Marketing 101 (part one)

by James Fowler
www.mywebsource1.com

According to the Small Business Association, the latest statistics show that 66% of businesses will survive two years and 44% will survive through five years.1 This is a far cry from when we were told 95% of all small businesses would fail before they five years old. Still, there are some things that you should know about marketing if you are going to be successful in business.

By now I am sure that you realize that running a business is much different than selling a hobby or service in which you have interest. There are dozens of other factors that go into making a business successful that few consider when taking on a venture. One of these aspects is marketing to the public.

What is marketing to you? Most people will say that it is selling a product through advertisements, e-commerce, television commercials, radio spots, or brochures. These are only the vehicles in which the marketing message is delivered. Marketing is simply a two-way communication between seller and buyer. Marketing enables you to sell more efficiently, not the actual sale.

Companies often consider marketing to be some mutant outgrowth of their sales department. This is the wrong way of utilizing your marketing. While marketing deals with the end user, it is not a sales position. That’s why you hire a sales executive.

Likewise, a sales person is not a marketer. No matter what your business, the paradigm of the sales person is wrong for your marketing. The way the sales person thinks is to have a goal to “get” business. The marketer doesn’t think of “getting” anything. The marketer’s goal is to build a relationship and understanding with the customer so that trust can be established with your business. Once this is done, the buyer will buy and the salesman can “get” their sale.

That trust is a very precarious thing to attain. It takes time and patience to build and it can be destroyed in a matter of seconds.

Although sales is viewed as a competitive field it is important to remember that the customer is not your enemy. In other words, the person buying your product or service is not something to be overcome. By looking at the sale in an adversarial context, the focus is placed on the sales person and not on the person who wants to do the buying.

And that is exactly what people want to do. They want to buy. They like buying things. They’d like to buy things that make them feel good and special. When they walk away from a sale they want to feel like they made a good decision. A smart marketer will know how to make that person feel special. They know how to present your product or service.

Successful marketing is about developing a successful relationship with your customer. Remember that this will take time, it will take nurturing, and it takes the right understanding of the people who want to buy from you.