14 Tips For Small Business Saturday

Are you ready for Small Business Saturday?

It’s a great opportunity to remind the residents in your community to shop local as the holiday shopping season kicks off.

I shared some ideas on MSNBC’s Your Business on how to drive online traffic into your brick and mortar location.

If you haven’t yet begun, there’s still time to fuel up your creative mojo and take full advantage of this widely publicized “shopping holiday.”

Here are some ideas to get the ball rolling. Remember, in everything you do, use direct response messages – create an offer, make a clear call to actin! Promote Small Business Saturday, but make it specific to you!

• Create a Facebook “Local Awareness” ad
• Tell customers to stop in for a free gift
• Door-to-door neighborhood flyers – hire some high-schoolers day before Thanksgiving
• Use a coupon that’s good for 11/26 only
• Email your list week of 11/21 – promote your special offer
• Posters around the community – library, affiliate business owners, municipal offices, schools if allowed (flyer with gift for students and faculty), other community hubs
• Put out a sidewalk sign in front of your business Monday through Saturday beginning 11/21 announcing Small  Business Saturday and your special offer that’s good only on that day; strong call to action: “Come in Saturday for X, Y and Z!”
• Run an ad in your local newspaper – be super clear with offer and call to action
• Postcard through Every Door Direct Mail
• Personalize your promotion with photos of yourself, your pet, your family, etc.
• Decorate your business to the nines, offer treats, feature music, make it inviting
• Open early and/or stay open into the evening; create rewards or a drawing for different times of day and night
• Bring in a celebrity or well-known figure in your town or industry; do a book signing
• Participate in a community food drive – “Bring in a non-perishable food item and receive X.”

I’m cheering for you! Good luck and have an awesome Small Business Saturday!

About Stacey Riska

Stacey Riska, aka “Small Business Stacey” is a serial entrepreneur who is passionate about saving small business and rebuilding Main Street. She helps small and local business owners become a #SmallBizMarketingWiz by teaching them marketing strategies that get MORE: MORE leads, MORE customers/clients, MORE sales, and MORE money. Stacey is the founder of Small Biz Marketing Specialist, THE go-to place for marketing tips, techniques and strategies that get results. Stacey is also the creator of the Daily Deals for Massive Profits Training Program, an online video training program that teaches small and local business owners how to use daily deal sites like Groupon to skyrocket their business growth and get massive profits. In this program she teaches from experience, as it was the key strategy that transformed her coffee and smoothie business from being $500K in debt to a 7-figure profitable business. When not saving the small business world, she enjoys sipping red wine, eating chocolate (who doesn’t!) and spending time with her amazing husband.