Eric's Blog: The Rise and Fall of the Small

In every ones life, there are countless times where one has failed at something, whether it be a class, or a job that someone got fired from. With our failures in life there would be absolutely no success. A blog on blogspot.com sums up when they said “Failure is a part of life. No one has never experienced failing because those who even tried not to fail, failed to fail.” Even though the quote is a little confusing at first, it shows that everyone in the world fails at some point before they finally learn how to succeed, or find something to be successful at.

Without failure, learning and success would not be in existence. Great icons known around the world have failed multiple times before becoming the great successful icons they are today. The same blog gives examples of icons such as Bill Gates, Michael Jordan, Oprah; these icons are the greatest in the world, or are originally the greatest, at what they do and without icons like these 3 no one else would succeed at the same or similar professions. Other icons that are well known for their failures, according to onlinecollege.org, are Thomas Edison, Marilyn Monroe, The Beatles, and Mozart. One of the most common ways people fail in the world is by opening their own small business. There are many risks when it comes to opening a small business, therefore the success rate to keep the business running is very small. But even though they have a little success, they represent 97% of all businesses (Gladys Edmunds). The main reason that small businesses fail is because of the lack of knowledge or experience the owner has involving how to market and advertise their business to the public eye and their own target market. Marketing is the key factor to the success and downfall of small businesses.

When opening a small business there are many key factors to allow that business to succeed. Passion and determination are just two of emotional factors of running a small business but there are a lot more physical attributes to make it succeed. The main way for a small business to be successful is by having efficient marketing tactics and market strategies. Without successful planning and supplementing of a well thought out marketing scheme any business will instantly fail because the owner(s) have not met the needs of their target market, which is the type of customers they want to have, and/or have not successfully, as said before, marketed to the customer. Without marketing and advertising, customers do not know that the business exists, therefore with no customers; the business has no chance of lasting.

The main reason why marketing is so important in the success and failure of small businesses is because marketing is the key ingredient to increasing the businesses awareness and sales. Also marketing helps a business be more efficient, and gives better consumer perception. Without these ideas going into a business and marketing plan, the business will not be successful or will have an extremely hard time finding success. As said before there are many successful business people, if not all successful business people, that have failed more than once. The key is to learn from that failure and use it in ones next adventure in the business world.

When it comes down to it a small business owner’s main interest is increasing sales, which increases revenue, which increases profit. Small businesses are not making the big bucks like big businesses and franchises are making, but they do make a pretty penny and the more success in the business means the more profit. How else are the small business owners supposed to buy a gigantic house and a fancy car; maybe not as nice as say Bill Gates’ house, but close enough. Ever business owner wants to make money doing something they love and lots of it. But the only way to get more revenue in a company is by finding a ways to increase the companies sales, which the only successful way to do that is by marketing and advertising the good or service being sold. Meeting the customer’s needs is what really matters when marketing a product, and even though it can be difficult, in the end, if successful, the sales will increase and so will the revenue and the paycheck. Now there time where marketing fails as well, but it is not the system of marketing that fails, it is false preparation and following threw with that prep that fails. Without the right knowledge to conduct say a marketing survey, the survey will not be successful therefore the small business not only is taking a hit in time management, but could also be targeting the wrong type of people for their product. The solution that fits most to this problem, according to the professionals at marketingforsuccess.com, is to build trust, and to overcome objectives that one may face while marketing their product. To build trust is a two way street; the customer can not just be loyal to the business, the business also has to be loyal to the customer. Giving things such as discounts and deals to those loyal customers that a business owner knows by name is a great way to build trust. Also marketing personally in public places meeting knew people. It is very important to have a good time and enjoy the loyal customers, along with the new customers; therefore the customers will remain loyal to the business.

As said with customer trust a business also needs to overcome objectives that get in the way of small businesses marketing tactics. Now with larger businesses, the marketing department takes care of this field in the company; but with small businesses not having such a huge staff and having less experience, it is more difficult for a company to learn and overcome these challenges. According to pragmaticmarketing.com, marketing is considered the “middle man” meaning that if the marketing scheme does not work, then everything else falls apart. An example of a key challenge in the marketing plan is which target market would best fit the needs and wants the product or service is giving out. There could be one group that has certain key qualities, but another group that has one important quality. There could be even two or more target groups that would fit perfectly. Challenges like that include a lot of studying, surveying and time to truly master the art of marketing.

To increase sales in a small business you must first increase company awareness. Now increasing sales and increasing awareness are very similar when in fact they are also extremely different. To increase company awareness an owner must think outside the box (quicksprout.com). When increasing company awareness, the business is not only trying to increase sales along with it, but the company is also trying to put a good word out that there company is out on the market and that customers should only shop at that business. To do so a company must continue to market and advertise to not only similar focus groups, but also to completely different groups as well. For example, say a customer only likes one thing in an entire store, but that one item is the best around, or the cheapest, that customer is more likely to buy that one thing at that particular business rather than anywhere else; but only if that business makes those types of customers aware that they sell that particular product at that low price. Without marketing customers would have no idea what is out there to buy and use in the world. With the help of technology marketing has increased massively, meaning that customers are now more aware of what certain businesses have to offer and can shop around for where they want to buy from.

A problem with marketing awareness, however, is that competition can be fierce. Competitors are all over the place trying to take customers from other businesses. But the thing with small businesses is that instead of always fighting with their competition, they could use that competition to build customer trust and good reputation between competing businesses (quicksprout.com). When it comes to large businesses that have very similar goals and target markets, the idea is to be better than the other; but with smaller businesses a solid reputation with one another is very important and can actually help a businesses immensely. If another business were to refer a customer to another business, both businesses are not only building trust, they are increasing their awareness and that customer can spread the word to other potential customers about both businesses. Word of mouth is a very successful form of marketing, but only if the talk to positive. Now the help of non-competing companies can also increase the awareness on another company. There are tons of small businesses that team up with non-competing small businesses to promote one another (businessknowhow.com), which leads to not only increase awareness but also builds even more trust between others. So using marketing to build awareness is not only with in the business is important, but also important outside of it as well. As said before marketing is all about finding the target market and successfully getting that group to buy a businesses product. As a customer the idea is to be careful and selective on what to buy and where to buy it from. This is any type of business sees as customer perception. It is the view a customer has toward a business. With small businesses it is very important to have excellent customer perception since the company has a smaller customer population and with such a huge market for competition it is very important to keep as any customers loyal as possible, even if the competition is friendly. With good marketing tactics, customer perception should be very similar to gaining customer awareness. To gain customer perception a small business isn’t just marketing and selling the product, the company is selling its brand name and making that name fry into the minds of its customers. If the customer remembers the name then that customer will spread the word and therefore word of mouth comes into play again. Marketing is a chain reaction that can help a slow business change instantly with the right marketing technique. A way for a customer to remember a brand name of a small business it to do something unique and special that way it seams like the business is going out of its way to do something for the customer, which is basically what small businesses do anyway. When a small business tries to enhance customer perception they are trying to increase customer satisfaction at the same time, whether knowingly or unknowingly. Customer perception equals customer satisfaction is the idea that small businesses should go into believing if they want to succeed. If a company has bad customer perception then it is extremely easy for those groups of customers to lose interest in what a business has to offer, or be taken in by the competition. Every little thing in the marketing plan should be key because if one thing goes wrong then the whole plan will back fire and that is why businesses have failed in the past and continue to fail. Even though business competition can be friendly it is still a tight race to get the better edge on the rest of the businesses. With out competition there would only be one producer of a product and that business could charge a high penny for that item. Without competition businesses can not succeed but on the other hand, with competition businesses fail.

For big businesses, there is more money to be spent on keeping it running, but small businesses do not have nearly enough money to do what large businesses do. Therefore small businesses have to compromise with smaller materials to buy. But with marketing, as shown already, comes an increase in awareness and sales, which helps these small businesses be more efficient in their work. Think about it, with a solid marketing and advertising plan at hand and installed in a company, that business can start to be more efficient in other area; such as building maintenance, customer service, and location of an expansion to the original company. All these things are also necessary components to a successful business along with marketing. The key is, when trying to make a company more efficient, is to be simple and do not over do it (quicksprout.com). Being fancy with a business can often confuse loyal and future customers and can actually draw them away because why would any one want to purchase something that is complicated. Customers want products that are easy to use or access without much work involved. Money is a huge issue when talking about taking care of a small business and so therefore the more money saved in advance the better off that business will be (businessknowhow.com).

With small businesses being less fortunate when it comes to income compared to larger businesses and franchises, there seems to be a lot more passion involved when working with small businesses. Owners do what they love and turn it into a dream business that they can make a profit out of, if they do it right. To be successful in a small business, business plans are essential (findlaw.com), as well as marketing schemes and ideas. When a small business is in trouble, a good marketing technique is a very easy way to get out of trouble, whether you have one main issue or more. The four main issues described are very important ones and can easily bring down a business if not taken care of properly. Also when marketing to customers, small business owners should choose a good or service that they enjoy and make it in their own unique way so that the competition can’t truly compete with that business and it gets the upper hand (quicksprout.com). Also even if a business fails the first time, strong owners learn from their mistakes and failures and make those into ways to succeed the next time around (quicksprout.com). If a business owner is willing to take another chance, it will show how tough they are and that they are willing to learn from there mistakes and change a weak point into a strong point. Unlike big businesses, small companies should use marketing to increase sales and awareness for the present time, not the future; because if a small business were to think for the future, then they may not last that long. This is why marketing is so important to the rise and fall of all small businesses.

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