Some would argue that branding in an important marketing consideration that should be considered early in the life of the business, for example, having a recognisable logo and imbedding this in all marketing documentation and communication both internal and external.

It's true that branding is important to small businesses but some successful small business marketers would argue that positioning is key not branding. Having a logo that looks good and glossy stationery may get you recognised but that alone won't cut it if that does not translate into real cash and bottom line profits.

Having a business or product name that distinguishes your business and products from your competitors, like household names like Amazon, Ebay or Google can ultimately lead to advantages but foremost in the mind of small business owners is how to start a business. Positioning comes later! Yet with product naming, business and domain naming tools being available, small business owners could quickly generate business name ideas and ideas for product and domain names.

Self made Internet Millionaires who market on the Internet have learnt lessons that small businesses can copy to great effect.

Key to the success of many small business Internet millionaires is finding out what people need, what solutions to problems they are looking for and how best to position themselves as experts to provide these solutions. They use the keywords entered in search engines like Google for their market research. Next they develop products and services as solution to these needs.

They then positioned themselves as the expert in that market who customers and potential customers come to trust and rely on thus setting themselves apart from any existing and future competition.

Using the Internet a small business entrepreneur can quickly and cheaply test the popularity or feasibility of a product simply by using pay-per-click advertising to send traffic to a web page and by tracking the results can determine whether or not to continue with that product or service. It's that simple!

In a matter of days and after spending as little as £20 on pay-per-click advertising an entrepreneur can measure the potential success of a product or service. This is powerful!

Traditional approach would have been to embark on market research, develop a business plan, looking for small business funding (bank loan, government grant, family finance or seed capital), securing an office, recruiting staff, marketing and advertising. Based on market research the typical small business entrepreneur would them consider how to position his or her business in his or her chosen business niche.

Compare the traditional approach to the approach taken by Internet marketers. Internet marketers combine marketing and positioning early on in the product or business life cycle. Furthermore they see branding as setting themselves as experts in their chosen market to win over customers and to extract maximum value from their customer base.

Recent research points to customers being more discerning in their buying habits preferring niche type markets rather than high street massed produced goods. This is where small businesses can cost effectively market and position themselves and in developing their brands by targeting by using direct response advertising.

David
Small Business Resource.