Never, never, never stop marketing your business. Despite the economic downturn, we can’t stress enough how important it is to maintain brand awareness and promote your product or service.

Here’s a couple of inexpensive marketing strategies that we often see small business owners overlook.

• Create a Web presence: Every small business should have a Web site. In the age where “google it” has replaced “look it up in the phone book,” having a simple and informative Web site builds brand awareness and credibility.
• Blog: Regardless of industry type, web marketing can be extremely rewarding for your business. For example, Butler Sheetmetal Ltd started a blog called Tinbasher. Within 6 months, the company Web site generated over 50,000 unique visits a month. The blog helped the company communicate with potential customers on a more personal level. As a result the company received media awards and coverage on the success of Tinbasher.
• Contribute to online forums: Establish yourself as an industry authority in the blogging community. Contribute your experiences and answer questions in online forums and link it back to your company blog or Web site. You’ll position your company as a leader in your field.
• Circulate a newsletter: Circulate a monthly or quarterly newsletter throughout your client community to maintain a strong brand identity. Take this opportunity to highlight new products, services or company achievements.
• Experiment with multimedia: Video can be an extremely cost effective marketing medium. Blendtec, a company that manufactures blenders, posted a video on YouTube of their product blending an iPhone. The video quickly became an online hit and helped quadruple their sales over a 6 month period. The video only cost the company $100 to shoot.