You don't have to have a marketing degree in order to effectively market your product. Your business will suffer, however, if you don't become familiar with the ins and outs of advertising and selling. In order to successfully market your product, it helps to look at the big picture. Don't just concentrate on the products you are trying to sell. Instead, try to also envision your small business as it relates to the customers you are trying to entice, any competition you may have, and how society as a whole sees your business. You must learn to do this in order to market your product successfully.

Heres an example. Lets say you are a breeder of toy poodles. Raising X amount of puppies every year is not nearly as important as how your potential customers see your kennel setup. Customers want to see bouncy, healthy puppies in a clean, orderly kennel with an owner who knows something about poodles and can answer any questions they may have about raising and training the breed.

Your fellow breeders and competition, on the other hand, are not only interested in the amount of money you are able to get for your dogs, but also in how and what you feed them to get them in such good condition, how you have your kennel designed in order to facilitate cleanliness, and the pedigrees of your stud dogs.

Society in general can see your business in several different ways as well. It could be considered to be a great place to buy their next pet, a place to take the kids on a Saturday afternoon to play with the puppies, simply another way someone is trying to make money, or as a noisy nuisance. An individuals perception of your business will differ from person to person.

This is the big picture everything your business encompasses. In order to learn how to market your product and be a successful salesperson, you must convey to the buying public why the item you have for sale is different from what your competition has for sale. Why is your product or service unique, and what makes it that way? What kind of people are interested in buying your product or service, and what kind of people would you prefer to sell your product or service to? Can you compete with other businesses who are selling the same product or service as you? How can you show potential buyers of your product or service that YOUR item is better and/or more special than that of the competition? How will you get your product or service out into the public eye? All of these questions are important to consider when marketing whatever your small business has to offer, and you should thoughtfully consider what your answer to each of them would be.

Once you get the hang of how the big picture can affect your sales, marketing becomes easier to understand. There are some basic tenets as far as marketing is concerned that every small business owner should keep in mind at all times. They are:

- The quality of your product. You want it to be better than what your competition has to offer.

- The promotion of your product. You must find a way to get your product or service out in the public eye, and make people WANT to buy it.

- The price of your product. You either want your product or service to be cheaper than that of the competition, or provide such an exceptional product or service that people will not mind paying you more for it.

- The distribution of your product. You must make your product or service easily available to anyone who wants to buy it.