Seminars

Hello everyone.
Welcome to the new year of the Chinook Entrepreneur Challenge.
Seminars have started and the next one is at 6:30 on Thursday at your local Community Futures office. We will be discussing marketing. This topic is widely misunderstood. Most, when they think of marketing the only thing that comes to mind is advertising. This is only a small piece, usually the end result of hours of research and analysis.

The trap many entrepreneurs fall in, especially when making a business plan is, is it realistic? Most think, I have a great product, its nothing like anything else, everyone in town will buy it. Reading it when I say it in a blog, it sounds naive. It sounds worse in a Business Plan.

The first thing you must remember is there are always competitors. Maybe not always direct competitors, but they still take business from you. For example, a family has the afternoon to burn, what options do they have. 1) going to a matinée movie for the afternoon 2)driving to waterton 3)renting a movie 4)go for a bike ride, picnic, go to the lake, swimming pool, or something else active. All these things are now in competition for that families time. Only one will win. Remember this when you are writing about marketing in your business plan.

Finally, traditional marketing is becoming less effective, especially towards new demographics. By traditional marketing I mean that annoying stuff that interrupts our favorite T.V. and radio shows and those overgrown signs that pepper the side of the road and take away the spectacular views of your favourite stretch of highway. If you want to watch a great video on this, its a presentation by Seth Godin. Its called Sliced Bread and Other Marketing Delights. It takes about 20 minutes. He goes over some interesting things that you should take into account for modern marketing. The problem, is that we are bombarded with ads constantly, no matter what we are doing. This is especially true with the younger generations. Think about this and its implications. So...how are you going to get the word out, who are you going to tell, and how will you make it unique enough to get them to listen. If you would like to see it the link is...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBIVlM435Zg&feature=related

I recommend it.

Marketing is not just this though.... It is analyzing your business. What are your strengths? What are your weaknesses? How can you utilize your strengths and counteract your weaknesses? And if you know who will buy it, how often, and where, you can find your market potential.

I hope to see you all Thursday for the seminar. It will be informative.