15 Minutes of Marketing Per Day Can Do the Trick

As an online retailer, you always have plenty to do: customer support, fulfilment and everything else. As a result, sometimes marketing is overlooked.

This is especially true for small businesses, who lack a dedicated marketing team that normally spends the whole day optimising campaigns or testing new advertising channels.

But, it is still possible to achieve good results with just a few minutes per day, even if you don't employ someone who is dedicated to winning over new customers.

However, you should still read on even if you do have the luxury of a marketing team, as Step 5 also applies to you.

Marketing is like fitness: doing just a little is a hundred times better than doing nothing.

In spite of this fact and although the Internet is already omnipresent, mobile traffic outweighs desktop traffic, and e-commerce continues to boom, some companies have no plans to invest in online marketing.

Instead of postponing marketing again until tomorrow, you should take the first step towards a more profitable future today. One step a day – 15 minutes of marketing a day.

Step 1: Idea finding

Before you can effectively advertise your online shop, you have to collect ideas on how to do so.

What is most suitable for your shop and what appeals to you most? Is it Facebook or Instagram advertising? Content marketing? Social selling? E-mail marketing?

First of all, find out what these marketing methods are all about (our blog is ideal for this). Once you’ve found something that makes the lightbulb go on in your head, note all your ideas on paper, brainstorm and examine the subject more closely.

If you think that new marketing tactics are difficult to learn, then remember the following: when you were born, you couldn't drive a car, and now you drive around, change gears, accelerate and brake without even having to think about it.

Take a look at newcomers videos on YouTube during a quiet moment, read tutorials and e-books at lunchtime, listen to podcasts on the way to work, they all help you learn about the subject.

Investing15 minutes a day studying subjects like Facebook Ads, SEO or content marketing will help you become an expert in a very short time.

When you feel that you have understood the fundamentals of a marketing tactic, then it is time for...

Step 2: Testing

New knowledge about a subject doesn't help unless you use it. After all, learning the theory about driving is of no use unless you actually get behind the steering wheel and drive.

Regardless of which marketing tactic you have chosen, you now have to give it a try. Take the plunge, start the motor and drive off.

Whether it is the first publishing of a blog post, the first Facebook ad, the first contact with influencers or your first Instagram post – clicking on the “post” button or the “book” button for the first time can be quite overwhelming.

But, when you've done it, then your first marketing campaign is alive... and you're off and driving. Nothing can stop you now.

Step 3: Patience

Shutterstock/Maxfromh

Practice makes perfect. One of the deciding factors for a successful marketing campaign also begins with a P... patience.

Abandoning an advertising campaign because it hasn't generated any sales after the first two hours, deleting the blog post because it has only been read twice, or giving up because you've received a negative comment – these are all very common occurrences for marketing newcomers.

Hardly anything works well when tried for the first time.

Advertising, driving a car, or anything else in life, all takes a little practice.

Be patient, give your advertising campaign time, watch what works and what doesn’t. Learn from your mistakes and do it better the next time. You will continually improve and will, at some point, create profitable ads because you then know exactly how it works.

And all with just 15 minutes a day.

Step 4: Targets and rewards

Set yourself targets, both large and small. 10,000 new e-mail addresses, a 20% conversion rate or a tenfold ROI are ambitious targets (which you should also have).

Targets which are set too high in the beginning are, however, not motivating, they actually have the reverse effect. It is much better to set smaller (interim) targets which are much more likely to be achieved:

100 new e-mail addresses, then 200…
a 2% conversion rate, then 2.5%…
a positive ROI, then a twofold ROI...

With the aid of interim targets, you will have the feeling of progress and achieving something, instead of running after a seemingly impossible goal and thus losing motivation.

If you reach the interim targets, you should reward yourself with something pleasurable such as more extended lunch break, a tasty cake or by going home early.

Shutterstock/Sahara Prince

Step 5: Step on the gas, discover new things

You have been driving for some time and always for just 15 minutes a day, but you are already pretty terrific.

Your ads create steady sales, your conversion rate is going through the roof, and you collect loads of new e-mail addresses every day. Your marketing tactic is proving its worth. Congratulations.

There are now three options open to you:

You can keep on accelerating and invest more of your budget into your successful marketing, continue optimising to maximise your sales and leave the competition far behind.
You can hand over the steering wheel and find a driver who keeps their foot on the accelerator for you. Or, you can work together with an experienced marketer, or teach a trainee – it's up to you. You know how it works, can delegate the marketing tasks and still enjoy the increasing sales figures.
Keep things as they are. You spend only a minimum amount of time looking after your marketing campaign yet still generate sales and have more time for new ideas.

Regardless of whether you choose three, two or even one, discovering new things will always be an essential factor in deciding whether your online shop still flourishes in 10 years' time.

If your marketing works without your help, then you can be more adventurous and try out things which your competitors have not (yet) dared to try.

You now have the luxury of being able to test and explore new marketing strategies.

This luxury allows you to be the innovator in your branch, to test new marketing strategies early on, and to optimise them before the competition has even heard of them. Make sure that your shop is always in pole position.

And all with just 15 minutes marketing a day.