SIMB Articles

Having just finished my I.T. Masters degree I decided that I should continue learning on a weekly basis. Learning keeps me energised and focused.

After 8 years of full time programming, I’m pretty confident in my ability to code to a high standard and engineer solid databases, and Libby can design beautiful graphics and layout elegant web pages, but neither of us have any training in marketing. Marketing, let’s face it, is important.

So I went to Borders today and picked up a book by Mark Stevens called “Your Marketing Sucks“. The title was instantly appealing (because well, my marketing could be improved somewhat), and Mark’s writing style was clear and entertaining. As I read the book I’m going to blog my learnings here (under the Marketing tag), so if you’re interested that’s where you’ll find it.

The first chapter was short and simple, and basically laid out some pretty obvious but nontheless important things a business should do:

• Know what you’re selling.
• Know why your business is different from your competitors.
• Don’t engage in marketing just for the sake of it.
• Don’t use marketing techniques that cost your more than you get back from it.

Written by Andrew Chapman of SIMB.