The challenges facing small business owners in today’s world can feel overwhelming. The digital marketing landscape is changing at lightning speed, with the rise of generative AI, social and voice search giving traditional digital marketing search like Google a run for its money. How do you keep up? How do you compete?
If you have succeeded in the past with SEO and content marketing, you may find your past growth metrics are being eroded with new systems, a new SERP experience, and a changing and challenging user journey.
On top of this new Wild Wild West environment for digital marketing, businesses are facing increased economic pressures from tariffs that raise the cost of imported goods and materials, disrupt supply chains, and retaliatory tariffs. Prices are also deeply impacted by our current inflation rates, which are shrinking profit margins and forcing increases to your customers’ bottom line.
For small businesses, this makes competing with larger businesses with more resources very difficult. Combine all of this with a competitive labor market, and finding and retaining employees becomes yet another challenge for small businesses.
I hear from you weekly asking me how do I compete and survive in this environment? While it may seem impossible, it is precisely at this moment that small businesses have advantages and scalability that their larger competitors struggle to keep up with. Larger companies have a much harder time being agile, authentic, and building direct relationships with their customers.
Now is the time to capitalize on this advantage.
Here are some tips to make the most of your resources and thrive right now.
Focus on Owned and Earned Channels First
Taking what you already have in existing equity and ensuring it is up to date with the latest trends is your first and easiest step. Make a list of everything you have invested in to date, and update it.
- Are you on social media?
- Do you have email marketing?
- Is your website optimized and continually generating content to ensure Google and other tools see your business breathing?
- Are your Local Business Profiles updated and optimized regularly?
- What else?
Owned and earned channels compound over time, making them extremely powerful and cost-effective for small business owners. Take inventory and sharpen your pencil. It’s essential to note that any investments you have already made or are currently making will feed into these new systems, and therefore, moving forward, this will be a crucial first step. Reinvest.
Double Down on Local and Niche Marketing
Instead of trying to compete with everyone, everywhere, own your space.
Small businesses typically operate in a local area, serving communities. It is critical that you build relationships with every customer you interact with. Asking them to give you a review on your Google Business Profile, offering return customer benefits, getting involved in local community events, and giving back to your community.
Be bright and visible, find your moments to engage and build relationships that your customers want to share with their community. Word of mouth is the best marketing tool in your toolbox, so own that, intimately, methodically.
When it comes to your community, understanding their journey becomes one of the most critical components of your marketing strategy. You can try to keep up on all the social media channels, which is exhausting, by the way.
Alternatively, you can meet your ideal customers on the social media channels they use and focus authentically in those spaces.
If you are serving consumers on social media and they are part of a younger demographic, consider TikTok and Instagram as potential social channels. If your audience is older, 40+, look at Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Here’s a good rule of thumb to follow:
- Younger audiences (13-24) are heavily present on TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram.
- Platforms like YouTube and Facebook still attract a wider age range, including older users, which can be beneficial if your target audience is older or if you want to reach a broad demographic.
- Pay attention to the platform’s behaviors as well, not just demographics: how often people use it, what content they prefer, whether they engage or just consume it.
- Different age groups utilize platforms in distinct ways (e.g., younger audiences tend to favor short videos, trends, and UGC (user-generated content), while older audiences prefer longer videos or content with substance).
This point cannot be overstated; engagement is the primary purpose of social media. Featuring customers, responding to comments, and engaging is key, no matter the demographic or platform. You are building your brand champions in this space.
Lean Into Authentic, Prioritize Relationships
Your customers are craving real, relatable content. Fancy, polished video or images aren’t going to win you new business or returning customers, they also take money and time, and require professionals in this space. You are a professional in your space. If you are on a budget, get your phone out, be authentic, and post.
Shoot video of behind-the-scenes activities with your phone, take pics of before and afters, your process, your store, your employees, your customers, your products.
User-generated content and testimonials are the bees knees. Pay attention to customers who tag you in their posts, or in local online community groups (join those groups, now). Respond to every DM, every email, every review, every comment.
Here, in my community of Vancouver, WA, we have a Facebook Group called ‘Around the Couve’. There are 55K members in this private Facebook group, and people post 40+ times a day asking for recommendations and providing reviews of their experience with businesses. It is amazing when someone reviews a business and the business responds in the comments. The business is demonstrating that it is a part of the community and is listening.
I can tell you as a member, maybe 2 out of 10 businesses called out in a week respond, those 8 businesses are missing out on an easy and powerful marketing opportunity. The other 2 are winning, even when someone gives a negative experience review, the business shows up and responds empathetically. The amount of kudos the community gives them is amazing, they likely got 20+ new customers who never knew they existed to try their business, and this is all from a negative review that they owned and made whole by just being there and responding.
When the business is a part of the community, they can respond, and it repairs damage that could have been eroded exponentially by not engaging with the community, not being there. When someone sings your praises and you come in and say thank you, that is a moment of community engagement, and it speaks volumes to your community.
The key is authenticity, consistency, and creativity—not expensive production.
Reward your brand champions with exclusives, loyalty programs, or early access.
Encourage word-of-mouth referrals with shareable offers.
If You Are Going to Invest In Paid Ads, Do It Strategically
Data is the informer of decisions, which requires data. This can feel like a hamster wheel if you are just getting started in any kind of paid advertising campaigns in the digital marketing space.
While paid advertising can look expensive, when it is approached strategically and laser-focused, even $5–$20/day campaigns can drive results. It can and should pay for itself with conversions.
Here are some things to consider when considering Paid Ads on any platform:
- Run retargeting campaigns to reach warm audiences (lower cost, higher ROI).
- Test low-budget micro-campaigns before scaling.
- Focus on conversion goals (leads, sales) rather than just impressions.
My Final Thoughts
Competing as a small business doesn’t mean outspending the competition; it means outsmarting them.
By focusing on authenticity, community, and owned channels, you can stay visible, build trust, and grow, even on a lean budget.
Tough times are fleeting, and things will change again. When we are in the moment of loss, tough decisions, and trying to stay afloat, it can seem like it will never end.
You will all survive this, and I find that when times are tough, the tough get smart. You dig in and own your strengths; you capitalize on what you know best. Even when it seems like the world is against you, that’s when you rise, that’s more than surviving, that’s you winning.
Are you ready to thrive?
