When I say “ice cream” what three brands come to mind? You’re walking down the frozen section aisle of the grocery store. Ice cream is on the list. Which brand do you buy? You might think that you’ll buy whatever is on sale. Or whatever you have a coupon for. Or whatever your favorite brand is. I almost always buy Breyers, even if it’s not on sale. It’s just the one I like – or is it? Lately, I’ve been seriously considering Ben & Jerry’s. Why? Because I want to try The Tonight Dough™ “caramel & chocolate ice creams with chocolate cookie swirls & gobs of chocolate chip cookie dough & peanut butter cookie dough.” I know! It sounds like mouth-watering madness! Go ahead. Wipe the drool from your mouth and stop teasing your taste buds.

Are you spending money on marketing your small business and wondering where it’s going? If it currently feels like you’re throwing your money out the window while driving down the highway at 70 miles an hour; or watching the coins slowly slip through your fingers like grains of sand on the beautiful beach you wish you were spending your hard earned dollars on vacation, then you need to examine your small business marketing strategy.

Let’s take a quick look at your small business. You have your employees, your product or service that you sell, your office, and your warehouse. With so many moving pieces and parts, it is inevitable that at some point in time your business will have a crisis or a point of transition, maybe even similar to the two examples below.

Transition in any small business is inevitable. It comes in many shapes and sizes – expanding to a larger facility, adopting new industry trends, hiring or losing employees, financial hardships, or a client that decides to go in a different direction. Transition in your organization and in the lives of the people who make up your organization, can affect your ability to market and communicate your message clearly. Transition also provides an excellent opportunity for your small business to get some clarity in your messaging and marketing.

What kind of marketing do you invest in for your small business? Somewhere along your journey as a successful small business owner you’ve probably tried billboards, radio ads, print ads and other types of traditional marketing. As a business owner who is constantly keeping up with trends and competitors, you probably have also invested in online marketing and have a decent looking website and Facebook business page. How’s all that working out for you?

When you created your business, you most likely were trying to fulfill a certain set of needs. Whether it be providing financially for yourself, or trying to help others by providing a product or service. Your marketing efforts have a similar mindset. You are marketing your business to create a successful small business to provide financially for yourself and to ensure that you are taking the right steps necessary to make sure your potential customers are aware of your product or service.

You’re the successful small business owner of a handyman company. You started out as a jack of all trades and master of none, but over the years you’ve been wise about hiring the right people for the right positions, and now you can focus on managing the business and building relationships.

You’ve grown your business from a small one-man service truck to a 50 employee small business that provides a number of services ranging from gutter cleaning to landscaping to painting. Over the years, your friendly customer service and positive relationships have made you one of the most trusted businesses in town. So trusted in fact, that business is booming. Or so it seems. Service request are rolling in faster than your employees can keep up with them.

Alright, so you run your small business day in and day out. You want to have exciting goals and motivated employees. You want to see employees achieving key milestones and enthusiastic about success. Unfortunately, sometimes it seems like the goals of your business just aren’t tangible or exciting enough, and day to day accomplishments aren’t tied to the big picture. Here’s one thing you can start doing now that will help you be more efficient, and also can help to engage employees and keep them involved.

If your business offers services that require you to give out bids or estimates to customers, there is one thing you can do to dramatically improve your marketing. By setting up a system where you are measuring not just how many requests you get, but measure how many quotes you gave and the dollar amount of those quotes, you will improve your marketing as a small business.

When you use the right philosophy, strategy, and tools in small business marketing, you will experience more benefits and a return on investment. Instead of wasting your time hoping and praying that your current marketing efforts are paying off, evaluate what inbound marketing has to offer. It’s a strategy you can start using today to get better results than traditional marketing techniques.