'I want to get more customers and make more sales but I don't have a big marketing budget and nobody knows that I'm here.'
The thing about this plaint is that it assumes that big-dollar marketing — which translates into things like direct mail campaigns and email marketing campaigns and expensive media buys and equally expensive PR professionals — is the best way for microbusiness owners to reach their customers.
But how accurate is that assumption? Well, for starters, who are your customers? If you sell to other businesses, then the odds are that most of your best prospects are other microbusinesses. In that case, as we learned from the recently released survey from Small Business Trends, the most effective way to reach your target market is through referrals and networking (offline), and SEO and your web site copy (online).
Referrals and networking and search engines are also pretty effective ways of reaching consumers. Overall, getting people talking about you and your products/services is both more effective and more practical for microbusinesses looking to market their wares. You just have to be creative about how and where and how wide to cast your net.
Then, too, there is this interesting insight from marketing maven Mary Schmidt:
| [S}pending big bucks on high-gloss marketing also doesn’t guarantee success. Ask any of the big companies who’ve spent billions and billions over the years on ad campaigns and such – and are still fighting toe-to-toe for customer mind share and shelf space. Does anybody really care if Coke wants to buy us a Coke? Or, that Cindy Crawford loves Pepsi? |
Food for thought, wot?
Besides the question of efficacy, recall that those expensive marketing methods may be standard operating procedure for larger firms but that's no reason to assume that they are the best available options for microbusinesses. We don't do anything else like the big boys do. Why should our optimal marketing methods be any different?
What's required is undoubtedly training yourself to be innovative, pondering marketing from the Punchline Perspective. What are you trying to accomplish? And, within the context of your available resources, what is probably the most effective way of doing that?
While we're trying to put together the marketing puzzle for our own businesses and products and target markets, we should all remember that tried-and-true is not necessarily the way to go. And, for any activity under the sun, just because that's the way everybody has always done it is a pretty piss-poor reason why you should do it now.
]]>Here's the latest interesting thing Syracuse has come up with:
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There are a number of interesting movies that can teach us about entrepreneurship. In fact, some of our greatest films, such as Citizen Kane, chronicle the lives of real or fictional entrepreneurs. An interesting new project based at Syracuse University, Lessons from Hollywood, hopes to be more systematic about linking films to entrepreneurship education. Syracuse’s Whitman School of Management is sponsoring a competition to find the best and most effective movie clips that portray key aspects of the entrepreneurial process. The competition is open to all, and the winner will receive a grand prize of $1,000. Through the competition and their own research, the Syracuse team plans to develop a movie clip database that can be utilized by entrepreneurship educators around the world. Contest submissions are due by March 1, 2006.
To learn more about the Lessons from Hollywood project and the Entrepreneurship-Movie Clip Database (E-MCD) at Syracuse University, visit http://whitman.syr.edu/eee/falcone/film/index.html |
Then, as is my custom, I'll release my 2005 Legislative Report on the following Monday (December 19th, and it will be available for free download to all the interested), and then we'll both be free to hit all those holiday parties.
Well, that's not really accurate. I'll still be here because this is the time of year when I do all my major programming and coding projects, and when I work on any new product enhancements or features for the Journal.
And the annual ritual hard drive format and re-install of everything. But I digress.
I will also still be updating here at The Journal Blog, so that The MicroEnterprise Journal does not fall entirely silent.
I'd feel badly if I completely abandoned you.
]]>That's what Patricia Keefe wrote today on the Information Week Blog, and it's something I see and hear again and again.
In fact, it's my unsupported hypothesis that one reason why microbusinesses have been able to successfully compete online is because they tend toward real-live-human customer service in an environment in which consumers are getting tired of automated customer service hell.
Even if they do occasionally use an autoresponder for this and that, micros believe in the personal touch. To the typical microbusiness owner, every customer is important and we generally are not shy about letting them know that. (I'm resisting the temptation to throw in a line from a certain Barbara Streisand '60s Easy Listening classic.)
One of the things that lets micros grow without growing is that they outsource various back office functions. But I hope that they won't elect to outsource their customer service to the point that they become indistinguishable from the Amazon.com's and the PayPal's of the world, where you can't get a human being on the phone to save your reason when you have a problem.
Recognize your competitive advantage and stick to it.
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Get ready for a strong fourth quarter, say American small-business owners, whose upbeat views of the days ahead triggered a nearly-four-point jump in the October NFIB Small-Business Optimism Index to 103.7 and confirmed previous findings that recent hurricanes had little effect on the nation’s overall economy.
-snip- "The job creation outlook is very good and the fourth quarter should produce solid employment gains,” said NFIB Chief Economist William Dunkelberg. More firms plan to create new jobs than at any time since the dot-com boom. Except for agriculture and retail trades, hiring plans were solid in all industries with financial services and construction topping the list, followed by professional service firms. Regionally, South Atlantic states were the strongest. |
On the other hand, check out the latest results from the monthly International Profit Associates Small Business Research Board (IPA SBRB):
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Confidence in the general economy has eroded. Just 26% of those surveyed say they expect the economy to improve over the next twelve months. This compares to 53% who said the economy would improve at the beginning of the year and 43% who thought the economy would improve in an IPA SBRB survey in July.
-snip- "Small business is worried about the outlook for the economy and their businesses," said Gregg Steinberg, President of International Profit Associates ... . "With a wide range of growing concerns, business owners and entrepreneurs must take stock of how they are managing their businesses. Those that are not currently controlling and maximizing every aspect of their business may be in for a very daunting ride." |
Who's right? Only time will tell. Check back with me in January.
]]>| Here's how Microsoft's strategy will work. Currently, for small businesses to get the most out of Microsoft Office applications like Outlook e-mail software and collaboration tools, they need to buy and maintain the corresponding Exchange and SharePoint server software, without which the desktop software isn't nearly as powerful. For many small-business owners, though, that expense is too high, so rather than buy server software, they opt for hosted services from ISPs, many of which use open-source e-mail and Web-server software and applications instead of Microsoft products. |
That says to me that there are still a lot of people who don't really understand why microbusinesses go with the software-as-a-service route. It's not that the full functionality software is too expensive. It's that the full functionality software comes with full functionality — that is, lots of bells and whistles that micros don't need.
That and, of course, since so many micros aren't geeks and don't have geeks on staff, it's just eaiser for them.
Then there's this:
| So why does Microsoft want to get into the low end of the small-business market? When young companies start with open-source technologies, they tend to stick with them as they grow. If Microsoft can hook small-business owners and IT managers with its own, cheaper hosted services, it can then sell them more expensive and lucrative enterprise server software products as those small businesses grow into large ones. |
See, Microsoft isn't really interested in the microbusiness market. They are interested in the growth oriented small business market. They are not the same thing.
So, it'll be interesting to see how this ploy works out for the big M.
]]>Yesterday, House Small Business Committee Chairman Don Manzullo (R-IL) and Congressman John Mica (R-FL), who are concerned about the trade deficit, introduced legislation that hopes to "reform U.S. trade assistance and promotion programs to help U.S. companies sell more of their products overseas."
According to the press release distributed yesterday by Chairman Manzullo's staff, the U.S. Export Promotion Act (no bill number yet) would
No word yet on how much this measure would cost. As for the other question — if passed, would it help? — well, that's possible but unlikely.
Not too long ago, Advocacy published research that indicated that one of the biggest obstacles for small business would-be exporters is the amount of paperwork and administrative waltzing about required to get into exporting, particularly if you're sending any quantity of goods overseas.
From a paperwork point of view, it's a lot easier to sell and ship a pair of shoes to France than it is to ship several pallets of shoes to France.
This measure doesn't appear to do anything to address the paperwork issue, so I don't know how useful it's going to be.
]]>Why? Because, according to Information Week, Sony is so paranoid about music piracy that they've included a hacker's tool called a rootkit "on selected CDs" that exposes its own customers to some pretty severe security vulnerabilities.
As IW editor Mitch Wagner opines:
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The Sony software is, plain and simple, spyware, by any reasonable standard of the word. It installs itself without users' knowledge, it runs in stealth mode, it damages the user's system, and it resists removal.
Sony's tactic isn't just a problem for consumers; it's also a problem for business network managers. Employees often enjoy listening to music while at work, and an employee who innocently brings in a CD that's infected with Sony's copy protection can open a security hole to the entire network. |
Talk about a lawsuit waiting to happen! That is, if the Justice Department doesn't get to them first.
I don't know about you, but I won't be buying any Sony music CDs anytime soon.
]]>Ford Motors is bragging about all the kewl gizmos it comes with -- a printer, digital camera and even a credit card scanner, according to the article. Of course, since Ford cut a deal with Microsoft, you'll be stuck with Windoze XP but you might not be one of those folks (like me) who feel that Microsoft hasn't published any decent software since 3.1.
Nevertheless, it's a fun looking gadget, isn't it? It's going to be offered as a dealer-installed accessory that will become available sometime in 2006. My geekish spouse tells me that car computers is "old hat" in his geek circles, but it's still pretty cool looking.
I can't help wondering, though, how much it adds to the cost of the truck.
]]>Not that Democrats should start dancing in the streets just yet. While Gallup found that Americans say the country would be better off if the Dems controlled Congress, an ABC News/Washington Post poll found that they are also saying that the Democrats are too disorganized to offer any clear ideas and they have no strong leaders.
All of which reduces to this: the midterm elections next year may well be the Democrats' to lose.
And if the Democrats remain true to recent form and are unable to get their collective act together, that's exactly what they'll do.
]]>In the context of federal contracting in the rebuilding of the storm ravaged Gulf Coast, the Bush Administration had a golden opportunity to simultaneously help local firms get back on their feet, create work for locals who have been seriously economically damaged by the storms, and gain some much-needed PR brownie points by at least appearing to give a damn about the minorities his party has been trying to make inroads with.
Instead, they use the opportunity to toss still more money toward Halliburton. Geez, these guys just can't seem to help themselves!
They always love small businesses (and minorities, too) when they're looking for votes. And they continue to love small businesses, too ... just as long as they don't get in the way of corporate profits.
]]>That's because I'm told that the House Small Business Committee is not going to be webcasting their hearings anymore for the foreseeable future.
They didn't offer any explanation for this. Taken in the best possible light, maybe they don't have anybody on staff with the technological know-how to deal with those audio webcasts anymore.
Or if you want to look at it in a more sinister fashion, maybe they've decided that they are going to be like the White House and dispense with transparency.
The bottom line is that, if I can't get down there for the hearing, I won't be able to offer much more than I can get from press releases and after-the-fact interviews.
From my point of view, this is typical of the change of mood in Washington over the past several years, during which it seems that there are too many people at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue who don't want too many people watching what they do too closely.
]]>I can sit here and prate about how microbusinesses are changing the economy and the world, but if that level of economic keystone-ness is more of a burden than microbusiness owners want to bear, then perhaps they will be unwilling to assume the mantle of "engine of the U.S. economy," political rhetoric notwithstanding.
See, part of being an engine is that you make noise when something isn't working.
Microbusiness owners, as a group, don't want to make noise. They prefer not to attract attention to themselves in any context that doesn't have to do with making a sale.
They often feel frustrated at policy makers who can't seem to figure out how to address problems when the solution seems "so obvious." But they also tend to be too intimidated (or something) to use their famous innovative thinking to find ways to make themselves heard.
Or maybe they see themselves as too busy to be bothered.
I got to thinking about this when I read this post over at Seth Godin's blog.
You see, what's needed is abundant thinking by business owners about how policy effects their businesses.
If you look around and decide that there's a policy issue around your business that needs fixing, you can think, "If I make a stink about this, what will happen if I'm wrong? What if nobody pays attention to me? What if partisan hacks chew me up and spit me out on talk radio?"
Or you can think, "If I make a stink about this, maybe I can show them how to solve this problem, not just for me but for all us microbusiness owners."
When those policy-oriented challenges gum up the works, are you a big enough engine to squeak?
]]>The trouble I've always had with President Bush is that he says pretty things but his subsequent behavior makes it very clear that he doesn't mean any of them.
The problem I've had with the voting public in recent years is that so many people don't seem to care what President Bush actually does, so long as he keeps saying those pretty words that make them feel good (or whatever it does for them).
But I also believe it's a bad thing for the country when a real sense of civic pride and community is replaced by the self-centeredness and the corrosively cynical partisanship we've all witnessed over the past five years.
I vote for a return of civil society. How about you?
]]>We get so wrapped up in producing our product that we forget about the need to run our businesses.
Or maybe we don't forget. Maybe we just decide that the numbers and the dollars-and-cents stuff is just no fun, so we avoid it as much as we can.
That can be a mistake. Especially when the short and/or long term prospects for the economy are shaky, it pays to plan.
I've just spent a few days here working up my 2006 budget and cash flow projections. I think it would be more fun to have my fingernails pulled out slowly, one by one. But, now it's done, I have good ideas of when I'm going to need extra cash for upcoming projects and where that cash will come from. And I have some sales and revenue goals to shoot for.
Once again, I'm reminded of that pearl of wisdom shared by SBA Administrator Hector Barreto: you get what you measure.
If you avoid doing your business chores, then you're measuring nothing. And, if you measure nothing, nothing may well be what you end up with.
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