Small Business Odyssey – Page 8 – Real world advice and tips for small business marketing

December 26, 2011

7 Major Changes in Small Business Marketing in 2011

As 2011 comes to a close, it is instructive to reflect on the massive changes to small business marketing that occurred during the year and to look at their implications. These changes were driven by a number of landmark events that spawned innovations.

One of the key drivers of the changes that small business marketing confronts today, and into 2012, is the direct competition between Google and Facebook for Number One position on the Internet (and all the revenue that goes with this position). The impact of this competition is being felt throughout the Internet marketing world and in social media. There are many people becoming disengaged by the endless changes created by the two Giants of the Internet as they try to outpace each other. One possible prognosis is that this could open up the arena for another player who undermines the customer base of the both the big players, as Facebook did to MySpace.

I want to focus on seven (7) key changes as a way to highlight the impacts from a small business marketing perspective. This approach is in line with my suggestion to write blog posts in sets and sevens. So here are the seven key changes in 2011 affecting small business marketing:

1. Google Places upgrade and resurgence

Google introduced improvements to Google Places, the platform for local businesses to highlight their location, hours of business and their products/services. Along with these changes, Google gave new prominence to Google Places in local search results, changing the display and increasing the value of a Google Places web presence. Sadly, very few small businesses understand the value of this change and have failed to take up their allotted Google Places website. In 2012, Google Places will be an absolutely essential part of your small business marketing. Without it, you may find yourself dropping deeper and deeper in the list of local search engine results as your competitors make full use of this facility (one which Google itself hosts!).

2. Changes to Facebook Pages

The big news of 2011, was that Facebook had more web traffic (visitors) in March than Google and took over the Number One position in terms of search engine volume. The race is now on and Google and Facebook are involved in a head-on tussle to capture (or retain) the number one position. This competition has generated many changes on both sites. Facebook has made major changes to its Facebook Pages to make further inroads into the business market. These changes have complicated the scene for small business marketing. It has meant that many small business owners have had to ignore Facebook or engage small business marketing consultants (who are struggling themselves to keep up with the changes). But how can you ignore the Number One source of web traffic that is also a social media site with over 700 Million members?

3. Introduction of Google Plus and Google +1

Google quickly responded to Facebook’s resurgence with the introduction of its own social network, Google Plus. It also introduced an equivalent to the Facebook “Like” in the form of the Google +1 button. There are other major changes in Google’s search algorithm and results display that accompanied these changes. The challenge for small business owners is, “How can you keep abreast of these changes and their implications for small business marketing?”. Again, you cannot afford to ignore the Google changes or your competition will be appearing in a much more prominent way than you as Google attempts to “reward’ those who get on board with its new social network and related changes.

4. The resurgence of LinkedIn

LinkedIn is the world’s largest online network focused on business and in 2011 grew to over 130 Million members. LinkedIn is a new and growing force in small business marketing. Depending on the nature of your business, it can be a critical component of your small business marketing, particularly in the light of the overall growth of social networking which looks like continuing unabated in 2012. The introduction of status updates by LinkedIn is an attempt to utilise its growing power to move into the Big League occupied by Facebook and Google.

5. The growth of local marketing

During 2011, there was a massive switch of focus by Internet marketers from affiliate marketing to local marketing. This was driven in part by two influences, (1) the decline of affiliate income owing to the depressed economy in the US and (2) and the recognition that around 80% of business for offline businesses comes from within a 5 kilometre radius. The changes to Google Places and the emergence of social networking ‘review” sites, intensified this new focus. What it means for your small business marketing is that you have to make the most of online local marketing tools because your competitors are being courted daily by Internet marketers who see this area of consulting as a the new “goldmine”. The new superstars of Internet marketing generate their income from monthly retainers paid by businesses, small and large, for local marketing services.

6. The massive growth of mobile marketing

With the advent of the Smart Phone and the associated growth of mobile usage, mobile marketing has taken off as the new frontier for Internet marketing. This growth is being aided by the focus on local marketing and has spawned the development of thousands of apps for mobile phones. Two new areas of online riches are emerging, (1) the creation and sale of mobile phone apps and (2) the development of mobile marketing strategies and tools (software). As a small business marketer, you are going to need mobile compatible websites and mobile marketing tools. One advantage of Google Places discussed above is that it is already mobile-compatible – which is another reason why it is so critical for small business marketing.

7. 2011 – The Year of the PlugIn

With so many changes on so many fronts, WordPress developers have had a field day. There has been a massive growth in WordPress Plugin development in 2011. I receive an invite every day to purchase two or three new plugins. It is becoming increasingly difficult to keep abreast of these software innovations. However, the WordPress plugins are designed to make it easier for you to accommodate your small business marketing to the changes that are occurring in Internet marketing. Many of the plugins help you to automate your small business marketing process.

In succeeding posts, I will further explain these 2011 changes and highlight their implications for small business marketing moving into 2012.

December 24, 2011December 24, 2011

Christmas is Here in Australia!

It’s so easy in the rush and bustle of present buying and preparation of Christmas lunch or dinner, to forget the meaning of Christmas.

For Christians, it is the day Christ was born – the day a new awarensss dawned about what it means to be human.

It’s the day that reminds us about our connectiveness and engenders an appreciation of others. It opens up our hearts to give and receive love – Christmas carols express this so emotively.

Christmas is the day we spend with our families and focus on them – something that is so hard to do in our busy lives.

My wish for you is that the Spirit of Christmas pervades your life and sustains the joy that is so often experienced at this time.

For those of you who do not celebrate Christmas, my thoughts are with you – at a time when you can feel excluded and misunderstood. It is the diversity of beliefs and faiths and persepctives that enriches our humanity. If Christmas teaches nothing else, it should serve to build tolerance and respect and valuing differences.

December 24, 2011

Christmas is Coming: How Many of Your Customers Celebrate Christmas?

Christmas is a very special time of the year for many people worldwide but do you know how many of your customers do not celebrate this festive season?

There was an article in ‘The Australian‘ newspaper recently that highlighted the fact that our old assumptions about demographics could be very wrong in relation to the religion of our customers. The newspaper reported that parents at one Montessori School in an inner suburb of Sydney were ‘up in arms’ over the lyrics used in Christmas songs at the school. Apparently, the words, ‘We wish you a happy holiday’ were substituted for ”We wish you a Merry Christmas’.

Some parents were really upset that all reference to Christmas, Santa and the birth of Christ were omitted from the lyrics, despite the children singing five songs.

The Montessori school’s response reiterated the ‘inclusive, co-educational, non-denominational’ nature of the school which includes educating children in multi-cultural awareness.

The Principal explained the shool’s policy in these terms:

Out policy is that we give children keys to the world and we show them many celebrations including Christmas. We look at cultures and the particular ways that people celebrate such as Easter, Christmas and Chanukah.

Apparently, the teacher involved was trying to accommodate the fact that there were Hindus and Jewish children in their classroom.

But it does raise the issue about what assumptions you have about the religious make-up of your customer base. Do you assume that everyone is Christian? Have you accommodated other religions in your marketing?

A Happy Christmas to those who celebrate this Festive Season

A Happy and a Safe Holiday to Everyone

Image Credit: paparutzi

December 23, 2011

Online Tenders: The Lifeblood of Business to Business Marketing

Business to business is a tough arena for small businesses in slow economic times and the online tender process may prove to be the lifeline for many such organizations. Small businesses engaged in consultancy, such as our human resource consultancy business, rely heavily on the business to business market and hence the tender process is critical to their survival.

Business to business (b2b marketing) involves supplying goods and services to other businesses rather than to individuals. In slow economic times, other businesses may limit their purchases of goods and services thus making the business to business market even more competitive than normal. In tight economic times, the tender process can make the difference between survival and going out of business.

So, if your small business is engaged in business to business marketing, what can you do to improve your success with the tender process? Well, the starting point, is to reframe your view of the tender process itself.

The tender process: chore or opportunity?

Having to complete and submit an online tender can become a real chore. If your success rate is low, you will have to do multiple tenders. So the first thing that happens is that you tend to rush the tender process, use generic templates, slap something together and hope for the best – all activities guaranteed to increase your failure rate. There is a parallel here to people who use generic job applications when applying for job after job.

One way to reframe the task of having to complete and submit a tender, is to see it as one of the purest forms of marketing. This is hard to imagine as you work late for many days to complete the multiplicity of forms and answer the endless questions.

However, when we look at the definition of ‘marketing’ (vs selling), we can see that the tender process has a lot to commend itself for small business marketing. One way to look at marketing is to define it as:

Providing a target market (group) with a needs-satisfying offering.

So with a tender, you have a respresentative of your target market (a public or private sector organization) spelling out what their needs are (their requirements), identifying their desired target group and offering you the opportunity to put forward a “needs-satisfying” offering (product or service).

When you think about all the information and resources on market research and the time you spend on trying to identify the needs of your target market, it is hard to acknowledge that a tender gives you all this “on a plate” – it specifies needs and ideal target sub-group and spells out ‘delivery’ expectations.

How, then, can you capitalise on your new mindset that enables you to view a tender proposal as a signifcant small business marketing tool?

How to win that tender – mastering this element of small business marketing

A tender gives you a unique opportunity to present your capabilities and your offering to a really interested party. This could lead to a new client and substantial long-term work. I know this for a fact as one of our successful tenders led to AUD $1.6 Million worth of work over four years.

A tender always takes longer than you expect (even allowing for computer or printer breakdowns at critical points). [I think sometimes even the equipment feels the strain of meeting the tender deadline.] So it is essential to develop a plan of attack for tenders and have appropriate processes in place.

Lessons from managing the development of proposals and submission of tenders

Here are some key lessons we have learnt (and are still trying to implement):

Allow plenty of time for development of the proposal (start when the tender arrives, not a week or two later)
Keep the profiles of staff/consultants up-to-date
Read the Tender Document or Invitation to Offer (ITO) very carefully and highlight signifcant points
Read documents recommended by the Client (e.g. strategic plan) and thoroughly research the Client’s website (for future directions, organizational values and goals and fundamental philosophy).
Identify a proposal coordinator (someone to get information off all parties involved)
Identify a proposal collator (someone to get all the bits and pieces together in the format required by the Tender Document/ITO)
Have a meeting of all involved parties at the outset so that everyone knows what the focus of the proposal is and what information is required, in what format, by when
Collect the routine information while people are writing the more creative bits of the tender proposal (you don’t want to leave this routine stuff to the very end – for example, start collecting copies of qualifications, insurance documents, etc at the outset)
Make sure you address the Ciient’s expressed needs (goes without saying) and carefully craft your statement about “your undersanding of our needs”.
In the proposal, demonstrate the fact that you have read and understood the reommended documents and the information on the organization’s website
Set your subnission deadline to be at least a day ahead of the actual final deadline date and time (to allow for any unforseen circumsatances)
Allow plenty of time for upload of your tender proposal in online tendering situations (eveyone tends to leave it to the last minute so there is often an overload situation) … the dealine time is becoming increasingly immovable and the online tendering system typically closes down immdiately the deadline is passed, thus blocking any further submissions.
Ensure that your website reflects the area(s) of competence that you are tendering for (increases your credibility).

When you come to the tender process, you will appreciate even more the good work you have done in creating a professional website and maintaing a regular schedule of blog posts around your areas of competence and the products/services you are offering.

Tender submission is a critial element in small business marketing in the professional services sector, as this sector often relies heavily on business to business marketing.

December 22, 2011

Leverage Your Blogging: Create a Small Business Ezine

One of the easiest ways to leverage your blogging, is to create your own small business ezine. An ezine is basically an email newsletter where you share articles, news and blog posts with members of your mailing list (customer list). This approach to small business marketing serves multiple purposes and achieves leverage on a number of levels.

Your regular small business ezine enables you to maintain contact with your customers, educate them about your products and services and offer free information and advice. Most email service providers offer ways to further leverage your ezine via RSS feeds and automatic posts to social media sites like Twitter and Facebook.

If you are blogging regularly, you are creating the content for your ezine. If you blog daily, you will be able to provide a small business ezine of considerable substance.

How to use your blogging in your small business ezine

If you blog regularly, you can easily create an ezine from your blog posts. Since I blog daily, I send a weekly ezine to my mailing list covering a number of posts around a theme, e.g. Squidoo or LinkedIn. You need to decide the frequency of your small business ezine based on the regularity of your blog posts, the nature of your business and the kind of information you are offering.

Most autoresponders will replace the blog links in your email with their own generated links (if you specify that you want open rates and click-through-rates measured).

Another option is to use the URL shortener bitly.com to shorten your blog links. The advantages of this approach are that you can share each individual shortened link automatically with your Facebook and/or Twitter account and you can also get statistics on click-through-rates on the Bitly link. It is a good idea to add a comment (like a status update) before you share your link on Bitly.

Blogging has lots of benefits, not the least of these is that it provides you with content to share with your mailing list via your small business ezine.