Marketing

Marketing is a three-syllable word that seems so simple, yet encompasses so much. Marketing is a multi-faceted approach to promoting a product or service. Both traditional and unconventional marketing methods have a place in the small business world. Marketing helps small businesses focus on building their brand and identity.

There are few limitations to marketing options, and the opportunities listed here are just a few that will generally result in a decent ROI (Return On Investment) for most small businesses. That said, do not be afraid to be creative -- no one knows or understands a small business like its owner, so think outside of the box and don't be afraid to experiment.

Identity Continuity

Create continuity between an online website, logos, letterheads, business cards, and packaging. Create an identity that will make your business stand out from the competition, and leave a good initial impression on potential customers. A professional image associated with your company or product will remind customers of their past brand experiences, and will reinforce your product line.

Trade Publications

Niche publications are journals or magazines that focus on a specific market. If your product or service is appropriate for a specific market, then advertising in their trade publications will allow you to immediately drill down and target that very specific audience.

Promotional Items

Branded giveaways have long been used by marketers to attract potential customers. Products that have a long shelf life will help keep your business in the forefront of a customer's mind. Weeks, months, and even years after a product is purchased or service is performed, promotional items will remind the customer of your brand.

Reviews

Solicit product reviews from reputable industry sources, magazine reviewers, bloggers, or industry journalists. Product reviews lend credibility to a product or company.

Keyword Advertising

In order to help your website's search engine ranking, use keyword advertising. Focused and targeted keyword advertising will drive web traffic that has a genuine interest in your product or service.

Niche Directories

Use online niche directories to promote products or services. Visitors who frequent topical directories have a strong interest and are more likely to purchase.

Viral Marking

Once known as "word of mouth" marketing, viral marketing has taken on a life of its own. Encourage product buzz, as well as customers referring customers.

Opt-In Email Marketing

Use email as a marketing tool to notify your existing customers about specials, new products or services, or product releases and updates. While some say email marketing is dead, others say that measured results of email marketing tell a very different story. Opt-in, targeted email marketing works, and produces results when done correctly.

Partnerships / Strategic Relationships

We see large companies leveraging their assets every day, and small online businesses should too! Whether it be as a partner, an affiliate, or a strategic relationship, all of these relationships can benefit small businesses. Businesses can use strategic relationships to penetrate niche markets. Affiliates can expand their reach and tap into the customer bases of similar products. Partners can provide additional value to existing products or services. Determine what types of relationships could be beneficial to your small business.

Online Classifieds

Craigslist is likely the best known online classified system. Classified systems increase visibility and are often overlooked by small businesses. Consider posting classifieds that relate to product or services, and monitor the results.

Sponsorship / Contests

Contests not only encourage customers to have fun, but also generate publicity and draw attention to your company and brand. Sponsor industry events, run contests, or donate prizes to industry contests in order to increase visibility and generate goodwill.

Newsletters

Communication is critical to all businesses, and small businesses are no exception. Be sure to establish a communication channel with customers and potential customers. Newsletters are a very popular communication channel for software developers.

RSS

RSS is growing in popularity. It is an alternative communication channel that has the benefit of reaching a larger audience through syndication. Supplement and enhance email and newsletter campaigns by providing an RSS channel for their content.

Forums / Newsgroups

Participation in newsgroups and forums will result in building credibility. Business relationships will often result from online dialogue in industry forums and newsgroups. Actively participate and always behave in a professional manner.

Forum / Email Signatures

All forum posts and emails you send should contain a "signature" that advertises your business name, tag line, and URL.

Blogs

Blogging and posting comments on blogs can result in an increase in web links and traffic. Socialization and engaging others with well thought out comments can establish a business reputation and generate product interest.

Videos

YouTube is a boon to business. If you are creative, consider compiling an educational or humorous video. YouTube is a huge distribution channel and can generate product or industry interest.

Press Releases

The avenue to inexpensive press! Write a press release to promote new products or services and reap the benefits with media attention.

Article Syndication

Writing articles can help lend credibility to your product line and improve your business reputation.

Local Newspapers

Contact local newspapers and pitch a unique story to them. Publicity is free and can generate discussions and interest.

Consider exploring alternative channels for advertising and marketing. Keep in mind that advertising need not be costly; creative marketers can often find inexpensive avenues that will result in a great return.

Source: http://www.collegecentral.com/Article.cfm?CatID=iss&ArticleID=3545

NetProphet 2012

Took place in Cape Town, I listened online - which another listener called listening in morse code because it was so choppy. And it must have been from their side because a 10 MBps guy in England experienced the same thing. And I followed the #NetProphet hashtag on twitter. It was fabulous. I was almost there. Here are my jumble of notes

SPEAKERS

#NetProphet ~ #RichardHardiman
Richard Hardiman: Internet Radio in South Africa. Why it shouldn’t work
• a differentiation happens online
• consultants from overseas tell you how to do it
• focus on client, not the end user, the client is the advertiser
• Tim Bishop: Too many (Digital) Entrepreneurs= fragmentation of best brains into 1000s of small entities. We must #ENTREPRELABORATE
• working for yourself you mind the hours and small salaries less because you are passionate
• when you set out to do something different, people question it.
• Average time spent listening to 'normal' radio is 23 minutes but internet radio is getting 2 hours 28 minutes on average
• Cellphones will have uncapped, blackberry free, iphone pays
• When you think of something new, and everyone is against it.
• listening is device driven
• you won't look back if you start your own business
QUESTIONS
• regulation - ICASA doesn't govern them because it's infrastructure not used. no licensing requirement except samro. Low startup cost for Internet radio
• 70% listen at work on wifi - normal radio is before and after work
• Revolutionary markets unite upstarts.

#NetProphet ~ #EricEdelstein
3 x 3 Minute Power Slot featuring Eric Edelstein, Rory Berry and Elodie Kleynhaus
• getting people to crowdsource
• pivot - throw out your software and start from scratch, took it onto Facebook.
• SAfricans don't like to fail
• fail fast and make it better the next time round

#NetProphet ~ #RoryBerry
• importance of Child's eyes
• children see the magic behind the ordinary object
• passions are fun
#NetProphet ~ #RoryBerry. Like children see the magic behind the ordinary object, play and evolve.

#NetProphet ~ #ElodieKleynhaus

#NetProphet ~ #RobGilmour
Silicon Cape Pitch London Announcement – Rob Gilmour

#NetProphet ~ #WalterPike
• marketing in the social era
• difference? They're doing the same thing and moving it to the digital. It's not the same.
• don't talk at people, reach is an old media redundant concept
• we should be spreading ideas, so they have to be good so people will spread them
• transportable ideas - tools to share, connections, networks, what roles does each element of the network play.

#NetProphet ~ #WesleyLynch
• developer
• investors are not the them to our us
• learn to sell, packaging is incorrectly packaged - investors know you can't package for your clients if you can't package for them
• investors are more optimistic about SA than we are, they are moving here, we must not risk not having a share of our own opportunity.

#NetProphet ~ #DonPackett
• we're living narcissism, and becoming antisocial in our social media environments
• Is your content adding more value to your life, or the life of others? If it's the former, don't press send!

#NetProphet ~ #RichMulholland
Do I need a topic?!
• Small efforts aimed at awareness are not enough, it's a start and creates a groundswell. That's the start of a platform for action.
• twibbons are for twankers
• Tuesday - avatars black to stand up for media freedom
• too easy to jump causes.
• Jumping causes is too easy these days, pick something and stick to it. Don't be an #avatard
• activism as marketing
• Rich Mulholland shouting out for #Activism instead of #Avatards and #Slacktivism.
• badassesesagainstavataractivism - baaaa.org
• #baaaa - Calls people to shoutout his hashtag... and then calls them sheep.
#NetProphet ~ #RichMulholland calls people to shoutout #baaaa hashtag... and then calls them sheep. #badassesesagainstavataractivism

#NetProphet ~ #QuestionGuy is a surprise development for organizers; is brought onto stage to answer questions. He's a good sport!
• What questions do you have for #questionguy, except 'What's your name?" -
• How do you feel about Julius Malema - encapsulates a cliché: "this is a shooting star"
• Who's going to be our next president? Not Zuma
• How does a netprophet celebrity feel about being one - surprised. How do you come up with the questions?  - playfullness, reacts to what he feels hasn't been covered by the speaker
• What do you do? IT, development, consulting, volunteers on a website

#NetProphet ~ #YusufRanderaRees: Entrepreneurship, South Africa Style!
• Yusuf Randera Rees is talking about the Awethu Project and how to make Gugulethu the next Silicon Valley
• If you never let people compete you can't write off their talent
•  social entrepreneurship SA style and what we can achieve if we invest in our own people.
• World Class inspiration is, new S'African style. Give all a chance.
• http://awethuproject.co.za/ enables entrepreneurs who have no previous access to opportunities, has received funding to develop 1000 Entrepreneurs in the next 20 months.

#NetProphet ~ #ChrisRolfe: Rewarding the right behaviour in a mobile world
• tweetpause when you say something fab
• incentivising the behaviour of students is the domain of the parents
• want customers to spend that money on your product... consistently
• Types of reward: Financial, Product, Utility, Recognition, fun, entertainment, clubs
• TOOLS to change behaviour - incentives, vouchers, airtime (NB), ebucks, electricity
• Dan Pink - human behaviour, writer for Al Gore
• MIT - gave students tasks, incentivised performance with three levels of rewards
• rewards cost money
• need to know when to reward, when to shift the customer's behaviour
• customer aquisition cost
• paper can't be distributed, cash customers, can't track, not sustainable, 1% conversion
• reach of mobile fab
• you can engage with a customer without knowing who they are
• remobilise excess inventory
• how to make customers into evangelists, how to keep them
• Groupon is a method to watch
QUESTIONS
• rise of the sovereign consumer, consumers will reward the brands not brands rewarding consumers
• know how customers want to be rewarded
• SA mobile market is the medium, have coupons in an ewallet, email on the phone
• http://t.co/L1wopGhz

#NetProphet ~ #RobynScott: Learnings from an African Native
• 20 chickens for a saddle (book), Co-Founder of OneLeap
• power of asymmetric connections
• Have to take yourself out your comfort zone
• value the connection - People have fears of having the door slammed in their face by high value connections.
• repersonlising online contact
• return on investment (ROI) - lunches and coffees are not expensive and increases the value because you are valuable
• The Internet has created a paradox where old boys networks have become new boy networks leaving ideas overlooked
• Oneleap - when you pay to send a connection, part of your payment goes to a charity.
• Paying for sending a message, makes you think about what you send
• Innovation is now outside in. Companies can't recreate that.
• Asserts that you should get ahead not based on who you know, but on merit
• who influenced your career and how did you meet them? Value your connections
QUESTIONS
• Scott a social entrepreneur
• Social Networking makes it easy to connect with similar people. But asymmetrical connections hold more potential.
• OneLeap allows outsiders in
• Limited for-profit, better resources to grow
• Go to investors who are users, who want to use your product
• Be bold, talk to people who may brush you away. The more no's you get the more likely a yes. Gamify your failures in the social networking game
• tell stories
• "people reacting with controversy to your business model is not necessarily a bad thing"

#NetProphet ~ #RichardMulholland: The power of the 3 Minute Message
• Always good value for time, @RichMulholland, especially when he's limited to 3 minutes. "The burden of brevity..."
• Packaging a message into a shorter period takes more work than talking for longer
• challenges every speaker to say their say and get off
• Say it well and get off the stage!

#NetProphet ~ #ArthurGoldstuck's tweetnote address - a presentation in 10 tweets - all 10, the full address @ http://www.gadget.co.za/pebble.asp?relid=4610
During the Net Prophet conference in Cape Town today, ARTHUR GOLDSTUCK delivered a tweetnote address - a presentation in 10 tweets - revealing the headline findings of the Internet Access in South Africa 2012 study.
• For details of the tie-in of this tweetnote presentation with the Net Prophet conference, see: http://bit.ly/IEUn4b
• #Net2012 Tweetnote presentation of Internet Access in SA 2012 headline findings starts 10.35am during #NetProphet
• The following is a tweetnote presentation – 10 tweets on the same topic – on the Internet Access in SA 2012 study. #Net2012 #NetProphet
• 1. #Net2012 unveils headline findings of Internet Access in SA 2012 study. World Wide Worx report due June. #NetProphet
• 2. #Net2012 uses multiple methodologies: primary research, interviews with providers, market intelligence. #NetProphet
• 3. #Net2012 first headline finding: there were 8.5-million Internet users in South Africa at the end of 2012. #NetProphet
• 4. #Net2012 found 2011 growth in SA user base was 25%, following 28% in 2010. Internet has awoken in SA. #NetProphet
• 5. #Net2012: 6,02-million access on computer, laptop, tablet. 90% of these also on cell. 2.48m only on cell. #NetProphet
• 6. #Net2012: Total of 7,9 million South Africans access the Internet on their cell phones. #NetProphet
• 7. #Net2012:  Number of 3G users in South Africa: 5,5m. Smartphone base end of 2011: 8.5m. Forecast 2012: 11m. #NetProphet
• 8. #Net2012: Undersea cable capacity to SA at end of 2011: 2,69Gbps. End 2012: 11,9Gbps. End 2013: 24,6Gbps. #NetProphet
• 9. #Net2012 ADSL lines in use in South Africa: 820 000. 2011 growth: 13% . Limited by Telkom as sole supplier. #NetProphet
• 10. #Net 2012: Internet growth in 2012: expect 20%, taking user base past 10m mark and 20% penetration. #NetProphet

#NetProphet ~ #DanBowyer: 604k ought to be enough
• You need 5 things in business - idea, cash, skills/people with skills, timing and luck
• South Africa has a great opportunity
• puts pics on a timeline that ticks over to remind him to talk about stuff.
• passion - be passionate about the stuff around the thing you sell, not the thing you sell.
• Define your unique ability and just do that
• technologies of the future - global and South African - stupid economy based on the growth of resources - change. People with money must be bad in SA - change. Governments whose only real mandate is to be re-elected - change. Online video - change and have more of that. Out mouse, in voice - change. Ubiquitous wifi. Cloud. Mindcontrol data as I need it. Babelfish. Self-healing hard and software. Virtual hologram instead of meeting. Nanotechnology. Robots. Teletransporter. Cleantech.
• South Africa - context - education is the medium where change will happen. Energy - wind solar tidal - renewable. Manufacturing - don't send resources out, make stuff here. Education - systems and processes we develop we can shift to other countries. Technological - great people resources
• cheaper better different
QUESTIONS

#NetProphet ~ #SylviaGruber
Sylvia Gruber: Seven Start-up sins
• introduction, name and company
• introduction to overview of lecture
• rubybox - monthly beauty box subscription.
1. Saving on the wrong things. Include your time cost as money-saving area. Don't cut costs on the core of your business.
2: Changing too much at once, don't underestimate your competitors
3. Hiding and keeping things from customers. Come to terms with it and face head on.
4: Panicking
5. Don't undervalue the power of your brand. People are loyal and will defend you.
6. Don't think your product is a static entity, listen to your consumer
7: Getting side-tracked
8. Bonus sin: don't try to be too perfect, you can always keep doing it better. Compare yourself to water, not Pepsi.
QUESTIONS
• invest in your team, operational people must be really well trained and they will grow
• managers should spend 50% of their time training their people.
• you'll get stuck when perfecting, rather spend time on operational matters
• you don't need a lot of money to cut through the advertising noise in SouthAfrica
• don't spend time looking for money, spend money on proving your model
• Launch with one business entity that doesn't cost too much, prove that model then expand

#NetProphet ~ #ChristoDavel. Play must be cultivated in our culture, it's how we develop and think.
#NetProphet ~ #ChristoDavel
Christo Davel: Obsession isn’t always a bad thing
• does a stunt about how people will pay more than R200 for a R200 note, says that's what we do routinely
• all about people and culture
• How do you create an unbelievable customer experience?
• Christo Davel talks about the idealist's view of the internet - Cluetrain Manifesto
• creating enchantment in life
• 20twenty staff had carte blanche on how to keep customer happy
• all the established banks opened online banks and 20twenty died in 6 months
• Wired warriors empowered to do anything to make a customer happy! WOW, what a lesson for all call centres out there!
• curatorship
• customers started talking to each other and supporting each other. Some 20twenty customers wanted to deposit their money while other banks were being emptied.
• 'People don't celebrate faliure enough. In innovation, there will be failure'.
• Thomas Edison had more that 2,000 international patents including for the tattoo machine
• ideas are not the killer app - hard work, sweat is
• opposite of courage is compromise
• play must be cultivated in our culture, it's how we think and develop
• "We would rather fail in pursuit of magnificence than succeed in pursuit of mediocrity"
• Lots of ideas on internet. Being able to execute that idea and blow away user is what counts
QUESTIONS
• curatorship? advice? - not liquidation, something like under administration
• staff - be selective about your partners, it's life and business, work on the relationship
• banks with FNB
• think about why people do things, not how
• risk - there will be reasonable bugs when you launch so can't not charge across the board, but don't charge the individual customer if something went wrong specifically for them

#NetProphet ~ RT @ricegirl2. Gender sub-narrative here pissing me off. Someone called herself 'just a girl' to explain why she didn't know something. Gawd.

#NetProphet ~ #AdrianBush
Bursary Shout Out – Adrian Bush
R43000 for ipad3 and mealie cover - it think it's resistance to the apple advertising opp

#NetProphet ~ #MotheoMoleko. Keep iterating
#NetProphet ~ #JeremyLoops & #MotheoMoleko
Jeremy Loops and Motheo Moleko: The metaphors of music in a digital age
• Keep iterating
• "The arts and sciences cannot live in vacuums. They need to interact"
• leave traces of your personality on everything you touch.
• don't afskeep small audiences

#NetProphet ~ #PermjotValia
Permjot Valia: One year in Cape Town: Still in love?
• one of top mentors in Europe
• learn to say thank you in many languages
• Midlife crisis - buy a mac, keynote presentations maker
• mentoring is something done for free
• consulting, coaching is charged
• trade mentoring for favors
• entrepreneur landscape negatives - think more global, think further than Africa; not enough capital and competition; need more diversity; learn how to pitch and simplify
• says Jenny McKinnel really wants to help the ecosystem
• Try to be effective not famous.
• Seek external validation, just because your friends think your business idea is good, doesn't mean it is
• Crowdfunding is good for creative stuff, but sophisticated funding with discipline, structure, strategy and support needed for startups.
• let the people who are good get on with it
• "The fact that you're African is irrelevant - what matters is, do u have a solution that meets global needs?"
• Entrepreneurship is the best defense of democracy

FAB EVENT AT EVENT
I sent to Jenny McKinnel:
@JennyatCITI ~ Nice shoutout from #PermjotValia at #NetProphet. Kudos.
and
Greater Good SA retweeted:
GreaterGood SA (@GreaterGoodSA) retweeted one of your Tweets!
- #NetProphet ~ #SylviaGruber. Managers should spend 50% of their time training their people.


GENERAL NOTES
• Snapplify made the app
• digital brochure
• presentations are calls to action
• #NetProphet being spammed, use tweetfilter for Chrome
• complimentary wifi
• introduce yourself when making a comment or question
• UStream Producer (Free) - stream audio, video
• http://oneleap.to - Robyn Scott
• Did Gates Really Say 640K is Enough For Anyone?
• What are Wired warriors?
• Play more Institute of Play: http://www.instituteofplay.com/
• 22Seven - https://www.22seven.com/
• looking at ad campaigns for 20twenty and 22seven
• http://memeburn.com/2012/05/how-to-reward-the-right-behaviour-in-a-mobile-world-net-prophet/
• http://memeburn.com/2012/05/could-paid-connections-be-the-future-of-social-networking-netprophet/
• http://socialmediatoday.com/daniel-levine/501345/what-twitters-new-discover-tab-means-future-social-media
• http://www.peeringdb.com/view.php?asn=15169

TED Sherry Turkle: Connected, but alone?

• Have each other at a distance we can control - The Goldilocks Effect
• We only pay attention to what we want to in a presentation, and never get to hear what we don't want to hear, this is a problem
• Conversations problem - we can't control what we want to say, we edit ourselves, we are just right, not too much, not too little
• Cleaning up relationships with technology
• Good for connection but not for really understanding each other
• Facebook makes up for feeling like no one is listening to me
• We're developing social robots for the elderly (robodog)
• We're lonely, but we are afraid of intimacy
• I share therefor I am
• Not suggesting to turn away from the devices, just make room for other stuff

TED Shlomo Benartzi: Saving for tomorrow, tomorrow

• everytime you earn more, save more. 
• monthly saving is difficult, present bias (immediate gratification) makes you think of how you have to give up something now
• we think about saving in the present, but spend in the long run. We diet today, eat tomorrow
• speaks of checking the box during an organ donor situation in licence aquisition. Germany shortage - you have to check the box to say yes. Austria you have to check the box to say No... they have organs for Africa. In terms of saving... create a situation where people have to opt out. Opting out takes effort.
• if you say, Yes, I want to save, that's half of the effort. Next automate the process.
• if you defer saving to when you get a raise, then it's a small percentage of that extra
• making the decisions around saving are complex, too many points to consider
• 1 in 10 Americans save enough
• Singaporeans spend average $4000 per year on lotto. Americans $1000.

TED: Seth Godin on standing out

• product knowledge diffusion... it must be remarkable, on the social networking
• sell to people who are listening, and hope that they care enough to tell their friends
• being good is boring, be remarkable

TED Seth Godin: This is broken

• why do you make a gate that can close on child and crush the child
• then there's a sticker maker who has to make a sticker to say, This could crush your child, and he makes the sticker because he doesn't have the authority to go down the corridor and say Fix this gate - this breeds "not my job" thinking
• sometimes you have to break it for other people to see that it wasn't broken

TED Sasha Dichter: The Generosity Experiment

• say yes to everyone who wants something from you
• he wanted to have to stop saying no
• he started to feel that he was generous, he started to see the change he wanted in the world

Lead from behind

http://dovbaron.podomatic.com/

AMY SHOWALTER
• yaktivist vs activist
• ego vs getting something done
• action shock vs action achievement
• street cred
• play by the rules
• they could have taken the easy way, but didn't
• underdog
• unconventional in how you do it, but still moral
• eyes up in a top dog world
• pious and self aggradising
• passionista - good in two circumstances - one: show passion of the top dog's interests and two: make top dog feel like a hero - calm face to face discussion first and don't start to look like a radical - make sure your passion is networkable - not just you
• making a presentation: start with what's in it for them
• time and personal contact with people you are persuading it
• how you put your personal brand across, your reputation
• changing minds through proximity
• building your pack
• takes the pack to make it happen
• team - cohesive team leader, convert communicator, connected pack members
need advocates who are connected
• engage humor, think friendly and funny
• universal law - be nice, be meek, be kind

DANIEL PINK
• show vulnerability
• make rules as a team
• let them do it their way

GURUS
Jonathan Jay - Sack Your Boss
Daniel Lavanga - The Law of Sevens
Mark McKergow
Peter Thompson
Richard Koch
David Thomas
Nicky Pattinson
Paul McGee - Shut Up, Move On
Pete Godfrey
Mike Dooley - Notes From The Universe
Stuart Goldsmith

TED Sheena Iyengar: How to make choosing easier

cut - less units to choose from
concretise - make it real
categories - more categories, fewer choices
condition - let me practice complexity