The top line in your income statement is "sales" - but what drives sales? Marketing. Point blank period, if you're not marketing, then your sales will suffer.

Any marketing tool you utilize should be designed to increase sales. If you use traditional media like print newspapers, magazines, direct mail, television,radio, and word-of-mouth you want to increase sales. Perhaps you prefer palm cards, party cards, flyers, posters, coupons, or even refrigerator magnets. They're designed to increase sales. Some of you use social media with twitter, facebook, youtube, foursquare, podcasts, blogtalk, text messaging, video marketing, mobile marketing, SEO and video web conferencing.The goal remains to increase sales.

And then there's event marketing, sponsorships,branded content, product placement, in-store, point-of-sale, street teams, ad sense and ad words. A diverse set of tools to increase sales. We can't even identify all of the creative marketing tactics and tools to utilize here, but they all share a common denominator, which is to "increase sales."

Now with limited economic resources,competition at heightened levels, and consumers holding their purses tighter than ever; the person who makes the best marketing decisions is going to realize, the best return on their marketing dollars.

So, how can you determing and utilize the best marketing tools for your unique situation? Here are nine muscle marketing tips to make sure that nobody's kicking sand in your face.
 
Tip 1) Identify your target market. It all starts here.
Who in the heck are you trying to reach? And guess what ..
it ain't "everybody". Too often amateur marketers think that "everybody wants my stuff". Sorry it just ain't so. There has to be a target for any product. 
 

Tip 2) Know the size of your target universe. If you're targeting "Black people in America", and the Census Bureau
reports there are 40 miilion in the U.S. that's the maximum size of your target audience. If you're targeting African American people with household income above $75,000 then minus those people from the audience and there's your target.

Tip 3) Know where your target audience resides and "fish where the fish are." You have to know where your audience hangs-out, lurks, and networks. If your target audience is online, guess where you should be? Exactly - online with them. If they're off-line and don't touch computers, then why are you reading this?

Tip 4) Know what percentage of your target market is reachable? Can you meet them at the mosque or church? Can you their contact info on a list? Can you buy a billboard they pass on their drive to work? What percentage of the target market can you reach? and oh yeah, How much does it..

Tip 5) Cost. What's the cost to reach them in terms of time and money. Hey, there is really not an effective marketing plan - if it's not implemented and executed. So, what's the point of developing a comprehensive marketing plan,
with a diverse mix of traditional and non-traditional media, if you don't have an adequate marketing budget. Now what?
 
Tip 6) Develop a marketing budget. Even if you're "word of mouth" - or say "I do my own marketing" -- you need to put some money aside on a consistent basis for your marketing efforts. If you sold $1000 worth of services
this month, and you decide to allocate 10% to your marketing budget, then set aside the $100. And leave it there!
 
Tip 7) Leverage your marketing dollars. If you approach a writer, a blogger, a radio show host, a television personality with "your story" and tell them you want "to come on their show" How much more powerful is it if you're also buying an ad schedule in the medium?

Tip 8) Use the latest technologies to duplicate yourself and spread your message. Cost-efficiency allows small businesses to market on a higher level. Web conferencing
used to be available only to large entities and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. Today you can quickly go live right from your computer in your home, office, or on the road.
 
Tip 9) Marketing is about timing. Understand what the trends are, what's hot, and how the calendar is working. Is your audience seasonal? What's happening that can give you a marketing lift? Perhaps you can capitalize on outside events that bring increased focus to your service or product.

By applying the nine tips above your marketing muscles should grow. If that happens I'm sure I'll see you flexing in the marketplace.

Norm Bond is the national president of the National Alliance of Market Developers (NAMD) . He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.