Too many small and medium-sized companies neglect their brand and focus solely on what they do. This is a huge mistake. Your customers don't just make decisions based on performance and pricing, but also on how they feel. The better your company looks, the better the feeling it leaves prospective buyers. Legendary marketing professor Phillip Kotler says: "does anybody really believe that people can turn themselves into unemotional and utterly rational machines when at work?" The aesthetics of your business matters, no matter the sector you serve. A well-crafted brand creates a professional image that underscores all the "soft stuff" that ultimately determines a deal, such as trust, expertise, attention to detail, modernity and a point of difference. Does your business look good to the outside world? By focusing on both what you do as a business, and how you look, you can stand out from the crowd and take charge of your customer relationships by showing

A major challenge for both the small and medium-sized business is that it does not have access to the same sources of information tha n  big companies do. Simply not knowing is often the main reason for not acting or not seeing results on the business development front. The problem is even worse when the customer is not a single individual, such as  a shopper in a retailer,  but  an other busines s  (business to business sales). It is easier asking  an individual  why they are buying  a brand of cereals  than  getting the same information from a company where many people are involved in a purchase decision .   But as a  growing  business, you ’ ve got to open the taps  on  a constant flow of market information, no matter the industry you are in. Simply sitting in your office (or on your cellphone) and hoping to  know what customers want, or trusting your sales team to tell you the full picture,  won’t work.  As the boss, you need to get your hands on some raw, unfiltered f

Too many small professional services businesses try to act like big professional services businesses when they start, leading to lots of misery for the founder(s). You can't market your small consultancy, like a big consultancy, to put it plainly. The reason for this is simple: a big consultancy has an established brand. Clients know the brand and trust it and have a broad idea of what they can expect when working with "someone from that company". This is not the same with a startup consultancy where there is no "company" brand established yet. Professional services, more than any other business, is all about trust. Clients need to believe that you can deliver and that you have their best interests at heart. This is especially true since the "product" is an intangible, i.e., a service you provide. The mistake most consultants make is that they try and hide behind the name of their business as they start out. They quickly ask a graphic designer to

You won't build a sustainable business unless you build a company brand, and to build a brand, you need to do marketing. Scream and kick as much as you like, but ultimately you will have to spend money on marketing to create a name for your business that stands by itself, even if you are on holiday, or dead. I have come to realise that few business owners want to grow beyond a certain point, so I have stopped saying to them "do marketing for growth". Growth can be a pain, and most entrepreneurs just want to have a good life (including me). Growing for the sake of growing seems "so American". Instead, I have realised there is a much more appealing proposal: do marketing to build a brand.  When marketing blossoms, you have a brand. Almost every entrepreneur wants to leave a legacy. The business is their art-piece,  and they want to know that it will stay behind even if they are long gone. Doing proper marketing is essential in making sure this can happ

There is somewhat of a trend globally not to have "Chief Marketing Officers" in large companies but rather other titles, such as Chief Growth Officers (the title at Coca Cola), etc. You can't help but wonder: do you, as a business owner, even need someone with the title "marketing" in your company? My answer? Not necessarily. But you do need marketing, as a business skill, in your company! No business can survive without marketing. There is no debate about whether marketing fundamentals are still relevant. Being focused on the customer; defining a clear value proposition; having a strong, well-recognised brand and clear messaging. These things are not in dispute. But do you need someone with the title "marketing" to make these things happen? Not really. Arguably, the best marketer to have ever lived is Steve Jobs, and his title was never "Chief Marketing Officer". He was the CEO of Apple but understood the essentials of marketing

In business, when you don't know what to say, you use the word "strategy". Do we have a strategy? What is the strategy? Let's have a strategy workshop. It's an overused word that means: I'm not sure what to do, and desperately need to look confident. Strategy time! But do you really need a marketing strategy, or is it just a fancy word for hot air? Let's answer this by starting at the beginning: In business, you want to make investments, not incur expenses. An "investment" is similar to an "expense" but with a long term benefit to the business. To move from pure expense to investment, you need to think deeply about how you spend your money: where are you spending it, why and what should the results be? I regard this process of thinking as "strategy". Too many businesses don't think through their marketing, meaning it remains a pure expense, with little upside. This is why you need a marketing strategy - to

I was at a function last week when the owner of a small business told me he was struggling to make sales. I hear this often, but what made it different this time was that the business had an existing contract with a big corporate: MTN, the multinational mobile operator. How do you struggle for new business when you already have such a large customer on your side? Like most entrepreneurs, this one also had a lingering feeling that maybe better marketing could be the answer, but precisely what needed to be done? I decided to try and help with some practical advice: My first question: Where do you want to get new business from? (he needed some time to think - like most entrepreneurs faced with this question) Answer: Other telecoms companies. Me: do you have a list of such "other telecoms companies"? Him: no First recommendation: Get someone to prepare such a list. (a good idea, he thought)  Me: once you have your list, do you know what you are goi