Small business owners were asked “If you had to put all your marketing time and budget into only one channel, what would it be?” The choice was between search engine optimisation, traditional media such as radio and newspapers, social, PPC (pay per click) advertising and mobile.

SEO was the clear winner with 32.9% of the vote from 2500 businesses, indicating the power and speed of the shift from traditional print advertising to reach consumer bases. Traditional marketing came 2nd with 19.7% of small to medium sized business owners opting for this medium to market their message and services. It would be interesting to see how this looks next year and what trends develop.

Facebook was the most common use of marketing through all of the businesses asked which perhaps invokes the question, “what role will traditional marketing play in the near future”? We have already seen a large number of campaigns on TV, magazines, radio etc directing the audience to their Facebook page. this is particularly useful for local businesses as Facebook feeds and likes get propagated to their friends who often still live in the local area.

The findings come from a MerchantCircle Survey with most business owners replying having only 4 or less employees working for them. It’s interesting how SEO can be used by business owners to be competitive with more experienced and larger businesses indicating the efficiency of ROI in this exciting marketing medium.

You can learn more about how small business SEO can help your business generate more leads.