Free Marketing Materials for Small Business is an opportunity to receive marketing materials including business cards, fliers, rack cards, postcards, brochures, flyers, posters and more. It includes step by step instructions to receive marketing materials very quickly for free!
This collection of free marketing material templates will help you create effective marketing across multiple channels, on a small budget. Inside you’ll find templates for logos, business cards, postcards, envelope mailers, flyers, letterhead and more.
Create a free Google My Business account
For local businesses especially, a Google Business Profile has become one of the most effective free marketing strategies available. This free listing allows your business to show up on Google Maps, the local section of Google Search, and the right-side Knowledge Panel for branded searches.
An example of a Google Business Profile Accessed from Google Maps
But in order for your Business Profile to show up higher on Google Maps or local results, you need to optimize your Business Profile, and in order to optimize it, you need to have verified ownership of it—which is done through your Google My Business account.
Tag people (and brands) on social media
Tagging your loyal customers, brand evangelists, or even neighboring companies and vendors on social media can broaden the organic reach of your business to a new potential audience, help you grow your following, and potentially even attain more clients. You should also encourage your followers to tag your social media handle or business location in their posts. More about user-generated content here.
You can also tag happy customers in your own posts, exposing your business to that customer’s network (provided you have their permission).
Don’t sleep on LinkedIn
LinkedIn is a major social media site that is often under-utilized. Don’t just add network connections and sign out; enter into dialogue with the connections you make, share your blog posts and offers, join and contribute to forums, and share others’ quality content.
By enabling other professionals to grow and educating your potential customers, you can build your brand and earn trust and respect in your industry. Also, encourage all your employees to get active on the platform too!
Develop an email marketing plan
Email marketing is a great way to get new visitors engaged with your business, as well as maintain relationships with your existing customers. And though email marketing isn’t new, it’s still one of—if not the—most reliable ways to achieve a strong return on your marketing investment. Here’s how to ensure that:
- Put thought and creativity into your subject lines.
- Make sure every email has an offer that encourages your readers to take a next step.
- Track your performance and run A/B tests to see what copy and offers resonate with your list.
Some more easy email marketing ideas:
- Get new website visitors to sign up for your newsletter by offering a bonus content piece or coupon/discount for subscribing.
- Slowly nurture your subscribers via email until they are ready to become paying customers.
- Start your promotional email campaigns with a free email marketing service like MailChimp.
Claim free ad promo credits
While massive ad campaigns may be out of your budget, there are often discounts and coupons floating around for Facebook or Google Ads. Some web hosting services offer advertising discount codes as part of their membership offerings. Check and see if yours does. Of course, receiving the promo is easy, but you’ll still want to brush up on your PPC skills to get the best results and audience insights. Check out the training resources in Growth Academy if you’re ready to learn the basics.
Brochures
The first marketing material on our list is the brochure. The faithful trifold brochure has been an essential part of promotional marketing since we knew the meaning of marketing.
Customize this template and make it your own!Edit and Download
A brochure is a handout overview of your business and its offerings. It typically presents itself as a double sided paper that’s been folded along two lines to create three panels with two sides. Once the panels are folded over each other, you’ve got a booklet for potential customers to open and look through.
The purpose of a brochure is to relay important information about your company as a whole, or for a specific service/product. They’re either distributed in person or left in a brochure stand for interested parties to pick up.
When to Use a Brochure
Brochures aren’t as common as they were before the internet, but they’re making a comeback because they still work.
If you’re considering using this marketing material, here are a few ideas:
- Hotels display brochures for travel companies or specific tours/activities in the area.
- Banks display brochures for their different banking programs. Consider doing the same in your place of business.
- School counselors have brochures for universities and colleges to give to students. They also have brochures for health and informational purposes.
- Companies hand out brochures at conferences.
Keep in mind:
For a brochure to be successful, it needs to include contact information. Since it’s printed, it’s a good idea to add a QR code for people to scan with their phones.
Posters
In a digital sense, flyers and posters are essentially interchangeable. But in the realm of printed marketing materials, they’re used in different ways. Let’s take a look.
Customize this template and make it your own!Edit and Download
A poster is a printed marketing material that is displayed on street walls for promotional purposes. They can be as small as an A4 page or much, much bigger. Posters can be more creative than flyers because they have to be eye-catching to be effective.
When people walk by them, it’ll go unnoticed if the poster doesn’t stand out and grab their attention. Bonus points if someone takes a photo to post on social media.
When to Use a Poster
Posters are essential for concerts, events and special deals for shops in the area. They can be created with one design or various designs to put up together as a set. In some cases, a shop will design ten different posters and put them up side by side on a wall.
Create promotions where your audience can get a discount code if they photograph your poster and share it on their Instagram story.
Keep in mind:
Always add a QR code for people to scan and find more information online. When designing sets of posters in different variations, add a logo and QR code to every variation.
Logo
Think of your logo as the face of your business. Because it will be featured on everything related to your business (like your website, business cards and branded clothing), it will be the first design element that clients and customers will associate with your brand. And as the face of your business, it’s also one of the most powerful marketing tools at your disposal.
But not all logos are created equal; you can’t throw together a generic, sloppy, or unprofessional logo design and expect it to drive results. If you want your logo to effectively market your business, build brand recognition, and connect with your customers, you need a logo that’s professional, well-designed, and accurately represents who you are as a brand.
And, unless you’re a designer, that probably means getting a professional custom logo design.
Is getting your logo professionally designed an investment? Yes. But because your logo is such a critical part of your branding and marketing, it’s an investment worth making. The right logo won’t just make your branding stronger and your business more memorable, but it’ll be an invaluable piece of your small business branding package for years to come. Your logo is an asset you’ll use on all of your marketing materials…so make sure it’s a positive reflection of your business.
Conclusion
Do you know that getting your business noticed through marketing is hard? It’s hard to make new small business marketing ideas work. Why? Because most small businesses don’t have the tools — only big businesses do. Wouldn’t it be cool if there was some free starter kit of small business marketing ideas for you to try out? Well, there is.