requires minimal investment, but the returns are high. Done right, you can enjoy an ROI of up to 4400 percent.   
• Campaigns are measurable. Delivery rate, open rates, click-through rates, and content engagement are easily discoverable and you can use the information to better future campaigns.
• Easily accessible. People check their emails on the go. By using a mobile-friendly email template, your audience will catch up on your communication wherever they are.

5. Content Marketing

Content marketing is a long-term asset-building strategy that promotes awareness and generates leads.

The content you create is a hub of information that customers and prospects can turn to when looking for information.

But that’s not all. 

With consistent publishing of top-notch content, audiences see you as a reliable brand and the go-to leader, increasing their likelihood of buying.

Consider the following practices:

• Publish industry studies to attract visitors, particularly decision-makers. When you provide well-researched studies, other blogs will refer to your content, improving SEO. Grant audiences free access to encourage engagement and sharing. 
• Send out newsletters. These can be weekly or bi-monthly depending on your goals. Newsletters remind subscribers you exist. The more they hear from you, the higher the likelihood of engagement leading to sales.
• Experiment with LinkedIn. LinkedIn is the professionals’ social network and the content you put out will be in their faces. Articles work, but interesting infographics and videos may attract more attention.
• Create content that people can use such as cheat sheets, how-to guides, templates, complete guides, and interactive infographics.
• Use video content. From how-to videos to brand stories, product presentations, expert panels, and re-purposed text-based content, video is easier to consume and remember.