Contents at a Glance
Introduction 1
Part I: Getting Started with Small Business Marketing 9
Chapter 1: Framing the Marketing Process 11
Chapter 2: All About Customers 21
Chapter 3: Seeing Your Product through Your Customers’ Eyes 35
Chapter 4: Sizing Up Competitors and Staking Out Market Share .53
Chapter 5: Setting Your Goals, Objectives, Strategies and Budgets .63
Part II: Laying the Foundation for Marketing Success 75
Chapter 6: Taking Stock of Your Business Image 77
Chapter 7: Forging Your Brand 91
Chapter 8: Creating Marketing Communications That Work .107
Chapter 9: Hiring Help When You Need It 125
Part III: Marketing in a Screen-Connected World 139
Chapter 10: Establishing an Online Presence 141
Chapter 11: Getting Interactive with Social Media 159
Chapter 12: Packaging Your Message for Blogs and Other Online Channels 179
Part IV: Getting the Word Out with Ads, Mailers, Promotions and Publicity 193
Chapter 13: Creating and Placing Print and Outdoor Ads 195
Chapter 14: Broadcasting Your Message on Radio, TV and Online 215
Chapter 15: Snail-Mailing and Emailing Your Customers Directly 229
Chapter 16: Brochures, Promotions, Trade Shows and More .247
Chapter 17: Public Relations and Publicity 265
Part V: Winning and Keeping Customers 281
Chapter 18: Making Impressions through Networking and Presentations .283
Chapter 19: Making the Sale .293
Chapter 20: Enhancing Customer Service and Developing Loyalty 305
Part VI: The Part of Tens 321
Chapter 21: Ten Questions to Answer before Choosing a Business Name 323
Chapter 22: Ten Ways to Attract People to Your Business Online .329
Chapter 23: Ten Steps to a Great Marketing Plan 335
Index 341
Table of Contents
Introduction 1
About This Book 2
Foolish Assumptions .2
Icons Used in This Book .3
Beyond the Book .3
Where to Go from Here .7
Part I: Getting Started with Small Business Marketing 9
Chapter 1: Framing the Marketing Process 11
Seeing the Big Picture .12
Following the marketing wheel of fortune 12
Understanding the relationship between marketing and sales .13
Jump-Starting Your Marketing Programme 15
Marketing a start-up business 15
Growing your business .16
Scaling your marketing to meet your goal 16
How Small Business Marketing Is Different 17
Budget differences .17
Staffing differences 17
Creative differences .18
Strategic differences 18
The small business marketing advantage .18
Making Marketing Your Key to Success .19
Chapter 2: All About Customers 21
Anatomy of a Customer 22
Collecting customer information .22
Geographics: Locating your market areas 25
Demographics: Collecting customer data .26
Psychographics: Customer buying behaviour .28
Determining Which Customers Buy What 29
Viewing your sales by market segment 29
Matching customers with distribution channels .31
Catering to screen-connected customers .33
Small Business Marketing For Dummies
Chapter 3: Seeing Your Product through Your Customers’ Eyes .35
Getting to Know Your Product 35
When service is your product 36
Your product is what Google says it is .37
Illogical, Irrational and Real Reasons Why People Buy What You Sell .39
Buying Decisions: Rarely about Price, Always about Value .40
Calculating the value formula 41
Riding the price/value teeter-totter .41
Evaluating your pricing .43
Raising prices .43
Presenting prices .44
The Care and Feeding of a Product Line 45
Enhancing the appeal of existing products 46
Raising a healthy product .46
Developing new products .47
Managing your product offerings 50
Chapter 4: Sizing Up Competitors and Staking Out Market Share .53
Playing the Competitive Field 53
Speaking the language of competition 54
Knowing what you’re up against 55
Understanding how to compete .56
Winning Your Share of the Market 56
Defining your direct competition .56
Moving up the competitive ladder 58
Calculating Your Market Share 59
Sizing up your target market 59
Doing the sums .60
Increasing Your Market Share .61
Chapter 5: Setting Your Goals, Objectives, Strategies and Budgets 63
Where Are You Going, Anyway? 64
The ‘vision’ thing .64
Your statement of purpose .65
Success stories .65
Defining Goals and Objectives Simply 66
Setting goals and objectives .67
Planning strategies 67
Putting goals, objectives and strategies into action .68
Following the fail-safe planning sequence 68
Budgeting to Reach Your Goals .70
Realistic talk about small business marketing budgets 70
How much should you be spending? 71
Table of Contents
Part II: Laying the Foundation for Marketing Success 75
Chapter 6: Taking Stock of Your Business Image .77
Making First Impressions .77
Encountering your business through online searches .78
Arriving at your website .79
Managing email impressions 81
Arriving by telephone 82
Approaching your business in person 84
Auditing the Impressions Your Business Makes .88
Surveying your marketing materials and communications 88
Creating an impression inventory .89
Improving the impressions you’re making .90
Chapter 7: Forging Your Brand 91
What Brands Are and Do 91
Unlocking the power and value of a brand .92
Tipping the balance online .93
Building a Powerful Brand 93
Being consistent to power your brand .95
Taking six brand-management steps .95
Your Market Position: The Birthplace of Your Brand 97
Seeing how positioning happens .97
Determining your positioning strategy .98
Conveying Your Position and Brand through Taglines 99
Balancing Personal and Business Brands 100
Maintaining and Protecting Your Brand .102
Staying consistent with your brand message and creative strategy .102
Controlling your brand presentation 103
Chapter 8: Creating Marketing Communications That Work .107
Starting with Good Objectives .108
Defining what you want to accomplish .108
Putting creative directions in writing 109
Developing Effective Marketing Communications 114
Steering the creative process toward a ‘big idea’ .115
Brainstorming .116
Following simple advertising rules 117
Making Media Selections 118
Selecting from the media menu .118
Deciding which media vehicles to use and when 119
The Making of a Mass Media Schedule .121
Balancing reach and frequency 121
Timing your ads .123
Evaluating Your Efforts .123
Small Business Marketing For Dummies
Chapter 9: Hiring Help When You Need It .125
Reaching Out to Marketing Pros 125
When to bring in marketing experts 126
Who to call for help .126
What kind of expertise to hire 127
Choosing and Working with an Agency 128
Requesting agency proposals 129
Interviewing agencies 130
Preparing the client-agency agreement 131
Understanding agency fees .132
Working with your agency 133
Hiring Help for Website Creation 134
Looking for help .134
Getting clear about your needs 135
Interviewing website designers 136
Finalising your choice .136
Handing off the content 138
Part III: Marketing in a Screen-Connected World 139
Chapter 10: Establishing an Online Presence 141
Pulling People to Your Business Online .141
Setting Your Goals for Online Visibility 143
Claiming Your Online Identity 144
Registering for a domain name 144
Reserving your social media user name .146
Establishing Your Online Home Base .147
Website basics .147
Contact sites .148
Brochure sites 148
Support sites 148
Lead-generating sites .149
Mobile websites .149
E-commerce sites .151
Building Your Site 151
Cracking the site-building code .152
Incorporating attributes of a good site .153
Optimising your site for search engines .154
Evaluating the strength of your site 155
Promoting your site .156
Advertising Online .157
Banner ads 157
Pay-per-click (PPC) ads .158
Table of Contents
Chapter 11: Getting Interactive with Social Media .159
Benefiting from Social Media Activity .160
Getting Started in Four Necessary Steps 160
1 Define your objectives .160
2 Choose the name that you want to use across all social media networks 161
3 Develop your social media Bio .162
4 Set up an online home base 163
Diving into Social Media .163
Facebook .164
Twitter .165
LinkedIn .168
Google+ 169
Pinterest 169
Location-based and check-in sites .170
Rating and review sites .172
Announcing Your Social Media Debut 173
Keeping Your Social Media Efforts Active and Engaging 174
Sharing content 174
Becoming a content conduit 176
Getting conversational 176
Keeping an Eye on How You’re Doing .177
Monitoring your social media mentions .177
Measuring your social media effectiveness 177
Chapter 12: Packaging Your Message for Blogs and Other Online Channels 179
Joining the 200-Million Blog Contingent .180
Who blogs? .180
Why blog? .181
Launching a Blog .181
Getting started .182
Committing to a blog .183
Crafting your blog-post approach .184
Using blog posts as the backbone of your online content-distribution strategy .187
Adding video to blog posts .188
Cross-Promoting Off-line and Online Content 189
Turning news into content .189
Giving long life to presentations 190
Small Business Marketing For Dummies
Part IV: Getting the Word Out with Ads, Mailers, Promotions and Publicity 193
Chapter 13: Creating and Placing Print and Outdoor Ads 195
Writing and Designing Your Ads 196
Packing power into headlines 196
Writing convincing copy .198
Making design decisions .199
Translating ad production terminology 202
Making Sense of Print Media Rates .202
Placing Newspaper Ads 203
Scheduling your placements 204
Using small-budget, small-size ads 205
Requesting your ad placement 205
Finding value in the classified section 206
Placing Magazine Ads 207
Selecting magazines .208
Scheduling placements .208
Considering Yellow Pages, Directories and Their Digital Alternatives 210
Creating and placing print directory ads 210
Getting found in online directories 211
Using Billboards and Out-of-Home Ads 212
Chapter 14: Broadcasting Your Message on Radio, TV and Online 215
A Guide to Buying Airtime 216
Knowing some station and ad-buying terminology .216
Achieving broadcast reach, frequency and rating points 218
Bartering for airtime 219
Broadcast Ad Guidelines 220
Establishing your own broadcast identity 220
Writing your ad 221
Turning your script over to the producers 222
Producing Radio Ads .223
Producing TV Ads 224
Hiring professionals .225
Airing pre-produced manufacturer ads 225
Considering Infomercials 225
Logging In to Webinars .227
Chapter 15: Snail-Mailing and Emailing Your Customers Directly .229
Using One-to-One Marketing 230
Direct Sales: Do-It-Yourself Distribution .231
Marketing with Direct Mailers .232
Setting up for success with direct mail .232
Deciding between email and ‘going postal’ 233
Making your offer .234
Personalising your mailer .235
Table of Contents
Putting Surface Direct Mail to Work 236
Developing a great list .236
Creating your mailer 239
Sending your mailer .239
Following up .240
Keeping your list current 242
Knowing the difference between direct mail and junk mail .243
Email Marketing .243
Keeping your email legal and welcome .244
Rating your email marketing 244
Sending email that gets read and gets results .245
Chapter 16: Brochures, Promotions, Trade Shows and More .247
Publishing Brochures 247
Differentiating types of brochures .248
Copywriting 250
Designing and printing brochures .251
Getting brochures into the marketplace .253
Making the Most of Newsletters 253
Planning your newsletters 254
Packing newsletters with useful content 254
Producing and circulating e-newsletters 257
Finding Marketing Opportunities throughout Your Business .258
Turning your packages into ad vehicles .258
Building business with gift certificates .259
Getting good use out of business cards 260
Making the most of advertising specialties 261
Choosing and Using Trade Shows .261
Building Sales through Promotions 263
Chapter 17: Public Relations and Publicity .265
The Relationship between Public Relations and Publicity 265
Taking a wide-angle view of public relations .266
Focusing on publicity 267
Becoming a News Source 267
Creating a media kit and online media centre .268
Establishing and maintaining an all-important list of media contacts 269
Getting real with publicity expectations .270
Spreading Your News 271
Preparing news releases .272
Managing media interviews 277
Staging news conferences – or not 279
Crisis Communications: Dealing with Bad News .280
Small Business Marketing For Dummies
Part V: Winning and Keeping Customers 281
Chapter 18: Making Impressions through Networking and Presentations .283
Building a Far-Reaching Network 283
Making Introductions 285
Introducing yourself 285
Introducing your business 286
Polishing Your Presentation 288
Stepping up to the microphone .288
Presenting your proposal or product .289
Chapter 19: Making the Sale .293
Turning Prospects into Customers .293
Navigating the Sale Process .296
Selling redefined .297
Getting off to a good start .298
Negotiating mutually agreeable solutions 300
Watching for buying signals .302
Asking for the order .303
Making buying easy .303
Chapter 20: Enhancing Customer Service and Developing Loyalty 305
What Customers Want 305
The Fundamentals of Customer Service .306
Mastering the service cycle 306
Evaluating and improving service levels 307
Cultivating ‘best customers’ .308
Creating a customer service environment .310
Dealing with Concerns and Complaints 311
Understanding why customers don’t complain .311
Encouraging complaints .312
Reading customer clues to dissatisfaction .312
Turning complaints into loyalty springboards 313
Making Loyal Customers for Life .314
Valuing your customers 315
Benchmarking satisfaction levels and cultivating loyalty 316
Closing the quality gap 317
Building loyalty through service 318
Launching loyalty programmes .318
Table of Contents
Part VI: The Part of Tens 321
Chapter 21: Ten Questions to Answer before Choosing a Business Name .323
What Kind of Name Do You Want? 323
Is the Name You Want Available? 324
Is It Easy to Spell? 325
Is It Easy to Say? 325
Is It Original in Your Market Area? 325
Is It Unconventional? .325
Does It Work in Markets Far and Wide? 326
Is It Memorable? 326
Can You Live and Grow with This Name? 326
Are You Ready to Commit to the Name? 327
Chapter 22: Ten Ways to Attract People to Your Business Online .329
Commit to Becoming Findable Online 329
Set a Goal for Your Online Activity .330
Decide on Your Online Identity .330
Establish Your Online Introduction 331
Stake an Online Home Base 331
Build an Online Media Centre 332
Get Active Across Social Media .332
Develop a Content-Sharing Programme 333
Monitor Your Online Reputation .333
Get and Stay Active Online .334
Chapter 23: Ten Steps to a Great Marketing Plan .335
Step 1: State Your Business Purpose 336
Step 2: Analyse Your Market Situation .336
Step 3: Set Goals and Objectives .336
Step 4: Define Your Market .337
Step 5: Advance Your Position, Brand and Creative Strategy .337
Step 6: Set Your Marketing Strategies .338
Step 7: Outline Your Tactics 338
Step 8: Establish Your Budget 339
Step 9: Blueprint Your Action Plan 340
Step 10: Think Long Term .340
One Final Step: Use Your Plan 340
Index 341
ntroduction 1
Part I: Getting Started with Small Business Marketing 9
Chapter 1: Framing the Marketing Process 11
Chapter 2: All About Customers 21
Chapter 3: Seeing Your Product through Your Customers’ Eyes 35
Chapter 4: Sizing Up Competitors and Staking Out Market Share 53
Chapter 5: Setting Your Goals, Objectives, Strategies and Budgets 63
Part II: Laying the Foundation for Marketing Success 75
Chapter 6: Taking Stock of Your Business Image 77
Chapter 7: Forging Your Brand 91
Chapter 8: Creating Marketing Communications That Work 107
Chapter 9: Hiring Help When You Need It 125
Part III: Marketing in a Screen-Connected World 139
Chapter 10: Establishing an Online Presence 141
Chapter 11: Getting Interactive with Social Media 159
Chapter 12: Packaging Your Message for Blogs and Other Online Channels 179
Part IV: Getting the Word Out with Ads, Mailers, Promotions and Publicity 193
Chapter 13: Creating and Placing Print and Outdoor Ads 195
Chapter 14: Broadcasting Your Message on Radio, TV and Online 215
Chapter 15: Snail-Mailing and Emailing Your Customers Directly 229
Chapter 16: Brochures, Promotions, Trade Shows and More 247
Chapter 17: Public Relations and Publicity 265
Part V: Winning and Keeping Customers 281
Chapter 18: Making Impressions through Networking and Presentations 283
Chapter 19: Making the Sale 293
Chapter 20: Enhancing Customer Service and Developing Loyalty 305
Part VI: The Part of Tens 321
Chapter 21: Ten Questions to Answer before Choosing a Business Name 323
Chapter 22: Ten Ways to Attract People to Your Business Online 329
Chapter 23: Ten Steps to a Great Marketing Plan 335
Index 341
