Marketing for a new business is the work of getting people who have never heard of you to find you, trust you enough to try you once, and come back. It matters most in the weeks around opening, because that is when you have the least to show: no reviews, no followers, no photos of customers being served.
Most advice on marketing for new business owners is a list of fifteen channels. The order matters more than the list.
Before you open, settle the name, set up your Google Business Profile within Google’s rules, write your offer in one sentence, shoot real photos and decide how you will count where customers come from.
In opening week, announce the date and an honest opening offer, tell everyone who already knows you and ask your first customers for reviews. Over the first 90 days, run two channels, write down a budget and pick a date to look at the numbers.
Print the checklist below, then use the notes under it as you work through each line.
The whole checklist on one page
| Task | Done |
|---|---|
| Before you open | |
| Name searched and registered; the same spelling on signs, website and profiles | ☐ |
| Google Business Profile with the real name, the address or a service area, hours and category | ☐ |
| One-sentence offer: what you do, for whom, where | ☐ |
| Photos and short videos of the real place, team and first products or jobs | ☐ |
| A way to record how each customer found you | ☐ |
| Opening week | |
| Opening date announced on the profile, social accounts and to your contacts | ☐ |
| Opening offer written without a made-up “regular” price | ☐ |
| Review request sent to every real first customer | ☐ |
| Ads limited to the area around the business (optional) | ☐ |
| Days 1 to 90 | |
| Two channels chosen, each with a weekly rhythm | ☐ |
| Monthly budget of money and hours written down | ☐ |
| Review date on the calendar, with one number per channel to check | ☐ |
Before you open: be findable under the right name
Settle the name before anything is printed
Signs, uniforms, a vehicle wrap and every profile carry the name, so changing it later costs more than any other fix on this list.
Search it with the South Carolina Secretary of State and in the federal trademark database before you order anything. Our article on how to check a business name before anyone designs a logo walks through both searches.
Set up the Google Business Profile the way Google’s rules expect
The profile is what appears when someone looks up your kind of business on a map. Google’s guidelines for it are stricter than most owners expect:
- The name has to be the real-world name, as used on the storefront, the website and the stationery. Google says that adding unnecessary information, such as a tagline or a list of services, is not permitted and can lead to suspension of the profile.
- A rented mailing address where you do not work, which Google calls a virtual office, is not eligible. An office in a co-working space qualifies only with clear signage, your own staff on site and customers received during business hours.
- If you go to the customer, as cleaners, painters and mobile services do, set a service area and hide the address. Google’s guidance is that the area should not reach much farther than about two hours’ drive from where you are based.
- The business description is for what you do and your history. Google does not allow promotions, prices or links in it.
Enter the phone number, hours and category exactly as they will appear on your website and social accounts, so a customer never finds two versions.
Write the offer in one sentence
Fill in this line: “We [do what] for [whom] in [where].” A cleaning company might write “We clean move-out apartments for property managers in North Charleston.” Every bio, ad and flyer starts from that sentence. If you cannot fill it in yet, the one-page marketing plan asks the questions that get you there.
Shoot the real place, people and work
Before opening day, photograph and film what customers will actually get: the room, the counter, the team in uniform, the first dishes or the first finished job. With no reviews yet, photos are most of the evidence a stranger has.
One session covers the profile, the website and your first month of posts. Skip stock photos that could belong to any business in town.
Decide now how you will count where customers come from
Pick the method before the first customer walks in: a question at the counter or on the phone (“How did you hear about us?”), a separate link for each channel, a code printed only on the flyer. Day 90 is when you decide which channels to keep, and you can only decide with this record.
Opening week: announce it without stretching the truth
Announce the date where people already look: the Google profile, your Instagram and Facebook accounts, a message to your phone contacts and the neighborhood groups you belong to. People who already know you are the likeliest first customers, so ask them to come and to bring someone.
Opening offers are fine. Crossed-out prices are where new businesses get into trouble.
The Federal Trade Commission’s Guides Against Deceptive Pricing (16 CFR 233.1) treat a former price as a fair basis for comparison only when the item was actually offered at that price, openly and in good faith, for a reasonably substantial period of time.
A business that opened this week has no such history, so describe the opening offer for what it is instead: what is included, who can use it and the last day it applies.
Ask every real first customer for a review, at the same moment each time: when you hand over the receipt or finish the job.
Do not ask friends to review a business they have not used; the FTC’s 2024 rule on fake reviews and testimonials covers reviews from people with no real experience of the business.
If you depend on people nearby, as a café, a salon or a gym does, a small ad campaign limited to the streets around the address does work that your followers cannot do yet.
Choose from the local marketing ideas that match how your customers reach you: whether they come to you or you go to them.
Days 1 to 90: two channels, one budget, one review date
After opening week, the temptation is to be everywhere. Two channels worked every week will teach you more than five worked when there is time. Pick them by where your customers already look: a map search when they need a service today, Instagram for food and places to go, a referral for anyone you will let into their home.
Write the budget as two lines, money and hours. Money covers ad spend, printing and photos; hours are yours or your team’s, and they run out first. Our guide to setting a marketing budget explains what makes each line bigger or smaller without guessing at a percentage.
Then mark a date about 90 days after opening and check one number per channel: the calls, bookings, orders or quote requests that came through it, taken from the record you started before opening. Keep what brought customers, change what brought interest without sales, and drop the rest.
Who can help in the first 90 days
Some help is free. The South Carolina Small Business Development Centers offer free, private consulting to new and existing businesses, and the Charleston Area SBDC office is on Rivers Avenue in North Charleston (SC SBDC office list). It is a good place to test the plan and the numbers before you spend on them.
The production side is where an agency earns its fee: shooting the place before opening, running the social accounts while you run the business, and setting up ads around your address.
At FB Digital Agency we do that work for businesses around Charleston, filming and photographing on location, in English or Portuguese. Compare the Start and Premium plans for a business about to open.