Goodbye Adwords, Hello Facebook: The new trends redefining SME marketing

Connected wearables, AI, IoT in the enterprise and businesses this year are going to be faced with a relentless storm of new technologies – all marketed by the big guys to aid growth in a competitive economy. But big, expensive and complicated is not always better and sometimes the simplest IT and tech tricks can have the best effect for an SME trying to remain profitable in a difficult environment.

In 2017, we’ll see a number of changes to the marketing landscape for small businesses and in turn, we’ll see a number of small-business trends emerge such as the rise of social media and Facebook recommendations to leverage these changes.

Marketing will become a whole lot more accessible for the smaller players and it finally won’t have to cost an arm and a leg.

Here’s three trends – and associated advice – that businesses can jump on this year.

Consumers will turn more to social media than to Google

Google has long been lauded as the best and most direct way for businesses to reach their customers. Facebook’s finally encroaching on this space, as customers start to rely on social recommendations to find the best provider of any given service.

Always remember that Facebook’s key purpose is to do the best by its users. Use this to your advantage: it can be helpful to get ahead on the network, through organic reach, like reviews, check-ins and updates.

Don’t spend too much time on it, businesses should just do the really important posts themselves – for example, post if you are open or closed on a public holiday – and then outsource or automate the rest.

Think about how this can relate to your business and go with the biggest, not the broadest spread. A targeted approach is key. A simple page post like “The café will be open all through the Easter holidays from 7am to 6pm” or “With this heatwave, we’ve added iced coffee to our menu.”

Outsourcing is key in 2017

Outsourcing is proving itself to be more and more beneficial and in 2017 we will see more businesses focus on their own expertise – anything from a smashed avocado on toast to a bespoke coffee-bean roast – and outsourcing the rest, for cheap.

Delegate the work to companies that do what you want on a piece-by-piece basis rather than rely on a one-stop-shop marketing agency.

If you want to deliver food, then don’t hire extra staff yourself, use Deliveroo or Uber Eats. If you want to get your customers to tell their friends about your business, then use social media check-ins as a word of mouth reference and testimonial.

When you outsource, focus on companies that have spent millions of dollars developing and building applications and tools that you can in turn use for under a hundred dollars a month, without a contract. These tried and tested businesses have the most user friendly and time-saving tools than ones that you customise yourself.

Costly and time consuming websites are on the decline — they’re more trouble than they’re worth

Websites take time and money to keep relevant and useful. When consumers are increasingly turning to social media, Facebook particularly, to find their next favourite local.

You don’t even need to have a website. If you are a cafe for example, the only useful function of a website is to offer your address, menu and opening hours. With more consumers using social to research businesses, It’s now more profitable and time effective to invest the time of publishing this information onto Facebook and Google business listings than your own website.

Consumers outsource their information updates to Facebook and Google, not your website. The chances that your Facebook page will tell customers if you are open on New Year’s day or not is far more likely than your website, which, let’s be honest, most business owners only have time to update once in a blue moon.

The key here is focus on your product or service – where the money is, then outsource anything that can give you more capacity to serve customers or lower your overheads.

Michael Jankie, Co-Founder, PoweredLocal