As a small business owner, you know that marketing your business is essential to your success. But it can also be overwhelming and paralysing, especially if you're not sure where to start.

Overwhelm is the one topic that comes up time and time again with my clients. 2022 had many trying to recover from the pandemic taking any job they could to claw their way back financially, leading to some pretty severe burnout.

My client had this to say on a recent Call, “I'm currently working through a pretty severe case of burnout - not sure what direction I'm going in, not enjoying where my business is currently at, and I get totally overwhelmed by marketing myself and my services, which leads to paralysis of not doing anything at all, and then the vicious cycle of guilt for not doing anything at all!”

Does this sound like you?

I get it. From social media to SEO, email marketing to outreach, and strategies to Instagram Stories – who wouldn’t find it overwhelming? As much as you love running your own business, sometimes the thought of marketing it can make you want to run away and hide.

It’s not a nice place to be. Often getting started is the hardest part.

First Up, stop thinking you need to be an expert in all things.

Look, it’s fine, in fact, more than fine, not to know everything. You’ve set up your own business and that is no small feat. And now you need to market that business to attract your ideal customers.

You don’t need to be an expert in all things marketing, so please don’t beat yourself up about it.

In this blog post, I'll share some tips on how to beat overwhelm and start marketing your small business.

Simplify your marketing plan

The first step to beating overwhelm is to set clear goals for your marketing efforts. If you don’t know where you’re going, no road will get you there. You need to know what you’re working for in order to see improvement. I know I tend to bang on about this a lot. Everything has to link back to a goal otherwise, what is the point?

What do you want to achieve with your marketing? Do you want to increase brand awareness? Generate leads? Set a goal to boost sales by 10% before the year ends, or something along these lines which is easy to measure. Finally, be realistic with your goal setting. Drive sales? Once you know what you want to achieve, you can start to develop a plan to get there.

Simplify your marketing plan

Even though you might feel like you need to do all things to market your business, you don’t. It’s easy to get caught up in creating a website, creating your emails, creating a lead magnet, planning your social media, posting to social media, writing blog posts, doing videos and so on and so on.

So take a step back… and ask yourself what is going to make the biggest difference now. What is the most direct path to getting new customers and clients? What do they need from me in order to make the decision to purchase?

So, just start with ‘will this make a difference’.

Then ask yourself:

Is this likely to attract my client / customer?
Will this help my client or customer decide to work with me?
Is this the easiest / most direct way for someone to find out what I do?
What else do I need to make it easy for someone to work with me / buy from me.

Focus on one marketing action a day

Try to focus on one marketing action a day. Don’t get lost in the noise and the maze of a million actions. Focus on one, and make it great.

If you’re left wondering, which action to tackle, then take a moment to reflect. What action can you do today that will help you tomorrow?

Perhaps it is planning out your social media content for the week. Think how great that would feel, to know that for the rest of the week, you don’t have to worry about writing your social media content. Instead, you can focus on engaging with your customers. Remember, most things can be automated and content can be created in bulk and scheduled to your website, social platforms or blog. Taking the time to do this can take away so much stress.

By doing this one action today, you are focusing on your business for the whole week.

Plan it out

Nothing makes me feel calmer than having a beautiful plan laid out in front of me. Highlighting what to do, when to do it, and how to achieve it.

Making a plan can take a huge amount of stress and overwhelm off your shoulders, and help you focus on the days or weeks ahead.

Break your goal down into manageable steps. Focus on one step at a time. Your goal might look a little something like this:

Think of ideas for a month’s worth of blog posts
Do the research for the posts
Write the text
Take a step back and start optimising the text and formatting it for SEO
Create the graphics to accompany your posts
Schedule your posts to go live for the month
Pour yourself a cup of tea and relax knowing that you have just planned out, written and scheduled a month’s worth of content!

It’s OK to be picky

A surefire recipe for a case of marketing overwhelm is attempting to market your business on every platform available. There’s loads of platforms available, and trying to show up everywhere can be a massive waste of your time and resources.

Why? Because your ideal customer isn’t everywhere. And not every platform is for you. Just because 1 in 4 Aussie’s are now using TikTok, it doesn’t necessarily mean it is right for you or your customer. So you can put your dancing shoes away!

Take your time to research and understand your client. Where are they? What platforms do they use? Take your time to understand the difference between all the different platforms available and master your approach before embarking on the next one.

Be picky but be consistent, and leave overwhelm at the door.

Be consistent and stick with it

Speaking of being consistent, that goes for your marketing plan too.

One great way to combat the overwhelm is to make time for your plan to be put into action. As a small business owner, you wear so many hats, and making the time to deal with everything you have on, on a daily basis can make you want to stick your head in the sand.

When it comes to your marketing plan, you need to make time for it – if not, that’s when the stress starts to build.

Grab your diary and schedule time in your calendar. You must make time in order for your plan to work and to see results. Think of the time of day when you are most productive and least distracted. Now add “marketing” into that time of the day, every day, and STICK TO IT!

Organisation is key.

A marketing calendar can help you keep track of all of your marketing activities, from blog posts to social media posts to networking events. This will help you stay organised and make sure that you're not missing any important deadlines. Use a platform such as Asana, Notion or Click Up. If you can’t handle another platform (I get it), go back to a good ol’ printed calendar.

Remember – your customer cannot buy from you if they don’t know who you are. This is why marketing is such an important ingredient in your business plan.

Fight overwhelm by making a plan that works for you from the start. It’s normal to feel confused by the sheer number of marketing options online today, but it’s time to cut through the noise. Your marketing doesn’t have to be massive to be effective. Actually, the more you’re able to hone in on your strategy, the more successful you will be.

Need some help. Reach out and book a Discovery Call with me today.

How to beat overwhelm and market your small business.