DIY Analogue Marketing Mix: Market without social media

Tired of the AI harvesters and the enshittification? You’re not alone. Here are 74 ideas to create your own marketing marketing mix.

Go all in on networking

1. Join the local Chamber of Commerce, networking associations, women in networking chapters, BNI and other styles
2. Attend business breakfasts and dinner events
3. Leverage your alumni connections from courses, university, school and further afield
4. Get hyperlocal and start inviting local businesses to have coffee with you
5. Attend a Freelance Jungle event and meet people to collaborate with
6. Hire a hot desk on a coworking joint and see if it helps connect you
7. Go to events about causes you care about armed with a business card
8. Support other people’s launches and events in the local business ecosystem as an ally to their endeavours
9. Make time for talks on creativity, ideas, and more
10. Tell your friends and family (and kit them out with postcards, business cards etc) how to pitch you in the wild to stretch your network reach
11. Contact old clients, bosses, and workplaces and catch up with them to see how they are doing
12. Start your own groups and events and curate them specifically to attract your clients
13. Offer 15- or 30-minute calls to talk about a specific issue at events – with a QR code book in via your business card
14. Send specific people you exchange business cards with (or that you meet and take your fancy) a postcard or gift to keep the conversation flowing
15. Volunteer your skills in a strategic way to causes, ideas and organisations you care about
16. Attend local NFP and for purpose networking events
17. Attend arts related events and network with other creatives to see if they (or the arts organisations that run them) need help

Leverage the clients you have

18. Integrate upselling into every project you do during the quotation stage. And once the project finishes
19. Offer retainers for ongoing maintenance and/or six month or twelve-month service and review offerings
20. Encourage clients to send their friends to you with a refer-a-friend program
21. Email your clients to connect them with people who can help their business without referral fees to create connection
22. Check in with projects after they are launched to see how the client and the works is doing
23. Offer a discount to clients that will commit to sharing your products and services within their marketing channels for six- or twelve-months post project engagement

Collaborate to maximise reach

24. Team up with other freelancers to work on projects together
25. Identify government tenders, grants, and other funding opportunities and create teams around the funding opportunities available
26. Create collectives of tried and tested freelancers to take on jobs agencies might pitch for but for a fraction of the cost
27. Create white label products with other freelancers and pitch them to organisations

Let others do the talking for you

28. Spend some time defining what your subject of interest is – and introduce yourself around to journalists, podcast hosts, vloggers, and other media
29. Write opinion pieces and pitch them to blogs and publications to get them in front of their audience
30. Be the person that highlights what others are doing through your channels and encourage them to share what you are up to, too
31. When you see journalists on the prowl for sources, be the one that connects them to the people you know – and pitch yourself where appropriate

Be proactive

32. Identify businesses that need help through viewing their ads out in the wild – and pitch directly to them
33. Run free learning sessions at the local coworking joint or library that require email registration
34. Create lists of potential clients with an issue you can solve by conducting formal and informal research
35. Approach local digital agencies, accountants, legal professionals, and others that deal with your target market and offer your services
36. Attend council-run sessions to learn and network with other proactive businesses
37. Create a campaign that benefits a particular sector, group of people, or your local area using your skills. Push it through media, outreach, poster marketing etc
38. Get involved in activism and politics around the business scene to help increase support for everyone and watch what happens
39. Submit your completed projects to competitions and awards
40. Apply for grants, prizes and other opportunities tied to recognition and profile raising
41. Shine a light on what your industry needs and watch the rewards come back to you
42. Set yourself a bunch of creative challenges that are activations to promote what you do

Embrace paper

43. Create postcards you can post, drop at cafes, and hand out that give more than the usual marketing spiel to attract people
44. Create your own marketing zine and share it in pdf and print version in key places and with key people
45. Create a one-page printable roadmap of a common client dilemma and how you would fix it and take it to the next event
46. Use folded concertina cards with a high-quality picture or map a client can use to work through a common problem you solve on one side and all about you on the other in lieu of a business card
47. Use QR codes to transform postcards and business cards into functional sales funnels and giveaways
48. Create stickers and leave them at high foot traffic areas, shops, and venues that invoke curiosity about your business
49. Work with the local business book seller to include branded bookmarks in their kit
50. Provide the paper bags at events that people can take their stuff home in that include your details
51. Send handwritten cards and letters of appreciation to people in your networks and in your client portfolio for that extra touch
52. Print small format rate cards that you can give out at marketing events as cards, standees or folded concertina cards
53. Drop your leaflets, postcards, and/or business cards into target businesses in your local area
54. Put fliers on local news boards at shopping centres, daycares, coworking joints, libraries, and anywhere you suspect people in the market for your services may see them
55. Mail out useful printed items (e.g. cheat sheets, roadmaps, cardboard objects) to places you’d love to work with an invitation to connect
56. Create pitch folders that help solve problems and pitch your ideas in the process and mail them to your clients

Utilise tech in a smarter way

57. Offer more story about your business in a savvy way by leveraging QR codes on all your marketing materials
58. Create a fun annual report you can share online and off that showcases the good you do, what you’ve learned, the connections you’ve made, and the challenges facing your clients you intend to solve in the next year
59. Send out specific newsletters that target major shifts in the industry with office hours calls, downloadable supports, and curated information on how to navigate the change (e.g. Google updates, AI impacts, social media algorithm updates etc)
60. Record podcasts, radio plays, audio lectures, or audio versions of your blogs as these formats to increase reach
61. Band together with other creatives to hold accountability sessions and deadline parties to feel less alone while marketing, creating, and building ideas
62. Spend time teaching your clients the benefit of not being on social media while on social media to normalise their exit and give them somewhere else to connect to you
63. Introduce a more artful, slow business version of your marketing to social media and the internet experience that allows you to reduce how much time you spend using it to market while still getting cut through
64. Embrace shorter, seasonal campaigns where you have bursts of online activity (to leverage the algorithm bumps of newness and return) before exiting again

Leverage analogue experiences

65. Create time to meet people in person to discuss their projects
66. Run skill swap events to connect people together
67. Seek out presenting and speaking opportunities at events and conferences
68. Start your own events in education, leadership and connection
69. Guest lecture at universities and TAFEs
70. Create your own showcases and experiences and invite people along
71. Try renting a pop-up space to offer advice and short pieces of work for a limited period at a coworking joint, artists salon, or unusual space
72. Hold open days and office hours sessions to share your working process
73. (Check with your local council beforehand and) Put a sign outside your business to attract clients
74. Talk about your move to analogue marketing and use it as a way of attracting clients that are also struggling online, sick of the online experience, or up for the next wave

Got anymore analogue marketing ideas you’d add? Drop them in the comments below. Need help? Get in touch.