Title: Bright marketing – why should people bother to buy from you?
Author: Robert Craven
Published by: Crimson Publishing
Robert runs a business consultancy called the Directors Centre and was sponsored by Barclays Bank to do a series of free seminars to small businesses. The seminars were called Bright Marketing’ and he refers to them throughout the book.
Bright Marketing is aimed at the owner managers of small businesses and is completely jargon free whilst being based on strong research. The sub title to the book is why should people bother to buy from you?’ The idea is simply that if you are exactly the same as all of your competitors then there is no reason why a customer should pick you.
Robert’s belief is that you should do lots of work on finding your USP and that amounts to what is different about you. He provides tools and questions to help you find that difference. He says if there has to be a choice between different or better I would go for different every time.’ He does qualify that by saying that different and better would be the best position.
The book is written in a very conversational style and is easy to read and digest. On top of that he provides you with a glossary although some of the descriptions are slightly tongue in cheek. He is also very fond of Pareto’s 80/20 rule and returns to it several times.
I think this is a great book for any small business that is serious about growing and needs to know where to start.
Reviewed by Mark Orr
MD, The Printing and Mailing Company
