Smart Marketing

Vertical marketing benefits

Vertical marketing is a term often used to define a company's marketing approach that concentrates on specific vertical markets, or niches. Vertical marketing benefits a small business because it:

• Forces your small company to focus its marketing efforts. By targeting using vertical marketing principles, you’ll be challenged to find vehicles that appeal to this audience.

• Focuses your messaging. Vertical marketing companies become the established experts in a field by speaking the focused and targeted language that a vertical marketing buyer wants to hear.

• Increases word-of-mouth and referrals. Vertical marketing buyers will willingly pass along information from a valued provider when they recognize that you know what you're talking about. Nothing promotes word-of-mouth faster than being an established expert in a vertical marketing field.

For more information on vertical marketing, see my article called Vertical Marketing vs. Horizontal Marketing; Which is right for you?

Some book reviews from Eric Dondero

Eric Dondero is a successful blogger who recently reviewed my two books The Marketing Toolkit for Growing Businesses and Stand Out from the Crowd.

His review is called "Two Good Books for Online Marketing" and he goes into how the books have helped him with his websites and blogs...

Find marketing tips and articles

Looking for a place to find marketing tips and articles? A lot of small business owners struggle to find the best sites that feature practical, usable marketing tips and articles. Here are a few of my favorites:

• Marketing Profs - Over 240,000 marketers belong to this fabulous site, so you know it features great content. Some of it is premium content (ya gotta pay).
• About Marketing - Laura Lake is your guide to marketing at this rich site and you'll be amazed at the amount of articles and tips featured. 
• Writing & Speaking Articles for Consultants - Located at Management Consulting News' site, these articles and tips focus on marketing a consulting practice.
• Emerge Marketing's Free Marketing Tips & Articles - My site features a bunch of free marketing articles, a Marketing Lingo section, and a bookstore.

These are just some of my favorite sites off the top of my head. Alright supermarketers, which ones have I left off that need to be added...?

Top Marketing books for small business marketing

Often I'm asked what the top marketing books are for small business that I recommend. Small business owners don't have a lot of time on their hands, so they want to know what the top marketing books are so they can get the information they need without a lot of wasted time.

So I've created a page on my website called Marketing Books for Small Business. Check it out and if there are some I've missed, leave me a comment...

PS -  The first two books are mine, but based on reader feedback, I still feel good about including them on the Top Marketing Books for Small Business list.

Do you want business growth? Try publicity

One secret to business growth in today's media-driven world is to get publicity. Most small business owners who are looking for business growth eventually find publicity to be among their favorite friends. Why?

Because publicity will help your business growth by:

• Increasing awareness significantly
• Generating new leads
• Establishing credibility for your business
• Earning more trust from your buyers and
• Gaining approval in the eyes of your investors, employees or vendors.

I'll get into all of these business growth benefits at a later date, but for now the lesson is this: if you want business growth, turn to publicity.

One great tool is to help you with this is PRLeads. This service matches you (or key executives from your business) with reporters and editors who are looking for sources they can quote in stories they're writing.

Hard to believe? I thought that too, at first. But then I joined PRLeads and was fielding queries from reporters and editors the very next day. So far since joining several years ago, I've been quoted in Entrepreneur Magazine, Inc Magazine and about a hundred other publications.

One secret to business growth is publicity and the secret to publicity is appearing in the press often. PRLeads will help you do that.

Definition of Marketing

I'm often asked to give my definition of marketing. In The Marketing Toolkit for Growing Businesses, I outlined what I thought was a very good definition of marketing. See what you think.

Do you agree with this definition of marketing:

"Marketing is a process where everyone in your company pursues actions, at designated contact points, to increase sales, grow profits and deepen relationships"

If not, what else is needed to round out this marketing definition?

Small business marketing plan tip #2

Most small business owners, when writing a marketing plan for their small business, seem to trip up on their elevator speech. That's the small audio commercial you tell others right after they ask you "What do you do for a living?"

Basically, your elevator speech needs to 1) start with a hook (to grab a listener's attention)  2) follow with a strong specialization statement ("I specialize in...") and finish with a benefits statement (that clearly communicates how your company makes people's  lives easier).

Being face-to-face with a potential buyer is a defining moment for your company. The buyer listens intently to see if you have something they need, and almost as importantly, they listen to see if you can communicate it effectively.

One of the best resources for developing your elevator speech on the market today is Robert Middleton's InfoGuru Manual. In it, he walks you through, step-by-step, exactly how to craft an  elevator spech (he calls it an Audio Logo) for your company. The manual also covers many other topics (generating referrals, web site promotion, email marketing, giving speeches, writing articles, etc) that are easy to follow. But, I am specifically drawn to  Robert's chapter on Audio Logos, because so few marketing resources out there cover it.

If you're a service professional that's serious about growing your business, take a look at Robert Middleton's InfoGuru Manual today.