91% of small business owners say they plan to invest in growing their business over the coming year. Alongside strategies like hiring, reinvesting in operations, and expanding into new territories, amplifying sales is an integral part of any growth strategy.
That’s why you’re likely always on the lookout for ways to increase sales for your business. This list is a great place to start. We’ve rounded up dozens of tactics to help your business stand out, build trust, and ultimately close sales with more customers.
Contents
- How to increase sales: Our best tips
- Ways to optimize your website for more sales
- Local marketing ideas to increase sales
- How to increase sales from your advertising campaigns
- How to increase sales using email marketing
- How to increase sales with social media
- How to turn more leads into sales
- Even more ideas to increase sales for your business
How to increase sales: Our best tips
Before moving on to more granular marketing and sales tactics, look at the big picture. Sometimes businesses struggle to increase sales because of confusion about what they do and who they serve. That confusion may be internal—for example, you may struggle to focus on your actual ideal client—or external—something in your branding and messaging is attracting the wrong type of person or confusing consumers about what you do.
Marketing tactics are great. But they’re most effective when backed by a solid strategy.
Regardless of where the issue lies, stepping back and assessing your brand holistically can help you identify and address structural issues before implementing specific marketing tactics.
1. Establish your unique value proposition
Can you clearly articulate what you do, for whom, and why you’re better at it than anyone else? If the answer is no, then it’s time to define your unique value proposition, or UVP.
While it seems simple enough, many businesses skip this step and go right to selling. But when you’re not clear on your UVP, it’s easy for your messaging to get muddied and for prospective customers to get confused.
When you develop a laser-focused UVP, it guides your messaging everywhere, from the homepage of your website to the calls you have with prospects.
⚡Ready to make your business stand out? Download our free guide on how to create a unique value proposition from the ground up!
2. Refine your ideal customer profile
This one goes hand-in-hand with the first strategic suggestion. As vital as it is to be clear on what you do, knowing who you do it for is also essential.
Many businesses start with a vague sense of who they’re going to serve. And that’s okay! But as time goes on, you should fine-tune your understanding of your ideal customer.
This process often begins with looking at past sales. Who are the clients that provide you the most income while requiring the least amount of work from your team? Do they share any characteristics? Knowing where your best business comes from helps you refine your messaging and undertake more targeted outreach.
3. Get feedback from real customers
If you want to increase sales for your business, asking your real customers for feedback can be helpful in several ways. What they tell you can help you refine messaging, restructure offerings, or rework key product features.
Ideally, you’ll talk to some of your existing customers one-on-one, but if that’s not possible, a survey can surface valuable insights.
4. Check your marketing funnel
The best marketing funnels move prospects from the awareness phase, where they’re first discovering your business, through to conversion and retention effortlessly. But marketing funnels can spring a leak.
Is there a place in your funnel where you’re losing prospects? Maybe you have an incredible blog that draws in tons of traffic, but it lacks a clear next step, so people read and then bounce. Maybe your online checkout process is wonky, and you’re losing people right on the brink of a purchase.
To see if there are areas that need patching, review your marketing data. Do you see a place where prospects consistently drop off, or a gap between one phase or tactic and the next? These are signs your funnel could use a fix.
5. Improve marketing allocation and refine your budget
Another place where you might see leakage is in your marketing budget. It’s common for businesses to get stuck simply redeploying the same old tactics, regardless of their actual effectiveness.
If you want to increase sales for your business, undertake an audit of the marketing ROI on each of your channels. Is there one that’s costing a lot and netting hardly any results? Or, conversely, is there one that’s super effective but receives hardly any budget?
Knowing where you stand can help you invest in the areas that are working and divest from those tactics that aren’t getting results.
Ways to optimize your website for more sales
Your website is the home base for your brand online. When it’s optimized (easy to find, fast, secure, and well-structured) it helps new people discover your business, engage with your offerings, and potentially decide to buy.
6. Focus on local SEO
Local businesses that want to increase sales must optimize for local SEO. By taking basic steps, like incorporating local keywords into your on-site copy and title tags, you position your site to appear in relevant local searches.
Technical SEO fixes matter, too. Your site should be fast and mobile-friendly, with structured data that helps search engines and LLMs alike understand what each page is all about.
7. Fine-tune your landing pages
Landing pages are built to drive a specific conversion. To increase sales for your business, it helps to have fully optimized landing pages that drive the highest possible number of actions.
From eye-catching visuals to a standout CTA, there are many ways to improve your landing pages and drive more interaction. Review this checklist for specific advice to help them convert.
8. Rethink your CTAs
Calls to action, or CTAs, aren’t just critical on landing pages. They are another key conversion point across your website.
How are your current CTAs performing? Is one getting tons of action while another sits unclicked? Sometimes it’s not clear why one CTA button really works while another is a dud. That’s where A/B testing can help.
Try two different versions of a button on your site. This may mean switching up the copy, design, or placement. Then, see how they perform side-by-side. If there’s a measurable difference, stick with the top performer and see how you can adjust other CTAs to align with the one that worked.
💡Ready to step up your CTA game? Download our free guide to the best call-to-action phrases ever (and why they work)!
9. Add live chat to your website
Consumers can be impatient. Most people will hang up only eight short minutes into a hold period on a customer service call. Even on your website, visitors may be antsy to get their questions answered quickly.
That’s where a live chat function comes in. AI chatbots have made live chat accessible to even small businesses. You can program the chat to handle common queries and provide an avenue for those with more complex questions to connect with a real team member.
Offering speedy answers keeps people engaged with your business now and makes them more likely to eventually become customers.
Local marketing ideas to increase sales
If you’re a business with a local presence, getting discovered by more of your neighbors creates the opportunity to increase sales. That’s why establishing a presence for your business in spots where locals hang out (both virtually and in real life) is a smart strategy.
10. Improve your Google Business Profile
With 90% of all searches starting on Google, there’s no better place for your business to be discoverable online. Claim and optimize your Google Business Profile to ensure people searching for “XYZ solution near me” have a better chance of finding you in regular search and Maps results.
11. Claim your local listings profiles
When they aren’t searching for local solutions on Google, people often turn to local listings platforms for guidance.
Yelp, Foursquare, and Manta cover all businesses, while other sites specialize in particular industries. Houzz and Angi are great for home services; Tripadvisor is big for hotel and travel businesses. Claim and optimize your pages on these sites, and ensure that your business information is consistent across all listings.
12. Explore local print ads
This traditional advertising tactic remains effective for modern-day businesses. Running an ad in a local paper puts you in front of a geographically relevant audience. Plus, people continue to rank newspapers as a trusted source of information. When you run an ad in a legitimate publication, you gain legitimacy in the eyes of readers, too.
An example print ad design.
13. Send direct mailers
Direct mail is another fantastic way to reach people in your geography. And unlike digital ads, which can be scrolled past, physical mailers command attention. 79% of survey respondents say they engage with the mail they receive.
By increasing awareness for your brand with such a large swath of the local population, you increase the odds they’ll want to learn more and potentially become a customer down the road.
How to increase sales from your advertising campaigns
Another way to increase the number of people discovering you online is to invest in digital advertising. While organic tactics, like building up a social media following and growing your email list, can help you reach new people, too, advertising accelerates the process. If you’re looking to increase sales for your business quickly, advertising may be a worthwhile investment.
14. Run search ads
Google lets you build advertising campaigns around relevant keywords so your business shows up when people search for businesses like yours.
Traditional Google Ads can help you appear in the blue links on the search results page, but there are speciality advertising options, too.
Ecommerce brands might implement shopping ads, which show images of relevant products as sponsored results. Service-based businesses can run Local Services Ads to appear above regular search ads.
15. Create social media ads
Popular platforms like Meta (which runs ads on Facebook and Instagram), LinkedIn, and TikTok allow you to create targeted campaigns to display your ads to those in your ideal audience.
You can also choose from a variety of CTAs to encourage those who see your ad to engage with your business further. A business with an online store may drive viewers to buy the item they see advertised, while service-based businesses can invite viewers to book a call or navigate to their site to learn more.
An example TikTok ad.
16. Retarget website visitors
The people who are most likely to buy from you are those who already know you. That’s why retargeting is a great tactic to increase sales for your business. This advertising technique serves display ads to those who have visited your website before. Retargeting helps you stay top-of-mind as these potential customers consider their options.
How to increase sales using email marketing
Email marketing remains a tactic with an incredibly high ROI. However, not all email campaigns are considered equal. To use email marketing to increase sales for your business, try these tactics.
17. Clean up and segment your email list
The best email marketing programs start with a clean, organized email list. Sending hyper-targeted messages to people who actually want to hear from you keeps your email deliverability high and gives those emails the best shot at driving conversions.
That’s why regular list cleaning matters. Remove addresses that bounce and give low-engagement readers the chance to opt out. Once your list is clean, invest in sorting your remaining subscribers into segments. Segmentation allows you to send messages that are most relevant to each sub-section of your audience, which helps drive higher open rates and conversions.
18. Encourage email sign-ups on your site
Email is an incredible way to stay top-of-mind with subscribers. Anything you can do to add engaged, enthusiastic new people to your list is a great way to increase the potential for new sales.
Make it easy for people to sign up for your emails across all your digital and analog properties. Include a sign-up pop-up on your site. Offer a discount code to encourage people to join your list. Put a sign-up link in your Instagram bio. Add a QR code to paper receipts so people can scan and join.
19. Create an abandoned cart drip campaign
If your business sells online, you know this phenomenon: a prospective customer puts something in their cart, then ghosts. It happens up to 70% of the time with online shopping carts. To recover some of those sales stuck in limbo, build an abandoned cart email drip. Brands that institute a series of reminder emails can recover around 10% to 15% of those abandoned carts.
20. Run email marketing campaigns around key events
Any time your business is doing something outside of “business as usual” is an opportunity to reach out to your email list to let them know. A new product launch, that upcoming holiday sale, updates to your class schedule—these are all events that can warrant an email and potentially stir up a sale.
21. Check in with lapsed customers
There’s an old marketing statistic that says it’s five to 25 times more expensive to acquire a new customer than it is to retain an old one. Your email list is one way to potentially re-engage those customers you haven’t heard from in a while.
Create an email for checking in with lapsed customers. A simple “We miss you!” message and accompanying discount code can be the nudge they need to buy from you again.
How to increase sales with social media
With just about 95% of all internet users engaging with social media each month, there are few places online that present a greater potential for meeting new potential customers. Once you’ve set up your social media profile, these other tactics can help you create opportunities for sales on social.
22. Try influencer marketing
The influencer marketing market size exceeded $32 billion in 2025. And with nano- and micro-influencers (those with thousands, not millions, of followers) generating great results for the brands they partner with, this advertising tactic is becoming increasingly accessible to brands of all sizes.
One key to success is finding influencers who align with your target audience (you can see other influencer marketing tips here). If you sell to health-focused young women, a fitness influencer or dietician might be an excellent partner. If your target audience is teen boys, a gaming influencer might be the right fit.
23. Step up your posting frequency
Setting up your social media profile isn’t enough. If you’re not posting regularly, you’re missing an opportunity to stay top-of-mind with followers by remaining in their feeds.
It’s tough to post consistently on social media without a plan. Set an achievable cadence for your team, then create a content calendar to keep you on track. (Or get our copy-and-paste calendar to help get you started.)
24. Encourage user-generated content (UGC)
Sometimes the greatest advocates for your brand are those who are already loyal to you. By encouraging existing fans to post about your products or offerings, you create additional social media content and expand your reach online.
People may already be creating positive content about your brand. Why not use it in your marketing like this business did? Source
User-generated content sometimes happens on its own, but you can encourage people to share about your business by creating a branded hashtag for them to use, asking them to share about their experience in emails seeking feedback about a recent purchase, or creating an online contest that encourages people to post about your business.
How to turn more leads into sales
So many businesses lose out on great sales opportunities because their lead management system isn’t as strong as it could be. Keeping track of all the relationships you establish on behalf of your brand and developing a system for moving people through the funnel and toward a purchase is essential to increasing sales for your business.
25. Invest in a CRM
Regardless of your industry, a CRM is essential for keeping track of all key relationships. These tools help you understand who is engaging with your business and empower you to take the right next step to nurture leads and generate sales.
A CRM is only as good as the data housed within it, so training your team to actually update the CRM is also vital.
26. Codify your lead scoring system
Successful businesses know how to manage priorities and direct their energy toward the leads with the greatest potential to become customers. Creating a system for scoring all incoming leads can help your team identify the people to focus on.
This is typically a joint effort between your sales and marketing teams, who can work together to identify the behaviors and attributes that signal someone is a high-value lead.
27. Use AI to streamline lead management
Depending on the size of your business, your team may be juggling dozens or hundreds of incoming leads every day. An AI tool can help your team manage inquiries, prioritize those that need a human touch, and move others down the funnel without human intervention. This frees your team up to focus on people with complex questions or more specialized needs and helps you better serve all incoming prospects.
Even more ideas for how to increase sales for your business
You’ve worked hard to create products or services your audience loves. If you’re already seeing success with what you offer, don’t change it! But perhaps there’s a way to leverage your existing offerings to get even more sales.
28. Create a referral program
Even your biggest fans might not think to refer others to you without some encouragement. A formal referral program can drive existing customers to pass your name along to friends, family, and colleagues. You can sweeten the deal by offering an incentive to both the referrer and their connection when that new person makes their first purchase.
29. Establish partnerships with other local businesses
Local business owners often find greater success when they support each other! Build up your network of other entrepreneurs in your area or industry, and look for ways to help each other out. Whether that’s a formal referral program, an agreement to co-host events, or the launch of a product collaboration, there are plenty of creative ways to boost sales for you and them.
30. Participate in community events or host your own
Getting involved in your community is a great way to engender goodwill and endear yourself to prospective and existing customers. You can host events that are more explicitly sales-focused or get involved in outside events as a sponsor.
For example, the local yarn shop might host a knitting class. The sharing of expertise is free, but the hope is that budding knitters buy some yarn while they’re in the shop.
31. Build up your online reviews
Online reviews continue to have an outsized influence on consumers, with 54% weighing online reviews first, ahead of recommendations from friends and family or social media influencers.
Encouraging your community to leave you online reviews can help influence purchase decisions from those who are evaluating your business online.
32. Design limited-time offers
FOMO is a real thing, and savvy brands know how to use it to drive sales. Designing a limited-time offer around a top-selling product can encourage customers to buy more or prospects to take the leap. Making the offer time-bound encourages people to act now, which is a great way to increase sales fast.
33. Run seasonal promotions
Like the limited-time offer, seasonal promotions tap into that sense of urgency that can drive impulse buys. Run sales or promotions around a holiday, your business’s anniversary, a local event, or anything else that’s timely and relevant to your audience.
Screenshot
34. Build out service or product packages
If you already have a product or service that’s selling like hotcakes, why not try pairing it with another item? This can be a great way to increase sales while leveraging what’s already working.
A nail salon might offer a deal on a mani/pedi combination service, or a skincare brand might bundle its top-selling moisturizer and toner for a 10% discount off the individual item prices.
35. Cross-sell complementary offerings
A great way to pick up an additional sale is to market to someone who’s already bought from you. By highlighting complementary products or services, you encourage the person who’s already happy with what they purchased to buy something else they might need.
You can cross-sell on your website by adding a “You might also like” feature to product pages or by sending an email with complementary products based on what someone just bought.
Increase sales for your business with the right marketing tactics
Sales and marketing are inextricably linked. By fine-tuning your marketing strategy and refining your tactics, you pull more consumers into the funnel, nurture leads more effectively, and ultimately drive more sales.
For more ways to get sales, see how our solutions can help, and keep the tips we covered in mind:
- Establish your unique value proposition
- Refine your ideal customer profile
- Get feedback from real customers
- Check your marketing funnel
- Improve marketing allocation and refine your budget
- Focus on local SEO
- Fine-tune your landing pages
- Rethink your CTAs
- Add live chat to your website
- Improve your Google Business Profile
- Claim your local listings profiles
- Explore local print ads
- Send direct mailers
- Run search ads
- Create social media ads
- Retarget website visitors
- Clean up and segment your email list
- Encourage email sign-ups on your site
- Create an abandoned cart drip campaign
- Run email marketing campaigns around key events
- Check in with lapsed customers
- Try influencer marketing
- Step up your posting frequency
- Encourage user-generated content (UGC)
- Invest in a CRM
- Codify your lead scoring system
- Use AI to streamline lead management
- Create a referral program
- Establish partnerships with other local businesses
- Participate in community events or host your own
- Build up your online reviews
- Design limited-time offers
- Run seasonal promotions
- Build out service or product packages
- Cross-sell complementary offerings
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