Do you know who your buyers are? Do you understand why they buy your products or services? Assuming that other factors in making the product available (distribution) and known to the buyer (advertising and promotion) are in effect, influences on the buyer may be catalogued by:

Today's marketing environment is influenced by the global marketplace and the explosion of the information age to a degree unprecedented in history. To be fully prepared, a company must recognize and understand:

Competitive spending trends may or may not be a significant influence on your company's marketing spending plans to support products and services. However, in a market where there are one or more large competitors, the amount of money your competitors are willing to spend will impact:

Once you know the identity of your most direct competitors and have a good idea as to your second- and third-tier competitors as well, you should give some thought to which actions they are likely to take in the next year or so. Estimates of competitors' future activity depend on your knowing and understanding their objectives, strength in the marketplace and resources. This important intelligence is key to your company's:

Obviously, your most important objective as a small business is to survive and make money. Realistically speaking, there may be times when you'll decide, after careful analysis, that the competition in one area is simply too hot. Here are some situations that may indicate that the cost of direct competition is unwise and ineffective, from a sales and marketing perspective:

You should be very aware of your first-level competitors— in many cases, you'll know them by name and may even belong to the same business associations they do. If you don't know much about their business operations now, make sure that you do soon! It's to your advantage to know as much as you reasonably can about the details of their businesses. Study their ads, brochures, and promotional materials. Drive past their location (and if it's a retail business, make some purchases there, incognito if necessary). Talk to their customers and examine their pricing. What are they doing well (that you can copy) and what are they doing poorly (that you can capitalize on)?

The information age has increased the number of opportunities for new businesses and products and has tremendously increased the speed at which new products are developed and introduced into the marketplace. As a result, the information age has also increased the need for businesses to be thoroughly familiar with their competitors.

Your competitors are not always who you think they are.

FargoGas: "fastest gas in the West!"

Conceptually, all of marketing is based on the idea that you must thoroughly know the environment in which your business operates in order to successfully promote and sell your product or service.

Part of the challenge of marketing is figuring out which distribution method to use for your business. As soon as you decide which business or product category to compete in, distribution decisions must be made based upon what your competition is doing.

Businesses based on the idea of providing less expensive products and services to customers can be extremely competitive. One problem such companies face is that the customer base is not loyal and will rapidly switch to another company depending upon what is on sale.

There are many ways for a business to be unique, from small pricing, packaging, and service differences to significant feature and benefit contrasts with the competition.

Many small companies believe there is little they can do to really position their products and services because they spend little or no money to promote their products to their target buyers.

If the universe of all potential buyers is your "market," then the market can be divided up into sections or "segments" based on any number of factors. For example, you might divide up your customers by age group and find that you sell most of your products to people aged 18 to 34. You might divide them up by family size and find that you sell most of your products to married couples with young children. You might divide them up by economic status and find that you sell most products to people with an annual income of about $50,000 to $100,000. You might divide them up by geographic location and find that you sell most of your products to people living within two specific zip codes.

Most marketers know that "20 percent of buyers consume 80 percent of product volume." If you could identify that key 20 percent and find others like them, you could sell much more product with much less effort.

Once you've identified what's unique about your business and who your target buyers are, you need to take a good, long look at your competition.

Do you know precisely who your customers are? You may know many of them by name, but do you really know what type of people or businesses they are? For example, if you sell to consumers, do you have demographic information (e.g., what are their average income ranges, education, typical occupations, geographic location, family makeup, etc.) that identifies your target buyer?

Intuitively, or based on sound research, you believe your business will succeed because you are doing something different from some or all of your competitors. The first test of any business, small or large, is its uniqueness when compared to its competitors.

In order to successfully market itself, every business owner needs to focus on what's special and different about his or her business. The best way to do this is to try to express this uniqueness in a single statement.

One of the quickest ways to go out of business is to market a product or service that hardly anyone wants, needs, or understands. Find out if there is a real need for your idea. Who and how many people will pay for it, and how much will they pay?

What do we really mean by "marketing?" To many time-starved business owners, marketing means two things: advertising and selling. However, we think that ultimately you'll be more successful if, every so often, you try to look at the "big picture" by taking the time to thoughtfully analyze your products or services and your business as a whole in relation to your competition, your customers, and to societal and regional trends and conditions.

For most small businesses, highly effective marketing is a make-or-break necessity. It's really impossible for you to be successful without good marketing and sales techniques — that's what brings the dollars in the door. You've got to let people know about all the wonderful things your business can provide to them, which means that your business must first provide those wonderful things that people are willing to pay for. And that, in turn, means knowing who your customers are and getting so close to them that you can virtually anticipate their needs and desires.