Some small business owners have the subjects of sales and marketing confused.

The essence of marketing is to send out communications that make people aware of your products or services, and to make them want your product or service. This is different from sales, which is what you do once you have a prospect, to get that person to agree to purchase a product or service.

So marketing is the first step, sending out communications to create want for the product or service. One is trying to get people to respond to you, either by calling, or walking in, or sending back a response card in the mail, or filling out a form on a web site. Marketing is often terribly neglected by small business owners. But business owners who consistently market their businesses are the ones with the more successful businesses.

Marketing can be accomplished through many different media, such as newspaper ads, magazine ads, web sites, search engine advertising, promotional emails, direct mail, fliers, posters, door hangers, and even phone calls to current or prospective customers.

Perhaps you feel like you can’t afford to do any marketing. Perhaps you had a bad experience with placing an expensive ad or sending out an expensive mailing that didn’t get much (or any) response. Or you had an expensive web site created but it doesn’t produce any leads or sales. Maybe you concluded that marketing “doesn’t work.”

Effective marketing DOES work. But what are the keys to effective marketing?

1. Surveying customers or prospects to find out what they really need and want
2. Using the survey results in your promotion, in order to get people to respond
3. Finding out what type of promotional media works best for your business
4. Sending out consistent promotion
5. Track the results of your promotional efforts

I’ll talk about each point in more detail.

Surveying Customers: It’s vital to find out exactly what your customers or prospects need and want from your business. There a number of ways to survey customers or prospects, such as calling them on the phone, surveying them while they are in your store, or putting a form up on your web site. I cover this more fully in my book “The Small Business Success Manual.”

Using the Survey Results: Once you have done a number of surveys, take the results and find out what the majority of people said, and figure out a way to say that in your promotion. It will most often come down to a benefit that your customers or prospects want, that your service or product delivers, or sometimes they will voice a problem that your product or service solves.

Finding the Best Promotional Media: This requires some experimentation. Try to experiment in relatively small quantities. Another tip is to observe your successful competitors, and see what media they use to promote. If they are using certain media successfully and consistently, then chances are that medium will work well for you. Then when you find something that works well, that is the time to pour the coals on.

Promoting Consistently: Once you find a medium or several media that work well for you, the key is to promote consistently, i.e. every week or every month. One mailing, one ad, will probably not do very much. It usually takes multiple communications from you to your potential customers to get them to buy from you for the first time. Plus when you promote consistently, you demonstrate your longevity, keep your company in the prospect’s mind, and make it safe for the prospect to buy from you.

Track the Success: Once you have promotion going out, it is important to track how many people are responding to it. This is hard in some cases, but you must make an effort. Have the person who receives sales calls or handles customers ask each person how they heard of the company, or if anything prompted them to call or come in. Once you find out that a certain promotional item is working well, continue it. If it isn’t, then discontinue that and create a new one.

With these basics applied, your marketing will be effective and it will drive business in.


Stan Dubin is the author of “The Small Business Success Manual.” This 200-page book contains new and innovative tools to help you increase your income and expand your business. For more information on this book, go to http://www.EffectiveBusinessTools.com.