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As a small business owner looking to promote your products and services are you overwhelmed with all the choices presented to you? Social Media (facebook, twitter, linked in, you tube and more), traditional advertising (radio, tv, yellow pages, direct mail, newspapers and so on), websites, blogs, article marketing, tribe syndication, forum marketing, podcasting, SEO to name just a few.

If you are like many business owners that I meet there is so much choice that you end up doing nothing or trying to do 50 different things at once. As you can probably appreciate neither of these solutions are likely to work in today’s market.

To increase your odds of succeeding in business today you must have a marketing strategy in place and remain focused. Here are some techniques to help you accomplish this:

Begin with your customers (Market)

As an entrepreneur you are in love with your ideas. Passionate about your idea, products and services, you assume that others are too. Your customers aren’t in love with your product and service but in what it can do for them or help them do for themselves.

Take time to discover who your potential customers are and how to reach them. Are they likely to be on social media at all? Not everyone is. You may love facebook, for example, but do your potential customers?

What is your message?

What do you want to tell people about your product or service? What makes it stand out from others offering the same thing? Decide on your USP (unique selling point) that would make potential customers choose you instead of your competition.

Focus on the benefits and solutions your product or service provides for your customers. Clarity in your message is key in successful marketing. There is so much information and ‘noise’ in today’s world that marketing messages are getting harder to hear and remember. What do you want your potential customer to remember about you.

Which 3 or 4 different methods should I use to start with to spread my message to my audience? (Media)

Start with 3 or 4 different methods of sharing your message with your potential customers and track the results. Develop expertise in these methods. Measure the outcome.  Keep what works and stop what doesn’t. If you drop one method of sharing your message  that doesn’t work for your business pick up another but don’t take on more than 3 or 4 at a time.

Don’t be overwhelmed with the choices presented to you. Marketing is all about getting the right message to the right people using the right media channels to do so.

Choose your marketing strategy, write it down in the form of a marketing plan. Try it, track it, adjust what you need to and stay focused.