You shouldn’t be ashamed because you’re trying to grow your business when bootstrapping. Not everyone has a big bank account they can use to pay for business expenses. There are a number of other things you can do to grow your business without spending lots of money.
Granted it will take a little bit longer for your business to grow but it is possible. So today I’m going to share five things you can do to grow your business when you have little to no budget.
Focus on Customer Service
Provide the best customer service experience that you can so that you stand out from everyone else that can do what you do. Go out of your way to make their experience with your company one they want to have again.
There are three main areas of your business that are impacted by the customer experience you provide:
- Number of ideal clients you attract
- Number of happy clients you retain
- Number of new clients you get from referrals
You can take care of all of your potential customers without having to live your entire life in your inbox. You don’t have to constantly waste time on the phone following up on dead end leads either. Make sure you have a good customer care process in place.
I have a few resources available that can help you with this. Here are two blog posts, 3 Tips to Boost Your Sales Organically and 3 Key Pieces You Need to Create Super Fans and Land More of the Clients You Want.
You can also grab a copy of my free customer care process template with swipe files to help you start documenting this process. Click here for your copy.
Study Your Competition But Don’t Imitate Them
You will always have competition! Knowing who your competitors are and what they are offering that works can help you develop your products and services. Use this knowledge to create your own marketing strategies but don’t copy what they are doing.
Get to know your customers’ expectations through your research so that you can customize your customer service to surpass those expectations.
Identify Your Target Audience in Detail
Narrow down your audience and get crystal clear on who you serve and what their pain points are. That information is the key to your marketing message, your services and any other products you create.
Now it will take some time and effort for you to create what is also referred to as your ideal client. But once you have this one person in mind, you can craft your marketing messages to speak directly to them which means success for you and your business will grow.
If you need help narrowing down your target audience I have a few fempreneurs in my community that can help you with this! Be sure to check Allison Scholes and Robyn Graham. They share some amazing tips on their Instagram accounts as well as on their podcasts.
Use Social Media to Build Relationships
Social media is the perfect way to grow your community online and in turn grow your small business on a bootstrap budget. But you can only do this effectively if you have a really good idea of who your target audience is.
While you don’t necessarily have to invest money in social media to be successful, you will need to invest your time. So knowing who you are trying to reach will help you pick the right platform to get the best results.
Just remember to focus on having conversations and the rest will happen on its own. But be patient! Social media is a marathon not a sprint.
Create Your Back-Office Systems
Business systems are the foundation that a successful business is built on. A system is a detailed step by step process that identifies the tool or tools that will help you automate certain steps in that process and the person who takes care of certain steps.
Click here to read my blog post where I talk about three of the six basic systems every mompreneur needs to implement no matter what phase of your business journey you are in.
When you have systems set up for recurring tasks in your business, you never have to waste time wondering how you should begin working on a task or what steps you should take.
How do you set up systems?
Focus on creating them one at a time and you can create simple checklists to help you get started. Be sure to click here to check out my blog post for a 4 step process you can use. If you want a free template to help you get started, grab a copy from my free resource vault.
The great part is once you create your systems as checklists, you can identify tasks that can be automated and begin using tools, many of which are free, that will do some of the work for you. Click here to find out five of my top time-saving tools I can’t live without. I discuss the key functions of each tool, some very useful features, and why I absolutely love using it when there are so many options. And most of them are free!
I hope these tips have inspired you to pursue your dream and will help you grow your business when bootstrapping. Don’t let a lack of funds hold you back. There is always a way to bring your business dream to life! Make a plan and take action!
If you want to connect with me and a community of women that can help you with then please, I would love to have you as part of my free Facebook community. Behind every successful woman is a tribe of women who choose collaboration over competition. I would love to have you in mine! Click here to join!
If you would like the audio version of this topic, be sure to check out episode 41 of the podcast. Tune in on your favorite platform by clicking one of the links below.
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