Marketing The Invisible

Penny Wise and Pound Foolish

2010-09-20T19:13:00.000-05:00

Have you ever thought about what your life would have been had you made that different choice? You know the one I’m talking about; the one that you lay awake at night and work out various scenarios about. What would have happened had things turned out differently?

Recently I sat across the table from a brand new marketing client and watched as her face went pale recalling the choice that she had made in the past several months concerning her business. It was not a pretty sight.

She recalled how she had decided to place all of her ‘proverbial eggs’ into that one hole ridden basket. You see, her company had been dying a slow death. Sales were lagging and she didn’t know what to do. So she decided that she had to do something. That something was a decision that fed the wolf that was at her door.

She decided to drop all print advertising and rely totally on word of mouth and hits on her website. This would have been a great idea had she had customers that were crazy wild about her service that would tell everyone they came into contact with about her and march them arm in arm to her business and a website that was SEO’d to the hilt for those customers who searched the web for her specific keywords. Neither was the case.

She felt good for the first couple of days thinking to herself how she had saved herself some money that could now be added to her bottom line. Then reality set in and her bottom line bottomed out.

No one new was coming into her store. To make matters worse, when her regular customers did come in they commented on how ‘quiet’ it was in the store and ended up leaving without making a purchase.

By the time she realized her mistake it was too late. To recover from one week of not advertising takes a good 4 weeks. Why? To understand the repercussions you have to understand why you need to advertise.

Reasons to advertise
1) To keep your name out in front of your customer, future customers and competition (nothing travels faster than a rumor that since they haven’t seen you advertise you must be shutting down)
2) To promote new products and services to your customers, future customers and competition
3) To show your employees that they are part of a thriving company that is always looking for more customers so that you can continue to pay their wages. Even lazy employees start worrying about their jobs when no one is walking through the door.
4) Showing people who have a vested interest in you like your investors, bank president, father-in-law that you are promoting your business so that you can make good on your note (this equates to if you don’t advertise you must not really want to be successful – something about seeing their investment promoting itself gives them the warm fuzzies).
5) You advertise to reach your competitors customers. Why is this important? You never know when they become unhappy. They need to know who to go to when times get bad with their current supplier.

Do you need more reasons to advertise? Let’s face it, my new marketing client had made a terrible mistake and almost didn’t recover from it. It took her three months of really, really low sales to begin to turn things around. Today, it is almost back to normal. Customers still walk in asking if things are picking up and she is still working to overcome the negative rumors of her demise. Eventually she will be able to put this behind her. It was a tough lesson to learn about Marketing the Invisible.

The Sky Is Falling

2010-09-20T13:45:00.001-05:00

We all remember the story about Chicken Little and the infamous acorn on the head that became a piece of the sky and quickly turned into a disastrous outlook on life.

How many of us are guilty of the same ‘falling sky’ mentality? How many of us are too ensconced in all the negative talk about the economy, the environment and the selling out of America by our elected politicians to have a positive outlook on our lives (both personal and business)?

I have always believed that you make your own economy, you chart your own course and you set your own sails. One of my mentors, Jim Rohn, said it best when he said ‘not to wish that it were easier, but to wish that you were better’.

So many of us are complaining about the state of the economy in our own county without really understanding that it is what we have made it by our own choices. It doesn’t have to be that way. When we are all trying our best to make a living here locally we should be helping the other guy make a living locally also. I think that every elected official and anyone that gets a paycheck based on the tax dollars of our local citizens should have to purchase everything locally unless they can’t find what they need here.

Ridiculous you scream!? I don’t think so. We pay taxes so that our city and county officials can have a job. Many of our local merchants work all the time just to make ends meet and then are slapped in the face by the very people that their taxes are used to pay when that money is spent with a merchant outside of their respective cities and county that they serve. What is wrong with this picture?

Everyone is screaming that the economy in our local communities has really dipped. Really? What would happen if everyone that relied on the taxes produced by the local economy had to spend their paychecks in the same local economy that supported them? Did you know that for every dollar spent in a locally owned independent store 68 cents returns to the community through taxes, payroll and other expenditures? If you spend that in a national chain, only 43 cents stays local and if you spend it online or outside of your area NOTHING comes home. Try taking 68 cents out of every dollar out of your paycheck, throw it away and see how long you can have a roof over your head. The same thing happens to local business owners, cities and counties.

Not guilty of spending money outside of the city or county you say? What about that website you had designed by that out of state entity? What about the online office supplies that you are ordering for your city/county office? What about going out for bid and awarding the bid to an out of county contractor when you could have chosen one just as skilled but they were a little higher? What about treating your staff to a retreat or brainstorming session in a great hotel OUTSIDE of your own county. Shame on you!

I try my best to spend my money locally. Granted sometimes the product or the service that I buy may be a few dollars more than what I would pay outside of my county but I know that my money is being used to help another business owner stay in business.

I think that all public officials should take an oath to not only serve their constituents but to also support their constituents. After all, the local business owners are the first people those same city and county officials look to for donations of space, time, talent and money.

I can’t tell you how many times I have been approached by someone running for office, a team or some other association that wants something for free and then spends money on products or services outside of our county. That’s just not right!

The buck doesn’t stop there. Merchants, if you are asking others to buy from you, you must remember to buy from local merchants also. Your own mantra should be ‘I shop local so that others will shop local’. We must all commit ourselves to spending our money locally whenever we can. I’m not saying that you can’t spend money outside of the county but what I am saying is to make a concerted effort to at least look for that product or service in our county first.

Many of you may be saying, ‘yes, but I just can’t find what I am looking for close to home and I have to go into another county’. I know that may be the case in some instances but let’s face it, have you tried getting a local merchant to order it for you, have you exhausted all your resources to try and fine it locally? If you don’t support the merchants that are here they may not be here much longer.

In defense of our non-local consumers, some “merchants” are guilty of not having the ‘service’ mentality that some of the larger stores have in the bigger cities. They aren’t open when they say they are going to be open and they aren’t willing to work with a customer when it comes to pricing or special orders. The inventory looks as if it has been on the shelves for years and the store is not as clean as it should be. The counter help isn’t as knowledgeable or friendly or even present. There, have I covered it all? Oh wait, one more thing. Their would-be customers don’t even know they exist … because their marketing – or lack of marketing – ‘worked for them 10 years ago and it should still work for them now. After all, EVERYBODY knows they have a store’. These are not the merchants that I am asking you to support. These merchants don’t have a business, they have a hobby. They will be open until the day they decide to start another hobby. I am referring to serious business owners who are doing everything in their power to entice you into doing business with them now and in the future.

Support these local merchants so that we can make our own economy and not have to be concerned with the economy that ‘others’ want to control for us.

Whenever you have a choice --- please shop local!

Does Advertising Work?

2010-06-02T11:16:00.000-05:00

I wish that I could take credit for this little poem but I can't. I found it on the website of another marketer, Rick Tracewell (www.ricktracewell). He says that it is a famous poem but I can't seem to find the author of it. In any case, it makes sense.

Why Is It?

A man wakes in the morning after
sleeping on an ADVERTISED mattress,
under ADVERTISED sheets,
and in ADVERTISED pajamas.
He washes his hair with an ADVERTISED shampoo,
cleans with an ADVERTISED soap,
shaves with an ADVERTISED razor,
using ADVERTISED shaving cream,
and puts on ADVERTISED deodorant.
He pulls on ADVERTISED blue jeans,
an ADVERTISED shirt and ADVERTISED sneakers.
He'll drink ADVERTISED coffee after
his ADVERTISED orange juice, cereal and
toast (from his ADVERTISED toaster).
He will drive to work in an ADVERTISED car,
sit at an ADVERTISED computer,
in an ADVERTISED office chair,
and write with an ADVERTISED pen.
Yet this man hesitates to ADVERTISE,
saying that advertising
does not PAY.
Finally, when his UNADVERTISED business goes under,
he then ADVERTISES that it is FOR SALE.
Why Is It?

Testing Out My New Blog Aid

2010-05-16T10:10:00.000-05:00

Image via CrunchBase

Fifteen minutes ago I was introduced to this marvelous little tool, Zemanta. I read a little about what it would do and then couldn't wait to download it. It took all of maybe a minute and here I am. If it works the way I hope it will work for me it should make my posts from here on out much more interesting. Fingers crossed!

There are so many great things being created that help people who are as busy as me become and remain productive. Frankly, my blogging has taken a backseat to my 'day job' as an editor and publisher of three magazines and a fourth on the way. I hope that by adding Zemanta blogging will become more enjoyable for me and hopefully for my readers.

This will probably spoil me. Someone will soon have to design a program for publishers to use that will do for print publications that are uploaded as pdf's online as Zemanta does for blogs. Hint! Hint! Hey, if you know of one out there please let me know.

I leave you with my new tag line. "Do what you love, love what you do and always be marketing!"

Giving Up On Television

2010-05-02T15:03:00.001-05:00

May 1^st was the first day of my self imposed – well sort of – hiatus from television. On the prior Thursday my 28 month old Phillips 42" LCD-HD went out and never came back. After calling Dell (from whom I bought it) and then Phillips (who manufactured it) I was told by both parties, 'sorry, nothing we can do about it.' My big question to Phillips was that why does a TV that I paid over $1200 for die in 28 months time? Silence on the other end of the line. I started Googling Phillips and I quickly realized that I would have been better off Googling them 28 months ago and not buying the TV.

According to numerous others, Phillips is not the brand it used to be nor is it the brand of the future. They not only make a shoddy product, they don't stand behind it and worse yet, they don't care. Enough about Phillips; I will never, yes NEVER, buy a product made by them or linked to them in any way. That being said, I always try to look on the bright side of these challenges and realize that I would be much more productive if I quit watching TV altogether.

I didn't really watch TV in real time. I usually set my favorite shows to record and then play catch up at night or during the weekend. I do this to be able to blow through the commercials. I hope that Phillips is spending a ton of money on their TV commercials that others like me fast forward through.

Well, it's been three days and I'm not suffering too much. We do have an entire room dedicated to watching TV and videos so I will have to figure out another use for it. I am looking now to sell my beautiful albeit now useless theater seating. Will we replace the TV? Not right now. My experiment is in full swing.

Have I become more productive? Yes. Instead of catching up on 24, Desperate Housewives, Big Bang and the rest of my scheduled entertainment I spent the time building three websites, catching up on my social media and organizing my desk. I may even blog more regularly now. Who knows what I might be able to accomplish by giving up on television. After all, my trusted internet and computer are still up and running. Life is productive ... and good.

Can you text your way to success?

2010-04-13T17:23:00.000-05:00

Latest stats on texting:

95% of all text messages are read within 15 Minutes
17% of all text messages are forwarded
Text messages outnumber phone calls in the US
20% of people respond to a text message
twice as many people use text messaging as use email
1/3 of humanity has mobile internet access
1.8 billion people will send a text message today (this includes me and probably you)

Just be careful what you send in a text message. It is the last area of privacy. Make it to the reader's benefit and your message will be welcome and read.

21st Century Marketing – Free Ways to Jumpstart Your Online Marketing

2010-03-20T14:59:00.001-05:00

Google Local Business Center: If your business is not listed on Google as a local business then follow the instructions on getting your business listed. It is free and is a fast and easy way to get noticed online. Make sure that you select the keywords that people will be typing in to the search engines to find you. To be found locally make sure that you put the name of your city and several cities where your local customers may be looking for you.

Something similar to Google LBC is Merchant Circle. It is dedicated to connecting Neighbors and Local Businesses online to help build real relationships between local business owners and their customers. To date, nearly 1,000,000 local businesses have joined Merchant Circle to get their business more exposure on the internet.

News Alerts: if you want to keep up with everything and anything that is being said about you, your company, your employees, your kids, etc. go to Google Alerts and follow the instructions. Each time anything newsworthy pops up that has this subject matter you will be sent an email. Great way to do early damage control or just make sure that nothing slips by you. You should set alerts to scan for your name, the names of your management team, your company name and the names of your competitors. Also, if you have particular brand name products that you want to keep up with I would set an alert for them also.

Reader: several to choose from but one that is free and does the job is Google reader. A reader is a program that will allow you to subscribe to certain online venues that have information of interest to you and to your industry. For instance, I can search for a particular topic, find websites or blogs that interest me and subscribe to them via my reader program. This will keep me up to date anytime anything changes on those sites. I just visit my 'reader' everyday and can read only those things that interest me and that will allow me to keep up with growing changes.

Just a few words about your website. Make sure that your website has all the WHY'S answered and that it tells a story that is understandable, relatable and makes people want to be a part of your story. One of the most overlooked things in website marketing is making sure that proper Search Engine Optimization has been done on it. In layman's terms it makes your website friendly to the search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing and allows people looking for your product or service to find you easier. Without it they will have to know your domain name and that really defeats the entire purpose of marketing to people who aren't familiar with you yet.

I think print advertising still works (I wouldn't be in publishing if I didn't) but only if it gets the attention of your customer, is located in a medium that your customers will read, and has your website on it. Also, remember you should answer a WHY question in your ad. The same goes for radio and TV advertising. Answer the whys, tell a story and drive them to your website.

So what is Marketing in the 21st century about? Marketing in the 21st century isn't any different than it was 2,000 years ago. It is still about answering the whys, telling your story and staying connected to your community of customers.

The only difference is that we have new ways to deliver our message.

I will leave you with this little bit of advice handed down to us from John Jantsch, Founder of Duct Tape Marketing. John said this just last month:

"Over time the single greatest opportunity is to rule the local search landscape. 20-30 year olds go straight to their mobile browser or Google Maps to find everything -- shoes, food, insurance, a dentist, you name it. If they don't find you by doing that, then you don't exist."

Make sure that your future customers can find you!

Teaching The Oldest 'Profession' To Our Teens

2010-02-07T13:30:00.000-06:00

I believe that we should teach the oldest profession to students as soon as they are old enough to begin learning about life. I know that many of you are thinking, "What?!"

No, I am not referring to what most people 'wink' and call the 'oldest profession'. Actually the oldest profession is sales. Nothing happens on this earth without someone selling either an idea, a product or service to themselves or someone else. Even the 'wink, wink' second oldest profession had to start with a sales pitch.

When I was 19 years old - I interviewed and was awarded my first official sales position. I was going to college and needed a little extra spending money. I answered an ad in the local newspaper for a health club sales person and a career was born.

I loved sales the moment I tried it on. Granted, health club sales in the late 70's was not where many would have wanted to get their first taste of sales but it was a start, albeit a brutal one. Health club sales at that time was not a love it or leave it, I'll throw in a disount, proposition, like it is today. Nobody walked out alive or at least not with their dignity intact. It was a kill or be killed, 'what do you mean you can't make a decision without your husband', no holds barred kind of sales. The sales manager played by Alec Baldwin in Glengarry Glen Ross had nothing on the long nailed, red lipped, bouffant haired sales trainer that corporate sent down to train unsuspecting want-to-be sales reps like me. It was brutal, but it was the best.

Not only did it teach me what to do; but more importantly, what not to do in sales. I walked away from my intense weekend of sales training thinking to myself that I can make a fortune in this field, and I can do it my way. I became a student of the profession and I do mean profession. There are thousands of people claiming to be in sales today but only a small fraction are little more than order takers. The true salespeople out there build rapport, uncover needs and then produce solutions. When the contracts/agreements/orders are completed by these professional salespeople they are sitting across the desk from a very happy, satisfied and referral ready customer and friend. That is the mark of a truly professional sales person.

I have often looked back at all the years I spent sitting at the feet of the world's greatest sales trainers and wondered why I wasn't taught sales or at least given a chance to learn sales in school. I think it is because most schools don't take sales seriously. They confuse sales with order taking. They think that learning history, geography, math, etc. are more important. To those school administrators, educators and board members I say, "you are missing the entire point". To be truly good in sales you must be the epitome of a well rounded individual. You must be a good at listening, observing, asking questions, thinking ahead, learning from the past, adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing. You must know where you are at all times and where you are going. You must know how to set goals and establish to do lists. You must have intense follow through and the patience of Jo. You must know how t take care of yourself and those around you. You must be able make people feel comfortable, make them like you and trust you. You must be able to solve problems and create solutions that will make everyone involved happy. You must have faith. You must be a diplomat. You must be a truly good human being. How many graduates of high schools or colleges walk away with a diploma in hand with these attributes and then make money, really good money, by putting these attributes to work?

Teach Sales to kids? Absolutely! There is no better way to show them what is needed to be successful in life. I was told over 30 years ago that if I could become good in sales that I could always have a job. That sales trainer was right. Now, I just want to pay it forward. Look for a program called 'Sales Teens' to be rolled out in August of 2010.

'Tis The Season

2009-12-12T12:39:00.000-06:00

The Holiday Season is upon us. As a marketer, this is my favorite time of year. This is when most businesses pull out all of the stops to try and get the attention of those willing to part with their hard earned and even harder to hold onto cash. Each day is filled with real life examples that I can use with my clients on how NOT to market your products or services.

Here I am standing beside my mentor, Bob Burg, at a recent event he was presenting at in Dallas, Texas. Bob is always talking about giving before you get. That's the foundation of great marketing (and great anything else for that matter). You really have to 'give' value before a potential customer allows you to 'get' their hard earned cash. For more info on Bob visit http://www.burg.com/.

This holiday season why not give of yourself in time, attention or talent without expecting someone to reciprocate. If we all did this, the season -- and the world -- would be much happier.

Merry Christmas!

And now it's time to introduce yourself .... eeeeeek!

2009-10-25T17:03:00.000-05:00

We have all heard that the thing that most people are afraid of is speaking in public. I can attest to that. I have seen grown men come near tears when asked to give a brief presentation in front of their peers. These are the same men who tell jokes with wreckless abandon and have the entire office in stitches. There is just something about being serious and having to stand up in front of everyone that makes most adults feel faint.

As business owners or managers it's not the 30 minute presentation that comes our way most often. It is our 30-60 second introduction of ourselves at organizational meetings that get the best of us.

I thought it might help to share my 'How to give your 60 second marketing message' with you. Here it is.

How To Do Your 60 Second Marketing Message

1) Stand up, smile, speak clearly & do not rush

Always stand up. It makes it easier for people in the back or to the side of the room to see who is speaking. Speak clearly, don't mumble and for goodness sake --- don't rush! The rule of thumb should be if you rush then you have to do it all over again.

2) Introduce yourself & company

Say your name and the name of your company --- clearly, and get some volume going and keep smiling

3) Tell who you help (who needs you) & what you do to help them (to) & how you do it (by)

WHO: This is very important. Your target market, the people who purchase your product or your service -- in essence, the people who keep you in business are the people who NEED you -- who are they? You want to make sure that you tell your listeners who these people are just in case they are one of them or may know someone who is one of them.

TO: Next, you need to say what you do for them. They don't care what you do - they need to know what you do for them. Do you make them healthier, save them money, get them more customers, make them prettier? What is it that you do FOR them?

BY: And last, but not least. Tell your listeners how you do it. Start out with the word BY and follow it with a brief process.

4) Invite those who (or know someone who) needs you to contact you

You can start out with the words: "So if you are ___________ (this is the people who need you) please contact me to find our how I can _____________ (what you do for them).

5) Reintroduce yourself & company

Smile, say your name clearly and then the name of your company clearly

6) Quote your tag line, smile and take a seat

Tag line? You do have a catchy tag line right? If not, start working on one right now that tells people what you do or how you do it or why they need you. Something that will cause them to remember your message.

Smile, smile, smile. You are almost done. Finish talking before you start to sit. Then sit.

When you are finished - DO NOT lean over to the person next to you and say, 'Oh my God, I thought I was going to faint." Stay seated and act like you do this all the time and each time you get better and better.

That's it. Do you need an Elevator Speech (15 seconds)? Replace 4-6 with a memorable website
address or hand them your professional business card.

Please make sure that you have your business card on your ALL the time. You are marketing all the time, right? Also, take a look at your business card. What is it saying about you?

That's a blog for another day. Practice your Marketing Message in th mirror at least five times today. It wouldn't hurt to practice it all the time.

Smile and Tell the World why they should do business with you!

Being Brave

2009-10-20T06:07:00.000-05:00

“Courage is not the absence of fear but the judgment that something else is more important than fear. The brave may not live forever but the cautious do not live at all. For now you are traveling the road between who you think you are and who you can be.” Meg Cabot

I wake up every morning like thousands of other people in our county, look in my bathroom mirror, take a deep breath and resolve to be brave.

My act of everyday bravery isn’t about rushing into a burning building to save a life. It isn’t about placing myself in harms way for a citizen. It isn’t even about fighting off someone who is a potential threat to my loved ones. My act is a smaller act of bravery; but like those thousands of others who join me; my act is that I go beyond my comfort zone each and every day. I push myself to do something I am either uncomfortable with or not particularly wanting to do. I do something that scares me. I face my fear and that fear is being the ‘me’ that I was born to be.

“That’s not frightening,” you say. “What’s so fearful about being yourself?”

Well, if you believe, as I and many others believe, that you have a great destiny in this lifetime, that you were created for greatness and that you will never truly know your purpose in life until you reach that destiny; then you understand the ‘bravery’ that it takes each morning. Most of us have to be brave because we find ourselves seemingly ill equipped for this mission and that the faith that we are here for a purpose is our only weapon.

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Hebrews 11:1

My ‘fear of failure’, in this mission to reach my full potential, drives me to get out of bed on mornings when the rain is drizzling against my window pane, the sky is gray, the weather is cold, I am feeling weak and exhausted and I would like nothing more than to stay in bed with a good book and a hot cup of tea. It drives me to go help one more person, smile at one more passerby, go to one more meeting and shake one more hand.

You see, we ‘brave ones’ hear little voices in our heads that try to turn us back from our appointed missions. Those voices try to remind us that we have too much or not enough looks, brains, money, degrees, kids, spouses, friends, reputation, experience, health, energy, time or control.

We hear those voices and keep on going. We face our fears and do it anyway. Why? Because there is a stronger voice that nudges us towards our goals of being good providers, great parents, better spouses, mentoring bosses, loyal friends, successful business owners and the people we were born to be.

They do not give medals for this everyday type of bravery. There is nothing that someone can pin upon your chest or bestow upon you that pronounces that you bravely faced each day not knowing what would be ahead and yet you did it with a prayer and a smile. The only reward you may ever get for facing your fears and reaching your full potential are the final words, ”She made a difference.”

Go out and ‘Make A Difference’.

Monday Morning Meditation

2009-10-12T07:34:00.000-05:00

As a small business owner do you ever wonder why some of us are really successful and some of us are barely making it. Can I let you in on a little secret? Most of us are hanging by a thread.

Yes, most of us look successful on the outside but in reality we are one payment away from defaulting on the lease of our copier machine. Why is that? It's because most of us are doing everything ourselves, including trying to manage our money and keep up appearances. That's another topic for another day.

We go to chamber functions and give away door prizes that we can't afford to give away. We pick up the check for luncheons for possible clients or friends throwing down a credit card all the while praying that we don't go over our limit. We smile and tell everyone that we own our own business. On the outside we look successful but on the inside we wake up sweating in the middle of the night remembering something we should have done or worse yet, paid.

WHY do we do this? Because owning your own business is the American dream. It is our dream. There are far more cons than pros in owning your own business but the pros outweigh the cons. What? That doesn't make sense to you? Sure it does; if you really look at it.

Do this right now. Take a blank sheet of paper. Draw a large 'T on it. On the top left side of the T write pros. On the top right side of the T write cons. Then start filling in the space underneath both regarding owning your own business. On the cons side you might write 'haven't had a vacation in five years'. On the pros side you might have 'get to take 30 minutes when my kids come home from school to ask them about their day'. Thirty minutes a day with your kids far outweighs a one week vacation in the Bahamas in the long run. To you and to them.

You should do this once every quarter just to make sure that you are in business for the right reasons. If ever the cons start outweighing (not out-numbering but outweighing) the pros then you have to take a serious look at going back into the workforce and possibly working for someone else. If just the thought of that makes you cringe then keep looking for those pros.

Small Business Marketing Coach Tip: The best way to help you realize why you do what you do is to collect testimonials from your satisfied clients. Ask them to write down why they do business with you and why they continue to come back to you for your products and/or services. Share those with others through your marketing materials and your website. Read those testimonials on those days when you think working for yourself isn't everything you thought it was going to be and smile.

Be proud that you are living the American Dream. Congratulations! You are a business owner.

Who Needs to Market Themselves?

2009-09-26T12:46:00.000-05:00

The better question is who doesn't need to market? The answer is, no one.

"No one?" you ask, "Come on. There must be someone who doesn't need to market themselves?"

Really? The best case scenario I can think of is a business owner with a product or service that all people must have to sustain life and there is no other person who has that product or service and whose target market of customers lives within the same household. Even that requires some marketing because how will that potential customer know that you have or do what you have and do? The moment you say, "Did you know I have this?" you are marketing.

Even God has to market. If you think about it, all religions have a 'brochure' telling their 'customers' about the various features and benefits. Whether it is the Bible, Torah, Koran, etc. there is a marketing piece that brings those followers to them.

If God has to market, what makes you think that your small business doesn't?

We all need to think about what we have that we are marketing. Who benefits from it? Who doesn't? How close to our place of business do they need to live or work to be able to benefit from our product or service? Who could they be using right now to get the similar product or service and what makes that competitor different? The more questions we ask ourselves as small business owners the better informed we will be in knowing how to focus on the best target market that would benefit from using your product/service.