Are you starting a gun company? Or maybe you’re already an established business owner specializing in the sale of guns and ammo. This Guide to marketing for Gun and Ammo Companies will help you navigate growing your business.
Regardless, we have a few questions for you. Is your marketing game on point? Are you advertising effectively to your target market?
If you’re not sure how to answer these questions (or your answer is no), you could be missing out on countless sales. We live in America, which means the gun and ammo industry is full of competition, but also opportunity. To stand above your competitors, you need to master the art of marketing for gun and ammo companies.
We can help. Keep reading for a complete guide on selling ammo, guns, gun parts, and gun accessories.
One of the most important rules in marketing for gun and ammo companies is to think about the user experience. When potential customers come to your site, what experience are you providing for them?
Is your site designed for optimum speed and intuitive navigation? Is it visually stimulating and intriguing? A slow website that’s difficult to navigate will turn customers away on a dime.
For this reason, your site also needs to be optimized for mobile devices. Studies show that 85% of Americans own smartphones and they will be using them to access your website. If your site isn’t optimized for mobiles, it will load slowly and in the wrong format.
If users find your website difficult to use, they’ll leave it quickly and find one of your competitors’ sites. This will give your website a high bounce rate, which will lower your SEO ranking (search engine visibility). This also has a large factor in your customer’s trust in your website. Unfortunately, there are many bad actors out there, and because of the nature of the business, it can be hard as a customer to navigate that.
If you don’t know how to create a user-friendly website that’s visually appealing and optimized for mobile devices, work with a website design agency. The impression you make with consumers through your website is vital for generating leads and making sales.
Learning your way around SEO is one of the most practical marketing tips for any business owner. Search engine optimization refers to your website’s visibility on search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing. The higher your SEO ranking is, the more likely consumers are to find your site when searching for guns, ammo, and related content.
As stated earlier, there are a lot of gun businesses in America. If you want people to find your website before they find your competitors’ websites, you must implement a solid SEO strategy.
You can boost your Local SEO rankings by registering your website with Google My Business. You should also publish articles on your site full of relevant keywords that you want to rank for.
Another important piece of the puzzle is to create articles and content for your website. These articles allow you to provide your knowledge and insight, at scale and allow you to build trust both with the search engines, as well as your customers. These articles (and your other web pages) should include internal links guiding users to other locations on your site. This could include product pages, contact pages, about pages, or other articles. Each article should also contain external links, leading to reliable sources of information, statistics, etc. This helps increase your footprint on the internet and again builds trust.
Finally, work with other businesses in the industry to get credible backlinks (links to your site on other websites). You can get these through guest posts and affiliate links, and we recommend working with an SEO Expert to manage this, although it can also be done with a good SEO Management tool.
As noted earlier, a big part of your SEO strategy should revolve around creating keyword-rich content for your blog. However, content creation isn’t just about publishing keyword-stuffed articles. This type of marketing for gun and ammo companies must provide something valuable to your readers.
When you create quality content, you define your company as a leader in the industry. By providing consumers with valuable content, you begin to establish a stronger relationship with them. Ultimately, this leads to more sales.
The type of content you create should serve to answer questions and provide solutions to problems. They can also be informative or entertaining. Some relevant article titles for your blog might include:
Topical articles like these are sure to attract your target market to your website. From here, you can use internal links to organically direct readers to your product pages based on the context of the article. You could also create a call to action encouraging readers to subscribe to your email list or contact your company.
Now, let’s talk about building an email list and developing an email campaign. Email marketing is an essential tool in your marketing toolbelt. That’s because this form of marketing allows you to retarget consumers who have already shown some kind of interest in your company.
You can gain subscribers through your website and social media profiles. Incentivize users to subscribe by offering valuable discounts, exclusive content, or small free products.
Once the consumer has subscribed to your email, you can deliver the promised incentive. From there, introduce yourself and tell the consumer a little more about your company and how you got started.
Then, you can send more promotional content exclusive to your subscribers. You’ll have a direct line to that consumer to showcase new products and market your brand.
However, it’s important to provide your subscribers with something of value or they’ll stop opening your emails. In some cases, people will unsubscribe.
Aside from discount coupons and other promotions, including engaging articles, news updates, and other features that will keep people engaged. Just as importantly, make sure your subject lines are written in a way that motivates your subscribers to open each email.
Marketing a company and selling ammo and guns isn’t as straightforward as you might think. Aside from keeping your prices competitive, you also need to learn who your marketing message should target. These consumers are known as your target market or target audience.
When starting a gun company, you should complete a market analysis to identify the demographic of consumers who will most likely be purchasing your products. However, this knowledge remains incomplete from a marketing standpoint.
To capitalize on your target market, you also have to understand them. What are their consumer habits? What’s the best way to market to these types of people.
To find the answers to these questions and streamline your marketing strategy, we recommend working with a marketing company. They can document and track this data and provide you with the analytics you need to maximize your earnings while minimizing your costs.
For example, the SMBHub business dashboard is designed to simplify your marketing efforts. We provide you with all the information you need to understand your target market and create ads that cater to their wants, needs, and beliefs.
Successful marketing for gun and ammo companies requires a social media presence. Roughly 82% of Americans use one or more social networking platforms. By establishing brand awareness on apps like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube, you can substantially improve your lead generation and sales.
Of course, social media marketing takes a lot more than simply creating a profile and filling out your business information. You have to create content that inspires users to follow your page, share your content, and click on links to your website.
One of the most important social media marketing tips is to post content regularly. Some gun businesses post content daily while others post two to three times a week.
This content needs to be more than product promotions and sales pitches. You need to create engaging content that your target audience would want to view.
We also recommend running raffles and other competitions that allow users to win free products. They can earn points by liking, commenting, following your page, and sharing your content. This will boost your social media visibility and help you gain more followers.
Depending on the marketing message you want to send, you can also repost news articles related to gun laws or current events relevant to your business.
Finally, focus on your reputation in the industry. Consumers will only buy products from you if you’ve proven yourself to be credible. They need to see that you sell quality guns, ammo, gun parts, and accessories.
Publish customer reviews to show potential customers why they should invest in your brand. This type of reputation management is essential if you want to maximize your profits.
Encourage customers to leave feedback by offering cashback rewards or future discounts. The more positive reviews you have, the more credible your company will appear to consumers.
Marketing for gun and ammo companies isn’t too dissimilar to marketing for other businesses. However, your competition is steep and you need to ensure you’re doing something to stand out from your competition.
If you need help generating leads or making more sales, let’s get started today. You can even download our business dashboard for a free 30-day trial of some of our services. This includes executive reports, advertiser intelligence, listing builder, and more.
