Summary: Marketing is overwhelming the average small and medium size business. The sheer amount of information, technology and tools is astonishing. It's more necessary than ever for these businesses to have a clearly articulated marketing plan.
As I've been working with small and medium size businesses, I've noticed a trend:
- Business owners are feeling overwhelmed trying to run their businesses, and, at the same time, keep up with the marketing technology and consumer expectations.
- As costs come down for technology based marketing applications, the Do It Yourself (DIY) element increases significantly. This means that websites, blogs, email marketing, viral marketing are all within the reach of the average small business person. At the same time, they have neither the time, knowledge nor inclination to make it happen.
- The amount of information about any one industry is exploding. The number of directories, search engines, portals and blogs about any one industry is astounding. Just remembering where all paid links are sitting is an interesting challenge for some customers.
Lesson Learned: The only way to keep focus and ensure that marketing expenditures are managed it to spend the time to plan. The sense of being overwhelmed comes from not having control of the activity, budget. Have objectives, budgets, timelines and activities outlined in one place. Then, work the plan.
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