hi I’m Evan Carmichael I believe in
entrepreneurs and I also do a lot of
work helping big companies sell to small
businesses and I thought I’d create a
new series to help these big businesses
do a better job of selling the small
businesses so my first tip my first bit
of advice is stop saying small business
small businesses don’t self-identify as
being a small business and I get how
it’s easy in big companies to to
classify people right you have
enterprise medium business small
business it’s easy to have a VP of small
business or a small business marketing
manager the problem is these small
businesses they don’t call themselves
small businesses so you don’t want to be
running that in your marketing your
campaigns your advertising because it
doesn’t connect to people well I riesen
did a survey to my newsletter list which
has almost 80,000 people on it all
entrepreneur small businesses and I
asked them what do you consider yourself
to be and I gave them options
entrepreneur business owner small
business and here were the results 60.2
percent of people said entrepreneur 29.2
percent of people said business owner
six point six percent of people said
small business and four percent of
people chose a different answer so only
six point six percent of small
businesses actually self-identify as
being a small business now if you want
to have success in your marketing right
you’ve got to be able to speak in the
same language that people speak in I
call small businesses small business
when I’m talking to big companies when
I’m talking to brains because that’s how
they call it internally but I never say
small business when I’m talking
entrepreneurs and the big businesses
have to do the same thing internally
maybe you still call it small business
but when you’re out public facing
talking to entrepreneurs stop saying
small businesses because that’s not how
they consider themselves to be now on
top of that a lot of entrepreneurs find
the term to be offensive not everybody
but a number of entrepreneurs find the
term small business to be offensive
here’s part of what they said they’d
consider it to be
limiting degrading reflective of their
ability just because somebody is small
it doesn’t mean that they are small
person or they have small goals and some
entrepreneurs not everybody but some of
them consider the fact that you’re
calling them small they take that as a
personal insult so at best you’re
calling people by something that they
don’t associate with and at worst you’re
offending them and that’s definitely not
something you want to have in your
marketing your campaigns here is some of
the specific feedback that came out of
the survey I run a profitable regular
sized business I definitely don’t think
that everything that required a lot of
my time thoughts and passion as small I
refuse to be degraded I consider myself
as an entrepreneur I’m a business owner
a one-man band but I’m not small I never
used the word small on issues relating
to my business I always use the word
entrepreneur the word small action
limits ones potential in my opinion
first and foremost I’m a business owner
and entrepreneur the problem is a
government to find small businesses as
50 employees or less and to me 50 is a
big business a business owner I’m in my
startup phase and it’s just me on board
I’m still not a small business I always
refer to myself as a business owner on
the basis it is factually correct
irrespective of size status or any other
adjectives you care to mention
interesting question and yes being
labeled small can be frustrating
particularly so when you feel that is
being used to suggest your ability that
impact your chosen market might be
limited by size I struggled to find a
polite way to say this but i would
venture that in the context of
categorizing businesses the word small
is usually used by someone whose
abilities to exist beyond the
comfortable safety of an established
corporate structure might be seriously
limited by definition I’m an
entrepreneur it is something that has
bothered me for some time although I’ve
never articulated it I consider myself
to be a business owner if someone were
to count my immediate permanent staff
they could conclude that I was small
however if they also included the
specialized consultants who I work with
then I would be considered bigger if
they then consider the influence I have
to enable change in other organizations
and I could be considered a large
business
I guess it all depends upon whether one
sees size in terms of headcount or
influence and in the famous words of
marketing giant David Ogilvy I don’t
know the rules of grammar but if you’re
trying to persuade people to do
something or buy something it seems to
me you should use their language the
language they use everyday the language
in which they think we try to write in
the vernacular David Ogilvy so stop
calling us small businesses and start
speaking our language belief if you guys
like this video you want to learn more
about how I help brands you can check
out Evan Carmichael calm / brands or
subscribe to the channel thank you guys
so much for watching I’ll see you soon
hi ever kill English here with mermaid
junkutv are you on Evans newsletter
subscription if not you should be I read
every single one and you should too ciao
you
entrepreneurs and I also do a lot of
work helping big companies sell to small
businesses and I thought I’d create a
new series to help these big businesses
do a better job of selling the small
businesses so my first tip my first bit
of advice is stop saying small business
small businesses don’t self-identify as
being a small business and I get how
it’s easy in big companies to to
classify people right you have
enterprise medium business small
business it’s easy to have a VP of small
business or a small business marketing
manager the problem is these small
businesses they don’t call themselves
small businesses so you don’t want to be
running that in your marketing your
campaigns your advertising because it
doesn’t connect to people well I riesen
did a survey to my newsletter list which
has almost 80,000 people on it all
entrepreneur small businesses and I
asked them what do you consider yourself
to be and I gave them options
entrepreneur business owner small
business and here were the results 60.2
percent of people said entrepreneur 29.2
percent of people said business owner
six point six percent of people said
small business and four percent of
people chose a different answer so only
six point six percent of small
businesses actually self-identify as
being a small business now if you want
to have success in your marketing right
you’ve got to be able to speak in the
same language that people speak in I
call small businesses small business
when I’m talking to big companies when
I’m talking to brains because that’s how
they call it internally but I never say
small business when I’m talking
entrepreneurs and the big businesses
have to do the same thing internally
maybe you still call it small business
but when you’re out public facing
talking to entrepreneurs stop saying
small businesses because that’s not how
they consider themselves to be now on
top of that a lot of entrepreneurs find
the term to be offensive not everybody
but a number of entrepreneurs find the
term small business to be offensive
here’s part of what they said they’d
consider it to be
limiting degrading reflective of their
ability just because somebody is small
it doesn’t mean that they are small
person or they have small goals and some
entrepreneurs not everybody but some of
them consider the fact that you’re
calling them small they take that as a
personal insult so at best you’re
calling people by something that they
don’t associate with and at worst you’re
offending them and that’s definitely not
something you want to have in your
marketing your campaigns here is some of
the specific feedback that came out of
the survey I run a profitable regular
sized business I definitely don’t think
that everything that required a lot of
my time thoughts and passion as small I
refuse to be degraded I consider myself
as an entrepreneur I’m a business owner
a one-man band but I’m not small I never
used the word small on issues relating
to my business I always use the word
entrepreneur the word small action
limits ones potential in my opinion
first and foremost I’m a business owner
and entrepreneur the problem is a
government to find small businesses as
50 employees or less and to me 50 is a
big business a business owner I’m in my
startup phase and it’s just me on board
I’m still not a small business I always
refer to myself as a business owner on
the basis it is factually correct
irrespective of size status or any other
adjectives you care to mention
interesting question and yes being
labeled small can be frustrating
particularly so when you feel that is
being used to suggest your ability that
impact your chosen market might be
limited by size I struggled to find a
polite way to say this but i would
venture that in the context of
categorizing businesses the word small
is usually used by someone whose
abilities to exist beyond the
comfortable safety of an established
corporate structure might be seriously
limited by definition I’m an
entrepreneur it is something that has
bothered me for some time although I’ve
never articulated it I consider myself
to be a business owner if someone were
to count my immediate permanent staff
they could conclude that I was small
however if they also included the
specialized consultants who I work with
then I would be considered bigger if
they then consider the influence I have
to enable change in other organizations
and I could be considered a large
business
I guess it all depends upon whether one
sees size in terms of headcount or
influence and in the famous words of
marketing giant David Ogilvy I don’t
know the rules of grammar but if you’re
trying to persuade people to do
something or buy something it seems to
me you should use their language the
language they use everyday the language
in which they think we try to write in
the vernacular David Ogilvy so stop
calling us small businesses and start
speaking our language belief if you guys
like this video you want to learn more
about how I help brands you can check
out Evan Carmichael calm / brands or
subscribe to the channel thank you guys
so much for watching I’ll see you soon
hi ever kill English here with mermaid
junkutv are you on Evans newsletter
subscription if not you should be I read
every single one and you should too ciao
you
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