Archive for the 'small business' Category

I’m a big fan of effective budgeting.  I don’t mean the old “use last year’s numbers and stick it in a drawer until next year” type of budgeting, but real world,  data based, flexible budgeting, the kind your entire profit plan is built around, the kind that, when done right and used effectively, would at least double and often triple the profit levels of most small businesses.  However, I find that many times people get tripped up on their marketing costs.

On one hand, marketing is an expense that needs to be controlled, just like all of your other expenses.  On the other hand, marketing is an investment, and the more you spend, the more you make.  Should your marketing costs be firmly budgeted, or should they be maximized for the greatest amount of sales in the shortest period of time?

Most businesses, including all successful businesses, have a marketing plan, but all too often that plan is missing a key ingredient – the holes.  Marketers get too focused on the product or service they are selling and they forget about their customer, and more importantly, exactly what their customer is looking for.  They forget about the holes!

So what’s a hole?  Remember that nobody buys a drill because they want a drill.  They buy a drill because they want holes.  The “hole” is the solution to your customer’s problem.  The “hole” is what you should be addressing in your marketing, not the drill.  The hole is what your customer is really looking for.

Being creative with your marketing can help attract a lot of attention to your ads, and when done well, can even create a buzz. There’s nothing better than when people like your ad so much, they tell all their friends to look for you ad.  They tell them where to find it in which magazine, TV show, or they post it in facebook and forward it in emails.  They spread the word for you, for free, to people that trust them.  It’s modern day word of mouth advertising, and there’s nothing more effective.

Just one word of warning – don’t get so caught up in the creative side of your advertising that you lose sight of your core message.  After all, if your ads don’t make an effective offer to the consumer, then you’re really paying for brand recognition, and most small businesses can’t afford an effective brand recognition advertising campaign.