Marketing vs Selling

Two friends, and business owners, were having a conversation, when one asked “What’s the difference between marketing and selling?”

“Marketing is what you do to keep your name in front of your customer. Selling is what you do when you’re trying to get your customer to buy something from you. Why do you ask?” the other replied.

“Well… it seems to me that I do okay in selling, but I’m terrible when it comes to marketing. I do a pretty good job of closing sales, when I get in front of a customer, but getting in front of a customer is the hard part. And I do a terrible job of keeping my name in front of my customers and prospects.”

“Because I’m so disorganised, by the time I get around to calling them to see how they’re doing, they don’t even remember who I am. Or maybe it just seems that way. Either way, I’m not getting any business.”

This is a typical problem it is typical of most of the salespeople and business owners I work with. Every salesperson I’ve met says “When I can get in front of a prospect, I can close the sale… [most of the time]. But I’m not able to get in front of enough prospects.”

What do they do? They go out and spend loads of money on advertising which does nothing more than lighten their pockets.

They don’t realise there is a difference between marketing, advertising and selling.

Marketing and advertising aren’t the same. You place advertisements in newspapers, magazines, and trade journals, and on radio and television. They’re very expensive and aren’t targeted.

Yes, you’re getting your name out there, and placing it in front of many people – or so says the person who sold you the ad – but the majority of people who are supposed to be seeing your ad aren’t the people who would be interested in buying your product or service.

Which newspapers and magazines do you read? How much attention do you pay to the advertising? If you’re like most people, you flip through the pages as you look for the next article or story you want to read.

Marketing, on the other hand, is designed to keep your name in front of a targeted list of prospects. A well conceived and executed marketing campaign can bring you huge results.

It is a much more effective – and cost-efficient way of staying in touch with your prospects and customers.

To become a good marketer, you must have a good database, i.e. a list of people – prospects and/or customers – that you’re going to keep in touch with.

If you’ve a database of 1000 people, and want to keep in touch with everybody once a month, that’s a thousand people you’re trying to contact. If you’re going to keep in touch every other month, that’s 500 people.

  • Without an effective marketing campaign, your customers don’t hear from you.
  • When a customer doesn’t hear from you it’s easy for them to forget about you.
  • If you don’t keep in touch with a prospect someone else will get the order.
  • If you don’t serve your customers, you’ll lose the business.

The old ways of marketing included sending out form letters, printed newsletters, and mailing catalogs. Many companies spend big bucks attending trade shows, conventions and conferences, but fail to convert those leads into sales because they’ve ineffective telephone techniques and no marketing programs.

These are all very time-consuming, labor intensive, and expensive. It costs a lot of money to write letters, mail newsletters, print boxes of catalogs.

Today, the best – and most cost effective – way to market your business is through the Internet. A Web site offers you a powerful business promotion tool.

But just having someone visit your website doesn’t do you any good. You must capture their vital information, i.e. their name, address, company, position/title, phone and e-mail address.