This is a guest post by Tom Harris, Your Marketing Coach. Tom helps entrepreneurs and small businesses develop and execute marketing plans. He specializes in website usability and effectiveness.This is a guest post by Tom Harris, Your Marketing Coach. Tom helps entrepreneurs and small businesses develop and execute marketing plans. He specializes in website usability and effectiveness.
I have a theory that many (most?) small business owners spend so much time trying to sell things that they don’t even have time to think about marketing. But of course we have to sell things. No choice about that, right? Right. And of course it’s true that actual “selling” activities generally have a quicker payback than marketing. Marketing is just too nebulous, takes too long, and results are too unpredictable and hard to measure. Come to think of it, maybe we’re not even totally sure what “marketing” is…
Let me give you my pet definition of Marketing: Imagine a continuum. At one end of the continuum is where nobody knows you exist. Nobody’s ever even heard of you, your company, or your products or services. At the other end is where you’re sitting down with a prospect and trying to close a sale. Marketing is everything that happens between those two points.
This definition suggests that we should spend a high percentage of our time on marketing.
But we still spend way too much of our time scrambling to find the next person that we can sell something to.
Michael Gerber, author of The E-Myth, talks about business owners who work IN their business when they need to be working ON their business. We could say that selling is working IN your business; and it’s certainly a pretty darned important function. But it’s a treadmill. Sell it, then build it, then deliver it. Repeat. Endlessly. When does the frantic search for new buyers abate? Answer: when marketing becomes the most important thing we have to do. It’s been said that when you do the job of marketing well enough, then there’s not very much selling that needs to be done.
We too often think this way: Here is what I sell, and, oh yes, I guess I need to do some marketing, don’t I?
We need to think this way: I’m a marketer, and this what I market.
We need to be marketers first and foremost and primarily.
Marketing is building relationships, becoming known, becoming an expert in your field, developing a reputation, creating a tribe of fans and followers. Marketing is working ON your business. It’s an investment, and yes, it has an uncertain and unpredictable return. But once a good, solid marketing program takes hold, it can develop a life of its own. That’s when people seek you out, and the frantic search grinds down.
And maybe then you can relax. Just a little.
This post was written by
Bliss in a Bubble – In the moment – my favorite place to be. As a creative outlet, I enjoy ‘Heavy Breathing Just Before Midnight‘ – a series of podcasts on fun, interesting, and random topics that I share. At InSights Group – I mastermind, coach, consult, and use Organic Marketing to empower businesses tell their stories to the world to become more productive and profitable – especially in the online world. I am also a coach and take on personal clients to help empower positive changes and growth within their lives and businesses. I have experience in many areas of philosophy and psychology including face reading, personality studies and motivation, as well as many holistic modalities such as Reiki Master, and core-conscious transformation. Ask the Pool Guy: I’m a partner in a trio of swimming pool companies from construction to service to online sales – we are changing the industry – and the experience of customers across the country – based in Brighton, MI.
John van de Linde says:
This is an excellent article, simple, but so true. Marketing is often overlooked by salespeople.
Michael Demeter says:
Marketing is 100% predictable and measurable, when doen correctly. The biggest problem is that most people DO NOT know how to market their business. If you only market your business through “Social networks or the internet, then yes I would agree that there is no predictability. Because you have to rely on your target demographic finding you. However if you provide real value that a targeted market needs, something that people can put their hands and head around and redeem for actual value, then you create predictability. I work with and coach 94 different clients. Each and every one of them has developed measurable and predictable results due to marketing. The second point I want to make is that when done correctly, selling is marketing and marketing is selling. Marketing is meant to show value in your unique product or service. When you “present your unique service offer” you are selling. It’s the difference between a cab ride and a limousine experience.