Marketing Myopia: Do You Have Scotoma?

5/23/2008 7:34:38 PM

Do You Have Scotoma?

“What is scotoma?” you ask, “And how does it relate to me as a business owner?”

Scotoma is essentially a blind spot, and—as a business owner—having a blind spot can be fatal to your business. How? Well, the majority of small businesses are founded on the technical expertise of the owner. When the owner focuses too intently on working in his business (as the technical expert) instead of on his business the blind spot develops, narrowing the owner’s overall vision until he is blind to growth opportunities and marketing myopia sets in.

For instance, a pressman—let’s call him George—at a large printing company becomes disenchanted with further employment prospects and decides to form his own printing company. George has plenty of good reasons for leaving—particularly when the freedom and challenge of owning his own business, as well as the opportunity to get out from under his boss, beckon him, so he quits his job. The first blind spots are now developing as George continues the pursuit of the American dream.

George researched the market beforehand and knows that he can count on some of his past employer’s clients to move with him in his new business. After scraping his life savings together and signing his life away, George is able to raise the necessary capital, and soon the pressman turned business owner is in business. However, being in business hasn’t necessarily prepared him for the challenges of business ownership.

Pushing for a return on his substantial emotional and financial investment, George manages to make ends meet, but he soon finds himself at a crossroads. The business has begun to pay the bills, and he doesn’t have to spend as much time and effort to keep it running—yet something is still missing. George stays on top of his industry; however, he finds gaining ground on the competition difficult. Seemingly overnight, his blind spot has grown very large, preventing him from seeing what he needs to help his business grow. Scotoma has robbed George of his vision by convincing him that being the best pressman will insure his success in business.

At this stage, the pressman turned business owner realizes he has the same job he so enthusiastically left a few years back. He has as a few more headaches and little more to show for it financially. Hard decisions now face George. Does he continue running as fast as he can, doing all the work himself and risk burn out, or does he seek outside help?

Advanced Marketing Consultants (AMC) would suggest that George, and other business owners is his situation, out source their marketing tasks. If you are responsible for day to day management, as well as all the marketing, then your business is losing revenues in direct proportion to the degree that you spend time managing your business as opposed to marketing your business. AMC can see where growth can occur because we are not blinded by familiarity otherwise known as marketing myopia.

Eliminate your marketing myopia by contacting Advanced Marketing Consultants.

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Tim Cohn is a Google Advertising Professional and author of the book For Sale By Google.