What comes next for any new startup that is up and running is how to attract customers. The job could be easier for those who open a brick-and-mortar business who will only have to worry about the location that should be busy. That actually depends on the nature of the business, where those who sell goods have no better choice than opening in a busy location because passersby could find them easily. A busy location is vital for any business with the exception that some businesses can attract customers by advertising; hence they can get away without opening their business in a busy location. The other alternative is to open the business in an area designated for business such as a neighborhood or a town or a city marketplace or a downtown area.
Even these groups might need help from traditional advertising such as attention-grabbing signs, distributing flyers, ads in local publications, and maybe ads in local directories if they are prevalent that could all be expensive, but the end result is it is possible to attract customers. The time people were heavily reliant on yellow pages is not that far behind and some people still use them showing that an ad on yellow pages could still go a long way.
There are more creative ways to market local brick-and-mortar businesses that are still effective such as putting stickers on the business vehicles so that people will see them wherever the vehicles travel. It is even possible to ask people to display the sticker on their vehicles or distributing eye-catching stickers so that people can put them on their vehicles. T-shirts, mugs, pens, and more aren’t still out since there are businesses that are using them effectively. Participating in trade shows is also possible and it can give exposure to the business.
The above approaches require money that means it is only startups with enough capital that can use them effectively. For others, simply meeting the busy business location requirement can enable them to start generating income. However, the arrival of the digital age has ushered in many low-cost marketing opportunities, especially for those who also choose to sell online showing that, those who do not sell online can also use online advertising to work for them.
Hence, there are going to be different kinds of startups that can have varying approaches at their disposal. Those who want to remain brick-and-mortar only can use the traditional approach. Those who want to also have an online outlet for their brick-and-mortar business and those who want to run an online business only have a huge variety of marketing tools at their disposal, the outcome being there might be a need to create a traditional and a digital marketing approach.
The traditional approach has expensive marketing venues that are most suitable for big businesses such as newspapers, magazines, radio, TV, and billboards that are expensive but very effective. Those startups labeled as small businesses with limited startup capital can take advantage of what the new digital media has brought to the fore that had become very effective and affordable. This shows that whether a startup is selling online or not, it is possible to use the latest introductions such as blogging, social media, starting a website, where it is possible to post various content that could be in a form of text, video, and informatics. It is also possible to use search engines by bidding in a pay-per-click advertising system to give what they are doing maximum exposure, by making their website or business to finish at a good position on search results.
The best thing about online advertising is it is cost-effective to start out and as it had been proven it is possible to sell globally eliminating the geographical limitation that used to constrain businesses a few decades ago. Consequently, the best startup business might be a business that has both brick-and-mortar and online presence, while those who do business offline only or online only could also thrive if they meet the requirements. There are startup businesses that can thrive by selling online only. Since the topic is marketing, those selling online have new and affordable marketing approaches that can at times outdo the best traditional advertising methods when seen from the number of people they can reach, without costing them a lot of money.
New startups have to deal with such realities because their survival and success depend on what kind of revenue they can generate. In order to generate revenue, businesses need to be found by their targeted customers. The targeted customers also make their own search to satisfy their needs. If an offline business is hidden in an obscure residential area, passersby might not find it compared to those selling in a designated selling area. Since similar businesses doing similar things could be available in designated selling areas, buyers might be reluctant to travel to an inconvenient location to buy what they can easily find in a busy market area showing that marketing alone might not make an offline business successful that lacks the required ingredients. If such a business sells online it can beat the odds, but selling online also has its own stringent requirements to be successful.