Survey: Small Business Branding and Marketing

I set up this simple survey in conjunction with Michael Cowen of Context Branding. (My marketing background is as a marketing guerilla, first with direct mailing, and then email marketing. Michael is an expert on branding, and his analysis of the results is in a PDF at the end of the report.

How true are the following statements in your business?

Michael has some views on these results, but my concern is that so many of us either have a low self-image of our businesses, or simply don't know.

Peter Drucker, the last century's leading business thinker said "A business exists to create clients."

In order to do that we need to at least have a better than even chance of converting the folk we meet (professionally) into those clients. That's very difficult if we don't think we're getting it right.

What is the primary means of your brand communication?

I guess there is nothing wrong with word of mouth since so many of us swear by it, but to me it has always seemed a bit of a copout. How do we inspire our clients to talk about us? How do we know that what they're telling their mates is what we would want them to?

My concern is that most of us have little clear idea of where we're going with our marketing, and that sure shows in the dreadful mortality statistics for small business.

How many full time employees are there in your business?

This number was deeply skewed with one respondent having more than 30,000 employees in other locations.

Michael Cowen offers a much more insightful analysis than my cursory overview, and his is well worth reading. You will find 10 pages of pure gold here.

This survey was conducted between in March 2009.  The sample of 382 respondents came from the PetesWeekly and Business Warriors communities, per an emailed request.