Small Business Consulting for the Self-Employed
I had a tough discussion with a client yesterday. She needs to hire a marketing manager, but would rather find a person who knows her narrowly niched target audience intimately and then teach them marketing skills. I suggested to her that she turn it around. It would be far easier to first find a marketing expert who had all the skills she needed …
Can You Explain Your Target Audience in 15 Minutes?Read More
In the 1950s television show, Lucy has one overriding goal: to break into show biz and to get Ricky to put her in his nightclub act. The thousands of wacky and inventive ways she went about trying to achieve this goal is what made the TV show so hilarious. Here's what Lucy can teach you about marketing There are no silver bullets, no magical "one …
The purpose of analyzing your web site statistics is to look for trends and to research the success level of your marketing campaigns. The numbers themselves can be misleading, as statistical packages count “hits” in different ways. If someone visits a page on your site doesn’t mean that they read it completely. The idea with web site …
Many small business owners say they "hate" marketing. How can that be? Without marketing, a small business will fail. Here's my analogy: Marketing is like diapers. No one leaps for joy at the prospect of changing the baby's diapers, but everyone wants a healthy, happy baby, so they do the work they dislike because they want the …
For some business owners, it’s a struggle to clearly explain what it is you do, especially if your business is unique or you are trying to stand out in a crowded marketplace. Often, we explain what we do, but not how it’ll benefit the person we’re talking to. We need a clear way of saying, “This is what I offer and this is how it will help …
Much of marketing is about persuasion. Note that I do not say "manipulation." That's the kind of marketing we all hate. Dictionary.com defines the verb "to persuade" like this: 1. to prevail on (a person) to do something, as by advising or urging: We could not persuade him to wait. 2. to induce to believe by appealing to reason or understanding; …
