Marketing for Small Business

Marketing & advertising is an area where countless small business owners frivolously spend their hard-earned money. Avoid the 6 Biggest Mistakes Small Businesses make in Marketing & Advertising:

1. No marketing plan; sporadic marketing & advertising without a strategy
2. Marketing & Advertising to the masses, versus focused marketing to your business’ specific target market
3. Continuing to throw money at marketing & advertising that is not working
4. Utilizing the wrong metrics to measure your advertising and marketing results; Sales pay the bills, not ‘Likes’
5. Attempting to use marketing shortcuts (buying followers, 3 Easy Step methods, marketing gimmicks, etc.)
6. No marketing budget (even great products & services won’t sell themselves)

Marketing & advertising is crucial for startups and small businesses, especially in ultra-competitive markets like restaurants, retail, and household service providers. However, just as you wouldn’t buy inventory or new equipment to every salesperson who calls on your business, neither should you buy into every marketing option presented to you as a business owner. Doing so would be like planting a garden by throwing seeds into the wind and hoping for the best. Instead, we recommend a small business owner take a strategic and systematic approach, first deciding what types of marketing and advertising are best for your specific business, products & services and target markets. Next, develop a strategy for how you plan to accomplish your marketing goals, and what measures/metrics you will use to declare a ‘success’ or ‘failure’. Hint: Letting a salesperson who is trying to sell you advertising or marketing-related services define what your business’ goals or metrics should be is a classic example of the fox guarding the hen house.

Realizing that most small business owners know very little about social media marketing, SEO, and the tens of thousands of advertising and marketing options available to you as a business owner, it is easy to default to ‘no marketing’ or a ‘marketing in haste’ mindset. Instead, roll up your sleeves and start bench-marking your competition, asking other trusted business owners what marketing methods they use and suggestion, and lastly ask independent experts in forums like our ‘Ask the Experts’ forum exclusive to the My Business Coach members.

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TAKEAWAY: Approach advertising & marketing like you would planting a garden, think through what you want your results to be, then buy into (plant the seeds) that will best deliver your intended results, stay organized and continue nurturing your efforts, and remove the barriers or poorly performing efforts (the weeds) from your plan.