Author name: richardbritton

Owners and managers of small businesses are generally preoccupied with the pressures and demands of keeping their show on the road day-by-day: Trying to collect money owned, solving operational problems and dealing with the red tape which is the curse of modern business and a huge barrier to entrepreneurship. And these pressures risk crowding out the job of taking a disciplined look at marketing – if and how their business is being promoted through the various channels available to them. Book after book has been written about marketing (indeed, I have written one myself) but too often these tend to be academic and theoretical and simply do not meet the more practical down-to-earth needs of small businesses. So in this short article I want to get back to basics. I want to present just three insights which, in my opinion, provide the essential building blocks of the successful promotion of any small business. Marketing is not just selling ‘Selling’ means the face-to-face engagement or telephone contact with a prospective customer. A good salesperson learns to ‘read’ the body language of their prospect, their verbal responses, and to anticipate and cut off lines of objection and adjust their pitch in response to all those signals. It’s much harder if you can’t deal with the prospective customer face-to-face or even voice-to-voice and have to reply on printed or digital sales messages. The production of effective sales material is a skill any businessman can learn but they must accept that it IS a ‘skill’ and can’t be taken casually. I hope I shall have the opportunity to post other articles about the production of effective printed and digital sales material. ‘Marketing’ is much wider than just selling. Press releases, advertising, website, social media, printed matter, sponsorships, mail or email shots, all present marketing opportunities to consider. Marketing also means looking at all aspects of your business operation and thinking about whether they collectively presents an overall forceful, consistent and accurate impression of how you want your business to ‘look and feel’ to your customers and prospects. Your vehicles, showroom and offices, how the telephone gets answered, your sales material and the way staff engage with enquirers, all present opportunities to promote your company. Is the use of colour and logos consistent everywhere? Does your sales material present the information your prospects need? (More about that in a moment.)   Set aside a couple of hours (OK I know that’s easier said than done) to do a ‘marketing audit’ of your business. Try to see it as a prospective customer would see it and consider what negatives a prospect would see or feel and what upsides you could introduce. You will be surprised at how many opportunities to promote your business you discover. Which brings me on to my next point Think like a Buyer, not a Seller How often do you see a tradesperson’s van signwritten like this: Prospective buyers of Tom’s services will only register his name as they pass his van. Is anyone searching for “Tom Jones”? Who is he anyway? What does he do? Why should I care? And the sales opportunity is missed. Surely, something like: is more likely to catch prospects’ attention? That’s because the advertisement is addressing the needs of a prospective customer. It doesn’t promote Tom as a SELLER of a service; it appeals to the BUYER. This idea of trying to put yourself into the headspace of your prospective customer is a fundamental part of marketing. Which takes me on to my third point What’s in it for me? Buyers buy a product or service to meet a NEED or a WANT – even if they were not previously aware of wanting something that want can be stimulated by effective advertising or other sales material. So by thinking like a buyer, not a seller, your can design promotional material – websites, advertisements, brochures, flyers – so it quickly catches the attention of a prospective customer by answering their sub-conscious question “What’s in it for me?” “Why should I bother to read any further?” In marketing terms it’s known as “Selling the sizzle, not the steak”. It’s the promotion of the benefit to the buyer and not the technical characteristics of the product or service which will make the sale. We shall need to consider how to catch the prospects’ attention; how to retain their interest and how to convert that interest into action – whether it’s making a buying decision or making an enquiry.  This is at the very heart of successful advertising whether in printed or digital form. I’ll enlarge on these vital techniques in later posts so subscribe to get my ideas for the successful growth of your small business. They’re FREE.SUBSCRIBE USING MY CONTACT PAGE