By Pete Winter

Two Tips for Marketing on a Budget in 2012

Marketing and budget don’t always seem to go together. It’s all too easy for a business to spend reactively and end up achieving very little. It also often seems that doing one big marketing push ends up being costly, rather than cost effective. Here are two tips to marketing better on a budget in the year ahead:

1. Create a game plan – and stick to it

Marketing often becomes the activity that business-owners do only when they can find the time. This piecemeal approach can often end up costing a great deal more than a more consistently delivered game plan. Step back and look at your overall business strategy. Who is your target market? Where are they? What type of messages do they respond to? Carefully match your marketing plan and your business plan and you’ll create an overall business game plan that is much more budget-wise.

2. Get connected

Companies often choose to stick to just one or two marketing channels when they are aiming to do marketing on a budget. But this is what can drain a business budget and provide only a limited return. Instead, consider all the options open to you – PR, SEO , email marketing, social media etc – and use an inbound marketing approach which integrates your overall marketing message across all these channels. This is much more budget-friendly and manageable.