Thursday, December 03, 2009

Marketing to small business

My Financial Post column this week offers 10 tips for marketing more effectively to small and medium-sized business.

The insights come from Jeff Berry of the Executive Council on Small Business, who shared his 10 points for making your marketing more "consumable” at a conference last week in Toronto.

The key, as in any market, is to better understand your target audience. When you know, for instance, that business owners are older than most people think, that they're more risk-avoiders than risk-takers, and that 60% are resolutely locally-oriented, then you can refine your marketing offers to match the actual mindset of your prospects.

Excerpt:

"Tactic 2: Reduce perceived risk by offering samples and free trials, refund periods or money-back guarantees. The more you promote such offers in your ads or website, the more you overcome buyers' fears of making a wrong decision."

Click here to read the full story.

1 comment:

bagindo said...

The number of small businesses are about a million units in Indonesia. They sometimes become a political commodity through populist policies made by government or through a campaign of political parties. They said that the policy is made for small business interests. The implementation of these policies still face many obstacles, especially in the distribution of revolving funds for small entrepreneurs. However, small businesses in Indonesia will be able to survive without relying on government stimulus. Small business success depends not only on financial aid, but still many other aspects such as training on business management, application of appropriate technology, or the promotion and marketing assistance. The government has given adequate attention to these aspects, although such efforts must be improved in future.