Article: http://mashable.com/2013/11/07/mobile-advertising-wins/

Mashable recently listed four small businesses within the USA that are taking advantage of massive online advertising opportunities. According to 17.4% of web traffic this year is coming from mobile browsing, which is a 6% increase to last year. This leads to a massive audience that has the potential to be segmented into ultra specific categories for maximum targeting.

This is especially important for smaller businesses who lack the physical and financial means to indulge in a mass marketing campaign. Additionally an online campaign will generally work out to be a more cost effective solution.

Mashable listed four companies all using different social media platforms to target their audience.

On Twitter: Rock Creek, a outdoor sports store, used promoted tweets to ramp up their advertising campaign during the holiday season. Their smartest move was offering deals in time bound situation, for example making a sale price only available for 2 days. This give an incentive for users to act quickly and not delay actions.

On Facebook: Karaoke Heroes, a Karaoke Bar chain in the USA, used Facebook ads to target customers after their launch in 2012. Facebook ads was their most cost effective strategy as it allowed to only target the customers they wanted.

There are many options a small business can take to leverage online communities and for the most part these allow for cost saving which are crucial for small businesses.