You have recently launched your new startup on the webspace. You have been noticed by your target audience online. Perhaps you’ve been reviewed on StartupsNigeria and you are happy to be on the list of latest sturvs on sturvs.com

But because you now have huge traffic on your site doesn’t mean that they might not be traffic from spammers, bots, crawlers, spiders, etc That’s why you need a good web tracking tool to determine your site’s activities.

Thus, you need to build an audience beyond the web (i.e offline) who would become part of your business online. This is important if you are to reach a much larger audience with your products and services.

Here are a few tips on how you can market your startup offline…

By word of mouth

The best way to get ‘real’ people to visit your site and use your product or service is to tell them one-on-one. You can do this by telling your friends, family members, neighbors, classmates, workmates, etc about your web startup and the products you offer. They in turn can tell other people, who would also tell others about it. That way, you are building an offline audience that will impact on your startups success.

Use Your Community

No, I don’t mean your social networks on Facebook or Myspace. I’m talkin about the community in your school, church, clubs, associations, etc These are people who you don’t really know but you would like to market your startup and product to them. The idea is to reach out to the members of your community who need your services. Make phone calls, make brief presentations, go out for lunch with them. Simply, network!

Use the Mainstream Media

Your local newspaper can just be what your startup or site needs to get widely known offline. Contact a friend who works with any of your local print media and get him/her to write about your new startup or do a press release. You can also talk about how your product will benefit the community, or how the local newspaper will benefit from the marketing.

Use Advertising Tools

By this I mean engaging in some advertising and promotional efforts to promote your product or service. You can use tee-shirts, face caps, etc to market your site. People who buy them off from your site will use them to promote your site and your products to people who don’t get online often and get them to visit your site.

Are there any other offline marketing strategies you have used for your startup? How have they worked for you?