Marketing on a Shoe String

As Entrepreneurs we are always faced with constraints related to marketing and selling our products and services, that is natural and true for every company. Very few companies have a unlimited budget to spend on marketing. I have had my pet peeves with the Marketing departments while I was working for a bank. The problem I had was, I never knew whether the money we spent was worth it. This is no longer a problem, today technology exists to precisely build-measure-learn from your marketing efforts. I saw this post in The Next Web with the title "10 Marketing Hacks For Entrepreneurs", I think it is applicable to any businesses and I don't know why they have the title as a Hack? I wish established companies would run their businesses like a startup especially in the marketing and sales organizations because they never give you the metrics related to the spending they do. Here is the list if you have not gone to the article to read it:

1. Google Adwords
2. ReTargeting
3. Facebook Ads
4. Twitter mentions
5. Gist
6. Craigslist
7. Billboard space through ADstruc
8. Facebook Insights
9. WordStream
10. Social Media - Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Google+, Quora etc

I would add your company blog is a great way to market your product or service or what you do. Marketing is a promise you keep with your customers. If you don't tell them what you are doing they usually don't know. All the above tools does not replace simple truth about marketing, as Seth Godin's post on Marketing says: 

The simple first rule of branding and marketing anything (even yourself)

Not a secret, often overlooked:
"Keep your promises."
If you say you'll show up every day at 8 am, do so. Every day.
If you say your service is excellent, make it so.
If circumstances or priorities change, well then, invest to change them back. Or tell the truth, and mean it.
If traffic might be bad, plan for it.
Is there actually unusually heavy call volume? Really?
Want a bigger brand? Make bigger promises. And keep them

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