10 free marketing tools for your enterprise
If you wish to promote your enterprise and don't have a lot of resources, you can make use of several strategies based on free tools and social media word of mouth. Often you don't need a complex marketing plan to able to advertise your company, services or products. Here are some ideas:
Use live broadcasting to show what's new, explain your services or respond to the concerns of possible customers or stakeholders: this is a good way of establishing a close relationship with them and making sure that they know how important they are to you.
Tools: Google Hangouts, Periscope or Meerkat. Facebook will offer a live broadcast service very soon.
Take a 360° photo or create a virtual tour of your head office. This gives a clear idea of where you work and your customers get familiar with your office and feel closer to your brand.
Tool: Google Street.
Design surveys: ask your customers or users which new services or features they would like, ask them to score your services, find out what they think about upcoming business decisions which may affect them, ask for advice, get them involved in a creative process...
Tools: Survey Monkey, Typeform, encuestas de Twitter, Google Forms.
Blog: this is a classic but it remains an effective tool to hold open and continuous dialog with your community. Blogging allows you to share stories in a relaxed and accessible manner; you can forget you are a businessperson and address your customers or users as friends. You can also create video blog posts – vlogger. You can create short videos which will be of interest to your community, e.g. review a product or simply give your opinion about a topic in connection with your business.
Tools: Blogspot, WordPress, Tumblr, Youtube.
Podcasts:one of the fastest growing online channels, especially in connection with technology. are agile and friendly tools which allow you to share relaxed and colloquial conversations. They are a good option for people to listen to you while they are doing other things such as riding a bus, train or walking
Tools: Soundcloud.
Newsletter:this is another of the traditional marketing tools; nowadays, however, the secret is to email marketing to the next level. Don't just use newsletters to send information about your company or products. You can for example select a series of news items from different sources and share them with your audience. I am sure they will appreciate it.
Tool: MailChimp.
Create gif and memes: they are the talk of the internet. Everybody is sharing them because they are effective way of generating empathy, making people laugh and even making them think. The secret is to identify viral memes, gif or characters that trend online and immediately think of ways of harnessing them to associate them with your brand.
Tools: Giphy, Shizup.
Infographics: informational charts are a good way of showing what you do. They are useful for processes, product characteristics and service benefits. Static charts are good but it's better if the user can interact and "play" with them.
Tools: Piktochart, Canva.
Tutorial videos:just like graphs, tutorial videos show how to make the most of your product or They are great when you wish to explain a complex process, show how to use a specific feature or give a step-by-step description of a task. When you create a tutorial video you are also thinking as a user and become aware of how processes could be changed to improve usability and user experience.
Tools: Camtasia, Screen Toaster.
Chat: Tools such as Whatssapp are becoming increasingly popular in many countries, e.g. They are no longer only a way of interacting with your contacts; the media and businesses are now using them to communicate directly with their stakeholders. Create distribution groups or lists to send information quickly using text, audio or images; or you can even receive questions or requests and provide an immediate and personal answer, and ensure your customer's satisfaction.