Small Business Marketing

Learn how to spend less and find more customers by establishing an online presence

Several years ago I had the opportunity to see up close why a small business marketing plan is absolutely essential to survive.

My brother-in-law made the decision to leave his corporate job with the great salary to pursue a small business opportunity which he believed would give him what he wanted for himself and his family - a higher quality of life. He soon found out what many like him before had already painfully learned.

You need a constant flow of customers! But where do you find them?

At that time I had already been involved with internet marketing a year or so and was acutely aware that I had to constantly create a flow of targeted traffic to generate sales. I tried to share my insights with him but as with so many traditional small business owners the internet was just another mountain they had no time to climb.

As the months went by I would hear about the peaks and valleys he was experiencing that was wreaking havoc on his cash flow. Therein lies the point of my message. To succeed today as a small business owner you will need to develop a small business marketing plan and that plan must include a way to reach potential customers online.

Effective small business marketing for beginners

Effective Small Business Marketing for Beginners
By Keith Perrett

Effective small business marketing is the lifeblood of any small business. An unsettling high percentage of small businesses fold within the first year of operation with most of the first year survivors closing shop by the end of the third year.

One of the major reasons that small businesses fail is a cash flow crisis. Effective small business marketing is one of the few business tools available to a small business owner that GENERATES cash.

Effective small business marketing starts with being able to write a simple and practical marketing plan, specifically for your business. This marketing plan then forms the basis of all your marketing efforts and acts as a reference point when you have to decide between two or more courses of action.

The result of following a well constructed marketing plan is that all your different marketing efforts form part of a co-ordinated strategy aimed at attaining your predetermined goal. That is in stark contrast to the marketing efforts of most small businesses and immediately puts you ahead of the pack.

Effective small business marketing naturally comes with some challenges – and advantages. Challenges might include a lack of marketing savvy, a limited marketing budget, time constraints especially if you are a one person business and so on. Anyone who has run a small business should recognise the danger of spending too much time working in the business rather than on the business.

There are many advantages however in marketing a small business as opposed to a corporate giant. These include a lack of a hierarchy of decision makers, no red tape to fight through to get anything done, direct contact with your target market and many more.

Effective small business marketing should and can be the cornerstone of every small business. Your simple yet effective marketing plan is the map that will guide you out of the woods towards a profitable business, irrespective of the market segment you operate in.

Keith Perrett is a qualified Veterinarian and business owner. To learn how to write a really practical and effective marketing plan, visit The Marketing Manual

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Keith_Perrett
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You have a sharp-looking Web site, but nobody visits it

Unfortunately, most of us have come to believe if the "bells and whistles" look really professional and attractive it must do well for the business it represents. Therein lies your first mistake.

Now, if you're the type of small business owner that knows he/she doesn't have the time to build what is actually an effective website then you may have decided that you'll just forge ahead they way you've been doing until you hit paydirt.

I'd like to respectfully remind you of an accurate saying, "if you keep doing what you've been doing, then you'll keep getting what you've been getting".

Finding time to perform the essentials of running a business is certainly not easy. To succeed you have to be able to work "on your business", not "in your business". An online presence is one of the essentials that your business needs to avoid becoming a statistic.

So, if you don't have the time to build an online presence as part of your small business marketing plan and you can't distinguish an effective website from a "pretty" website, then what can you do?

You can have a website that looks good and actually works

What is the definition of a website that WORKS? Such a website...

>delivers targeted traffic from the search engines

>provides additional streams of income and leads

>can ease the stress of the "peaks and valleys" of your business

>establishes your own unique identity; sets you apart from competitors

>once it's up and running it actually creates more time for you to do other things

There is only one service that can create such a site for you. Actually, they have created more sites than anyone else that rank in the top 3% of all sites in the world. Some were designed for existing small business owners and others were designed by the entrepreneurs themselves as a means to support their family and leave their undesireable jobs.

You can find out more about this service at... small business marketing


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