10 Key Insights to Inform Your Marketing Plans in 2025

Understanding the small business marketing landscape can be a challenge, but it’s important to know if you want to be competitive and stand out.

What are your competitors doing? How are they investing their marketing budgets? What are they planning for 2025?

LocaliQ wanted to answer all these questions and more, so we created The Small Business Marketing Trends Report for 2025 with data and insights from over 730 small businesses!

If you want to see the full report, jump on over to LocaliQ or download it here. And keep reading for 10 key takeaways from the report you need to know to inform your 2025 planning.

10 biggest takeaways from LocaliQ’s 2025 Small Business Marketing Trends Report

We rounded up 10 fast facts from the report to help you understand the small business marketing landscape and start your 2025 planning.

1. Most SMBs aren’t investing in paid search

According to the report, only 40% of SMBs are investing in search advertising, which means the majority of small businesses are not running ads on top search engines like Google and Bing.

Plus, only 39% of SMBs are investing in SEO. This means that small businesses are largely missing out on the opportunity to capture high-intent, local searchers.

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2. Less than half of SMBs are investing in social ads

We were surprised to find that less than half of small businesses are investing in social media ads on platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, and more.

These platforms are important because customers spend so much time on social media and are increasingly relying on them to discover new businesses. In fact, TikTok is now the fourth most popular search engine, with one in 10 Gen Zers more likely to use it than Google.

By not running ads on popular social media sites, SMBs are missing out on ways to engage and convert customers where they’re spending (a lot!) of time online.

3. But SMBs running paid search are satisfied with results

When it comes to how satisfied small businesses are with their marketing investments, search advertising topped the list as the tactic they are most satisfied with.

This makes sense to us! It’s pretty easy to measure results for search advertising compared to tactics like reputation management or social media marketing, so this could definitely be a factor. But we also know that search ads are effective for small businesses at driving website visits and conversions.

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4. SMBs are also not taking advantage of low-cost online presence strategies

Back to the marketing channels and tactics SMBs are investing in—we would be remiss if we didn’t mention the lack of investment in strategies like reputation management, listings, and website chat.

These strategies contribute to a strong web presence—listings and reputation management can help you capture and draw in potential customers on search engines and map apps while chat can help you capture website leads and convert them quicker.

Many listings, reputation management, and website chat tools or strategies are also fairly low-cost, making them a strong fit for small businesses.

5. Facebook is the most popular social platform SMBs are using for marketing

Facebook is not only the most popular social media platform for users—it was also the most popular social platform for SMBs to use for marketing.

Of those businesses investing in social media marketing or social ads, nearly 80% were doing so on Facebook, followed by Instagram and LinkedIn.

6. Smaller businesses have small budgets (unsurprisingly)

Okay…duh? But understanding the typical marketing budget for your SMB competitors is really handy. LocaliQ found that only 5% of SMBs had no budget and 38% had monthly budgets under $2,500.

And because the report was able to break down marketing budgets by business size, we were able to see a clear correlation between business size and budget. Which, again, isn’t necessarily a surprise, but it should be validating to small businesses who are doing so much with not a lot.

This just shows the importance of adopting those low-cost strategies we mentioned earlier and take advantage of creative marketing ideas to get in front of potential customers.

We have some you may like here:

• 27 Free & Low-Budget Marketing Ideas for Any Business
• 42 Powerful Local Marketing Ideas That Work (+Examples!)
• 10 Free & Creative Marketing Ideas for Small Businesses

7. They’re also less likely to have dedicated marketing support

The smaller the business, the less likely they are to have staff dedicated to marketing. Which does make trying any new or additional marketing strategies a challenge—those often take some kind of time commitment.

But, the report also found that many SMBs aren’t taking advantage of free tools that could simplify some of these strategies for businesses strapped for time and resources.

8. Most SMBs are already using AI

Even though our team has been dabbling in AI, and our AI-related articles tend to be popular, we weren’t sure how much smaller businesses have embraced this new tech. But nearly 60% of SMBs are using AI for some part of their marketing! Most are using it to save time on activities like content creation, social media management, and more.

9. The economy continues to be a challenge

After a tough few years for businesses—from the COVID-19 pandemic to record-high inflation and supply chain issues—SMBs are still concerned about the economy. Nearly half of businesses indicated it will be their biggest challenge in 2025, with 18% noting it will be very challenging.

Plus, of those decreasing their marketing budgets in 2025, 56% noted it was due to economic conditions and uncertainty.

10. Getting new customers is also a top challenge

Getting new customers continues to be a top challenge for small businesses, with 45% saying it will be one of their top challenges for 2025. This is something we hear time and time again—generating leads and getting new customers is hard, especially with limited budget and resources.

Investing in the right marketing strategy can help drive leads and capture customers, which could simplify this challenge for SMBs.

Create the right marketing strategy for big results in 2025

Small businesses have big plans for 2025, and this round-up covers just a few of them. To see all the data and insights we gathered from over 730 SMBs, download the full report. And reach out to schedule a demo if you need help crafting the right marketing strategy to stand out from the competition.

Here’s a recap of the top takeaways from The Small Business Marketing Trends Report for 2025:

1. Most SMBs aren’t investing in paid search
2. …or social ads
3. But SMBs running paid search are satisfied with results
4. SMBs are also not taking advantage of low-cost online presence strategies
5. Facebook is the most popular social platform SMBs are using for marketing
6. Smaller businesses have small budgets (unsurprisingly)
7. …and are less likely to have dedicated marketing support
8. Most SMBs are already using AI
9. The economy continues to be a challenge
10. …And so does getting new customers