Marketing

Training › Small Enterprise training

Bring in more customers, and bring them back

Selling to whoever walks in, and cutting prices to keep up with competitors? Marketing is much more than adverts. You talk to your own customers, choose the ones you serve best, and make every part of your business work to win them and keep them.

▶▶ Watch the short introduction to the course on YouTube

What you walk away with

• ✔Market research with your own customers and competitors
• ✔Your niche and your Position: the one idea customers remember you for
• ✔The seven Ps worked out for your business, with a three-month promotion plan and budget
• ✔A dated Marketing Strategy, reviewed by a SMEAZ consultant

See the prices Start the course

Choose how you want to learn

Already have the self-paced course? Add a webinar or a live class on the course page and pay only the difference. Pay by EcoCash or Paynow; the self-paced course opens as soon as your payment is confirmed.

Where two prices are shown, the first is for paid-up Small Enterprise, Medium Enterprise and Corporate members, and the second is for everyone else, including Standard members, Start-up members and non-members. Sending your sales staff? On the course page, choose Buying for your staff?: pay once for as many seats as you need and receive one code per person, which opens the course on their own login. Each certificate carries your business name.

About the course

Build a marketing strategy that brings customers in, and brings them back.

For owners and managers with no marketing background. You talk to your own customers and study your competitors, choose the customers you can serve best, write your Position (the one idea you want them to have about your business) and your business model, then make each of the seven Ps (product, price, place, promotion, people, process and physical evidence) deliver it. You leave with a dated Marketing Strategy that builds on the marketing section of Develop Your Business Plan. Adapted for Zimbabwean conditions from the International Labour Organization’s Improve Your Business programme. It is one of the six Improve Your Business modules, each of which can be taken on its own.

Who it is for

• Owners and managers of businesses that are trading and want more customers who come back
• Sales and marketing staff sent by their employer: the plan is agreed with the employer, and the certificate carries the business name
• Members whose Action Plan includes the Marketing Strategy section

What you will do

About 12 hours in all: roughly 5 on screen and 7 talking to customers, studying competitors and working on your own business. Most learners finish within two to three weeks.

1. Welcome (30 minutes). Why marketing is about customers who come back, and a picture of your business and its customers today.
2. Marketing and your business (1 hour). The power of customers, what marketing really is, and the seven Ps.
3. Know your customers and competitors (1.5 hours). Positioning, and market research with your own customers and competitors.
4. Target customers and your Position (1.5 hours). Segment the market, choose your niche, check it is big enough, and write your Position and business model.
5. Product (1 hour). Basic and specific needs, and improving the product, its packaging and its service.
6. Price (1.25 hours). Price, cost and profit, the four things to know before you set a price, and attractive prices.
7. Place (1.25 hours). Your location, and direct, retail, wholesale and online channels.
8. Promotion (1.5 hours). Advertising, sales promotion, publicity and digital marketing, and your promotion plan and budget.
9. People, Process and Physical evidence (1.75 hours). Key people and selling skills, the customer’s experience step by step, and what customers see, hear and smell.
10. Your Marketing Strategy (45 minutes). A case to solve, a check of your marketing practices, a dated action plan, and review.

What you leave with

• Your Marketing Strategy: your market research, target customers, Position and business model, the seven Ps worked out for your business, a three-month promotion plan with a budget, and a dated action plan
• The SMEAZ Marketing workbook (Excel): segment size check, prices against full cost, channel profits and a promotion budget that tells you whether it pays
• A Certificate of Completion when your strategy is approved, and a Certificate of Competence once it is in use in your business

How the self-paced course works

• Work on your phone or computer, in short sessions. Your answers are saved as you go.
• Every exercise is about your own business, not a textbook case.
• An AI coach comments on your key answers and asks the questions a consultant would ask.
• A SMEAZ consultant reviews your finished work and replies with comments.
• Your certificate carries a number and a QR code that anyone can check on our website.

Ready to start?

Start the course Join the live class list

You will be asked to log in to your SMEAZ website account first. No account yet? Registering is free and takes two minutes.

What comes next

Put your strategy to work with SMEAZ: your Business Directory entry, customer testimonials, the SMEAZ Online Marketplace, mailshots and a website. Then work out the full cost behind every price in Costing, on the Small Enterprise training page.

Questions? Message us on WhatsApp.

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