Your business might be small, but that doesn’t mean it should get lost in the shuffle. There are nearly 100,000 catering businesses in the United States alone. And if you want to stand out from the pack, you’ll need some amazing marketing strategies. Here are five tips to promote your small catering business.
Design attention-grabbing flyers
Every marketing campaign needs some attention-grabbing graphics to… grab attention. There’s a lot of content out there, whether online or in real life. And the only way you can cut through the noise is to have professional graphics designed to stand out.
Of course, you’re busy preparing for events. You don’t have time to design professional graphics from scratch. Luckily, there are thousands of templates for small business flyers available online from websites like PosterMyWall.
Simply browse through the designs, choose the template that best fits your brand, and customize the information using the easy drag-and-drop editor. You can either print your designs to hang around town or download digital copies to upload to your website and social media accounts. Templates are the best way to ensure professional marketing designs without taking time from your busy schedule.
Get social on social media
With over 5 billion active users, social media is perhaps the quickest way to reach a massive audience at relatively no cost, perfect for small catering businesses. It’s really a marketer’s dream! But because it’s so perfect, everyone uses it. There’s a lot of competition!
The best way to stand out on social media is to post only high-quality content and plenty of it. You’re competing for attention against professional content creators. Everything you upload needs to look good enough to make people stop scrolling and pay attention. Luckily, good food always gets people to stop and look. Post plenty of mouth-watering pictures of your dishes that’ll make people want to book you for their next event.
Unfortunately, all that amazing content you post gets pushed down in your followers’ feeds as more and more content is uploaded. The only way to combat the constant push to the bottom is to upload more content! Most marketing professionals suggest uploading to social media at least once per day — and sometimes more frequently depending on the platform!
Run some social media ads
One of the biggest frustrations of social media is that only your followers get to see your posts organically, and it takes time to grow your following. Want to expand your marketing reach exponentially? Take out some social media ads.
With social media ads, you pay the platform a small fee, and it’ll promote your posts to thousands of additional users. You even get to choose who sees your ads by selecting specific demographics to target, including age, gender, location, and even interests.
You might think taking out ads isn’t something a small business can do. But social media ads are quite cost-effective. You can easily get thousands of views for your catering service for just a few dollars per day!
Start an email newsletter
In the world of cost-effective marketing solutions, email reigns supreme. With an average return on investment (ROI) of $36 for every $1 spent, it’s one of the most effective ways for small businesses to reach customers!
The power of email comes from being able to reach your customers directly. You don’t have to cross your fingers that the algorithm serves your content to the right people; your messaging is sent directly to their inbox.
Start an email newsletter for your business to keep customers up to date with your catering service’s latest offerings. Collect as many email addresses as you can and send a few emails per month to keep your business top of mind. You never know who might need a caterer, and your email messages might remind them that your business is the best!
Optimize your website
Every business needs a website. It’s like your home base on the internet! When people need a caterer, there’s a good chance their first stop will be their favorite search engine. They’ll type in “catering service near me,” and whichever business appears at the top of the search results is the one they’ll reach out to. Make sure it’s you!
By optimizing your website for search engines, you can help crawlers find the information they’re looking for more efficiently, encouraging them to put your website higher in the search results. Here are a few tips to boost your website’s search engine optimization (SEO):
- Write plenty of quality content
- Reduce page load speeds
- Include alt-text in images
- Use proper format for headings
- Add internal and external links
The higher your website ranks on the search engine results page (SERP), the more customers you’ll get from organic search. With the right SEO strategy, you can even outrank the larger catering companies!
Grow your catering company with effective marketing
Just because your business is small doesn’t mean you can’t stand out from the competition. Design attention-grabbing flyers, post plenty of quality content to social media, run some social media ads, harness the power of email marketing, and optimize your website. With the right marketing strategies, your catering business won’t be small for long!
