Internet Marketing Isn’t Complicated. We Are.

Small business owners often complain that Internet marketing is confusing and complicated. I disagree. Sure, on the face of it, there appears to be too much information and advice to realistically digest, synthesize and put into practice. If big biz barely has time to get its marketing straightened out, small business owners running their own shop certainly don’t have time to guru-fy their Internet strategy.

I urge you though to consider what marketing really is. Then consider why it is that we are inclined to complicate it so.

Perhaps it’s not so much that we consciously TRY to complicate it, but that we have not bothered to ask “what’s the straightest line from A to B?”

It’s tough to be this disciplined, mind you, when the information is just lying around all over the place, there for the taking. In other words, if we’re going to help ourselves to some information anyway, why not supersize it? Heck, let’s stuff ourselves silly!

So with all that information lying around, it’s far too easy to arrive at the conclusion that Internet marketing really IS complex. When in fact, marketing–Internet or otherwise–is just a habit you practice in order to meet your people where they are and make their pain go away. That’s all it is and all it ever will be.

The Internet is an extraordinary tool for marketing a business. It’s permitted us to innovate new and better ways to communicate with our people. But remember that it is a tool. It is not WHO we are, nor is it WHAT a business IS. And we can all learn how to use a tool. We just have to stop making simple things hard.

When we complicate things, we miss the point. We stop seeing WHY we have a business; our judgment gets clouded by marketing minutiae instead of marketing purpose; we obsess over things like search engine rank and list size and twitter followers and dammit how did I miss that typo in that blog post last week?

So when you’re feeling paralyzed by information overload and decision overwhelm, ask yourself:

“Who are my people, and what can I ONLY do in this moment to connect with them meaningfully?”

That’s all.