A new year brings so much excitement!
For small businesses, it’s a great opportunity to start fresh with new goals and develop a marketing strategy that will make 2025 a success.
Small businesses face a very dynamic marketing landscape, in order to stay competitive, it’s crucial to adapt to emerging trends and to leverage innovative practices.
Here are some key marketing tips to help your small business thrive in the new year:
Target New Movers
Approximately 31 million people move within the United States each year, and these new movers are known for their significant spending habits – making them a valuable segment to target in 2025.
Research shows that
During the moving process, new movers make numerous purchase decisions, spending about $11,000 on products and services.
Strategically reaching out to new movers is a low hanging fruit that should be a key part of your marketing campaigns going forward.
Success Tips:
Analyze Demographics: Use data to understand the age, income, family size, and other demographics of new movers. Consider their lifestyle preferences, hobbies, and potential needs based on their previous location.
Personalized Outreach: Craft personalized messages that resonate with the specific needs and interests of new movers.
Offer Welcome Promotions: Create special offers or discounts to attract new homeowners in your area to encourage their business.
Direct Mail Marketing
According to a report that was published by the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), direct mail has an average ROI of 112%.
Despite the rumors about it being outdated, direct mail marketing remains a vital tool for small businesses to use in their outreach efforts – vintage is in!
It offers a tangible and personalized approach to reach customers and is a great way to drive a strong CTA, with measurable results.
When you combine direct mail with data (such as new mover data) that targets specific demographics, you can tailor messaging to resonate with individual needs and preferences. This helps ensure your offers are getting in front of the right people at the right time.
Unlike digital advertising, which can be easily overlooked, physical mail captures attention, has a longer shelf life, is typically shared within a household, and creates a lasting impression.
Success tips:
Use Targeted Campaigns: Use data to identify and reach your ideal customer; personalize your direct mail pieces accordingly.
Creative and Engaging Content: Design visually appealing postcards, letters, and brochures that stand out in the mailbox.
Trackable Campaigns: Implement unique codes, QR codes, and personalized URLs to measure the effectiveness of your direct mail efforts.
Social Media Marketing
Social media platforms offer a cost-effective way to reach a vast audience, build brand awareness, and engage with potential customers.
As an entrepreneur, it can be overwhelming to plan and schedule posts and videos. But, when you consistently share relevant and intentional content, you establish a strong online presence and foster an extremely loyal customer base.
Making use of the analytics feature to gain valuable insights into your audience’s behavior can help you to tailor your strategy around the greatest opportunity for maximum impact.
In my own personal experience as a small business owner, a robust social media presence is no longer optional but necessary.
Success tips:
Platform Selection: You do not need to be on every platform. Choose platforms that align with your target audience and business goals.
Consistent Content Calendar: Develop a content calendar and use a scheduling app to ensure regular posting and engagement.
User-Generated Content: Encourage your customers to share their experiences with your brand on social media. Team-up with an influencer who reaches your target audience to build trust and confidence in your brand through their recommendation.
Paid Advertising: Utilize targeted social media advertising to reach a wider audience. On platforms like Facebook, you can set up your target audience to reach segments with distinct demographics, psychographics, and more.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
More than 90% of online experiences start with search engines, wow!
SEO is a cost-effective, long-term marketing strategy that allows small businesses to compete with larger companies and establish a strong online presence.
It can help you increase your online visibility, attract organic traffic, and ultimately generate more leads and sales.
It is crucial to optimize your website with relevant keywords, high-quality content, and strong backlink profiles, that way your small business can rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs). When you improve your ranking, you increase brand awareness, higher website traffic, and greater customer reach.
Nearly half (46%) of all Google searches are local, and 18% of these searches lead to a purchase within 24 hours. Going one step further to include Local SEO into your strategy can give you a competitive edge, and help you reach potential customers when they’re looking for exactly what you offer.
Success tips:
Keyword Research: Identify relevant keywords and phrases, considering customer intent when they search for your business, to optimize your website content.
On-Page SEO: Optimize your website’s title tags, meta descriptions, and header tags.
Off-Page SEO: Build high-quality backlinks to your website from reputable sources.
Local SEO: Attract local customers by considering their intent when they search for the products or services you offer, attach them to location-based keywords – “near me” “in my area.”
Claim and Optimize Your Google My Business Listing: Google also owns almost 94% of market share for mobile search. Ensure your business information is accurate and up to date.
Email Marketing
Email marketing remains a cornerstone for small businesses to thrive in 2025.
It continues to offer a cost-effective and personalized way to connect with your customers. When you craft targeted email campaigns, you can nurture relationships, drive sales, and boost brand loyalty.
Unlike other marketing channels, email allows direct communication with your customers. You bypass the algorithms and ensure messages reach their intended audience.
With email, you have access to advanced analytics. You can track email performance and measure ROI. Giving you the capability to optimize your campaigns for maximum impact.
Success tips:
Personalized Campaigns: Segment your email list by demographics and send highly targeted and individualized messages.
Compelling Subject Lines: Craft attention-grabbing subject lines to increase your open rates.
Mobile-Friendly Emails: Ensure your emails are optimized for mobile devices.
Clear Call-to-Action: Guide your subscribers to take the desired action with a clear and concise CTA and use visuals to draw them to it.
Email Automation: Automated emails can generate 320% more revenue than emails that are not automated. Consider leveraging automation to save both time and resources while delivering consistent and timely messages. For example, welcome emails or abandoned cart reminders.
Video Marketing
In the age of snappy TikToks and Instagram reels, it should come as no surprise that 100 million people watch a video online every single day.
The popularity of YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram Reels has fueled the necessity of including video in your outreach. Attention spans are shorter and consumers are increasingly expecting brands to communicate visually.
Video marketing captivates and engages your audience in a way that static content simply cannot, giving it an important role in your strategy.
Videos are a great way to showcase your products or services, highlight your brand personality, and differentiate yourself from your competition.
Success tips:
Engaging Content: 82% of consumers have decided to purchase a product or service based on watching a marketing video. Making sure that yours are short, concise, informative, and entertaining videos.
Platform Optimization: Share your videos on platforms like YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram – utilize their analytics and affordable ad opportunities.
Video SEO: Optimize your video titles, descriptions, and tags to get in front of the most actionable audience.
Conclusion
New Year, new strategy!
Whether you’re starting fresh or looking to do better in 2025, follow our tips for a multi-channel approach to marketing that is sure to find your target customers where it counts the most.
For more information and ideas for small business marketing, contact Welcome Wagon! Founded in 1928 to welcome new movers to their community, Welcome Wagon is committed to connecting with new homeowners through their mailboxes and online.
