The terms “marketing” and “selling” can often be confusing to new business owners. Marketing simply means making people aware that your product exists. Selling, on the other hand, means taking whatever steps are necessary to convince your potential customer to purchase your product.

Marketing is essentially nothing more than research. It’s about identifying groups of potential buyers and then finding the best way of bringing the product to their attention, generally through some form of advertising.

Once potential customers have been identified, marketers will try to reach them by developing what is called the “Marketing Message”. The more closely this message resonates with the wants, needs, or desires of prospective customers, the better the odds of making a conversion, or closing the sale.

Online vs Offline Marketing

Marketing online has some distinctive advantages to offline marketing methods. Online marketers can conduct market research using search engines or keyword searches, using specialized programs as well as various other methods.

In mere minutes the online marketer can accumulate highly accurate real-time data on what people are looking at, or looking for online. The value of this powerful research capability cannot be understated.

Online or off, marketing and sales sometimes seem to overlap in the development of what is commonly known as the “pitch”. The pitch is how the marketing message is delivered. It’s where the marketing “rubber” meets the road, so to speak.

If the marketing has been done properly, then the marketing message will be clearly delivered in ad copy, sales copy, or by whatever means it is brought before the prospective customer.

Closing the Sale

Selling is more closely associated with a process called overcoming objections. It is a much more intimate, one-to-one technique where a buyer “assists” a prospective customer in making a “buying decision”.

Part of the marketing process is to actually uncover potential objections which might prevent a prospect from being converted to a customer. Selling is where all that marketing research is applied at the point of sale.

Perfecting the Art of Marketing

While many would say that marketing is only a numbers game, it is really an art as well. Successful marketers often seem to have an instinct for how to reach prospective customers that goes beyond simply number crunching. They simply seem to know what makes people tick, or perhaps more to the point, what makes them buy.

With internet marketing in particular, there is a tremendous focus on the numbers. How many thousands or even millions of potential customers will see an ad or get an email? It’s easy to get the feeling that if only you have a big enough audience, sales will automatically follow.

Unfortunately many novice markets have fallen into the trap of thinking that bigger numbers make for greater success. It’s no wonder that so many fail to achieve any success at all.

A successful marketing plan will get the marketing message in front of as many people as possible. Not just any people, of course, but the right people and at the right time. With a successful plan there is never any question as to why a certain product is targeting a certain niche. The marketing message makes sense to the people in the market and these targeted customers become excited to buy the product.