30 Must-Read Small Business Marketing Stats You Need to Know

As a small business owner, it is essential to stay up-to-date on recent marketing trends to ensure you don’t miss a trick. We rounded up 30 must-read small business marketing statistics to help you make informed decisions about your next marketing steps. Read on for our findings on content marketing, email marketing, social media and more.
 

Small Business Statistics

• In our small business survey, instantprint found that 48% of small business owners agree that their company reputation is their most valuable business asset. Therefore, handling customer service issues should be a top priority!
• 49% of small business owners aren’t sure if their marketing efforts are effective, and 14% know they’re not. A distinct minority of small business marketers are using tactics that they know to be effective. (Leadpages)
• 42% of small business owners admit they don't use a robust website and social media channels together to market their business. (The Drum)
• 6 out of 10 very small businesses have yet to establish an online presence and get a website. (GoDaddy)
• Even though the worldwide advertising spending is expected to slow down, its growth is still predicted to reach astonishing 12.9% next year, turning the Internet into the largest medium for advertising. (MediaPost)
• In a survey of both large and small businesses in 2017 30% of online marketing spend went to SEO, 23% went to website development, 26% went to PPC. (HubShout)
• Millennials are optimistic about their businesses. Three out of four millennial business owners expect to see their businesses improve over the next year. (Wells Fargo)

From these statistics, we can draw the conclusion that small business owners see the importance of successful marketing. However, a certain percentage are struggling to implement it. This could be down to lack of knowledge or resources, or perhaps with so many aspects now expected of a business, owners may be unsure where to start.

Social Media

• 50% of Instagrammers follow a business. (Instagram) Ensure you’re posting engaging content to get your business in your customer’s feeds!
• 72% of consumers expect to hear back within one hour when they make a complaint to a brand using Twitter. (Econsultancy)
• Small business owners have doubled their spending on social advertising over the past two years. (iMedia Connection)
• 44% of local businesses said they depend on social media to generate brand awareness, and 41% depend on it to drive revenue. (eMarketer)
• 88% of small business owners are embracing social media to support their businesses and half (54%) plan to invest in social media in 2017. (The Drum)
• 55% of small businesses updated social media business content monthly or less frequently, while just 15% did so daily and 30% weekly. (eMarketer)
• Facebook posts with images see 2.3x more engagement than those without images. (BuzzSumo)

The significance of social media is becoming clear to most small business owners and it is now a vital component to driving sales. Master the art of engaging posts and ensure you are responding to customer messages, and you are sure to reap the benefits!

Content Marketing

• More companies are seeing the importance of content marketing. On average, they are allocating 32% of total marketing budgets going towards content. (Content Marketing Institute)
• 75% of marketers saw positive returns from their content marketing efforts. (Contently)
• 48% of smaller organisations have a documented content strategy, compared to only 41% of larger organisations. (CMI)
• 56% of marketers believe that personalised content promotes higher engagement rates. (http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/2016/08/content-marketing-stats/)
• While content marketing costs 62% less than outbound marketing, it generates more than three times as many leads. (Content Marketing Institute)
• Of the small businesses with websites, 10% updated their site at least once a week, 33% at least once a month, and 21% once per year or longer. (eMarketer)

Small business owners are now more likely to have a content strategy than larger companies and are investing more of their budget into content year on year. It’s understandable to see why when you consider the effect great content can have.

Email Marketing

• According to the latest statistics, 4.3 billion people have email, which is approximately one-half of the world’s population. (ReadWrite)
• But 2/3 of all emails are completely ignored and never opened (HubSpot) Therefore, it is important to come up with innovative ways to get your customers to open your emails!
• 75% of Gmail’s 900M users access their accounts via mobile devices (Campaign Monitor) With this in mind, it is vital to ensure your emails read well on mobile devices.
• Emails with personalised subject lines are 26% more likely to be opened (Campaign Monitor). So, gaining customer information is a useful tactic.
• Small business owners and found that 49% of small business owners do not use email marketing data to assist with their email marketing campaigns because they do not know where to begin. (Constant Contact)
• E-commerce customers who received multiple abandoned shopping cart emails are 2.4 times more likely to complete the purchase than those who receive only one follow up email. (Experian)

With half of the world’s population having access to email, and a sizable percentage accessing emails on their phones, it would be a huge mistake not to take advantage. However, it seems that small business owners may not have all the information they need.

Search Engine Optimisation

• Google has decreased the number of organic blue links displayed as the result of a search from 10 to 8.5, on average. (Searchmetrics) So it is now even more important to appear high up on those search pages.
• Marketers see SEO as becoming more effective, with 82% reporting effectiveness is on the rise and 42% of this group stating effectiveness is increasing significantly. (MarketDive)
• However, only 17% of small business owners will be investing in SEO in 2017 (The Drum) This may indicate a lack of awareness of the importance of SEO and where to get help implementing it.
• 200 million+ people now use ad blockers (PageFair). Therefore, it is more important than ever to reach customers organically.

It is now more important than ever to appear high up on search engine results pages, so it is worrying to see that such a small percentage of small business owners are choosing to invest in SEO.

We hope that these statistics have given you some insight into recent small business marketing trends and helped you to plan your own marketing strategy. Keep your content up to date and invest in some professional SEO advice and you will be giving yourself a distinct advantage.

Do you have any marketing tips for small business owners? Let us know on Twitter or Facebook!