What do you do if your business, product, or service is something hardly anyone is aware of or understands? Or worse yet, if it is something they are afraid of or want to avoid? My answer is three-fold.

First, focus on the SOLUTION you are providing.

What is the primary problem your prospects have that you can solve? Do they have pain you can relieve? Do they have an ailment or affliction you can cure? In these cases, you are not selling your "scary" or "misunderstood" product or service; you are selling pain relief or healing.

It is imperative you look at what you are selling from your prospects' perspective and talk about it in terms of a solution for them.

Second, understand your competitive advantage.

You must understand how what you sell stacks up against the other options your prospects have. Is it superior? Do the effects last longer? Is it safer? Is it cheaper? The list of questions could go on forever.

In the end, you must be able to clearly communicate to your prospects how you can help them in a way no one or nothing else can. This makes your "scary" or "misunderstood" product or service the only logical alternative for them and will help to overcome any obstacles or fear they may have. It simply becomes THE best solution for the problem they have.

Third, undertake an educational marketing effort.

Through your web site, a newsletter or ezine, special reports, tele-seminars, and presentations, or other free information products and services, you have an excellent opportunity to educate your prospects about your product or service and to dispel any fears or misconceptions they may have.

You may even want to enlist testimonials from satisfied clients. People very often believe what others say about your business more than what you say. If you don't yet have clients from which to gather testimonials, treat some friends or colleagues to your product or service and ask them to provide you with testimonials in exchange. It's a great way to get your business off to a great start!

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One of the great advantages small businesses have is that by their very nature they are more personal.

What clients experience in working with a small business tends to be more genuine and authentic. You can leverage that fact and put a little more of you in your marketing.

Lots of small businesses are finding out that one of the best things they can do for their marketing and sales is to start getting a little more "personal" with their audience. Let them know a little bit more about what makes you the way you are. How did you get into doing what you do? What are the things about you that shape your thinking?

Putting more of you in your marketing helps to give your company a face and actually builds the know, like, and trust factor with your audience. People love a great story and relate to stories much easier than a bunch of marketing speak that's clearly just trying to get them to buy. In one of John Jantsh's (Duct Tape Marketing) Ultimate Marketing System teleclasses, he shares that he believes every small business should include their story (a marketing story) as part of their marketing kit of materials. I think he's right.

So how do you put a little more of you in your marketing?

1. Put a picture of yourself on your web site, ezine, blog, networking follow-up thank you notes, etc. It lets people see the human being behind your small business.
2. Reserve a little space in your newsletter for a personal section to tell readers a little bit about what's going on with you and your life. There is a financial advisor that has put together a little web site about his dogs. Who wouldn't want to take time out of a newsletter about financial news to read about what his dogs are up to and then go visit the web site to take a look? I guarantee if he follows my simple suggestion then his response rates will increase.
3. Scrap the resume or bio on the "About Us" page of your marketing kit and web site. Give us a story to let us know who you are, why you do what you do, how you got into it, what interests or even fascinates you about your work, some of the things that you're most proud of, etc. People love a story and it will absolutely help people feel more like they know you and can trust you.

These are just a few ideas. Put a little more you in your marketing and make the most of one of the great advantages small businesses have.

It is no secret that public speaking can cause a lot of fear and stress; in fact, public speaking ranks high in causing fear in many of us.

The problem that most of us face is not speech making per se, it is actually any kind of frontal lecture or exchange of information that we need to deliver. College students are well aware of the devastating effects of the fear of public speaking; the need to present seminars or to protect a work from criticism makes public speaking 'victims' out of most of us.

There are a lot of tips and advice on delivering a well planned and perfectly executed speech. This article shares a few basic points of good public speaking, the points that matter the most and that will increase your chances of getting to the end of your speech alive and well.

A great speech starts with a great topic. It is important that you select a topic that interests you, and you believe will interest your audience. When researching the topic of the speech, look for diverse subjects within the topic. Try and locate one with which you feel very comfortable and to which you can base most of the time in your speech.

Think carefully of your audience and its needs. Be prepared for both types of audience. You could have a silent audience, grateful for any piece of information you throw their way. Or you could be in front of a savvy, interested audience that will make your life hard and ask questions. Either way, if you prepare for the worst, you will come out on top.

When writing your introduction, think of it as the base of the speech and try your best to make it powerful. If you want to capture the attention of your audience, you will need some passion here. Start by writing a three-sentence introduction. Think of it as trying to explain your subject to someone in a pleasant casual conversation. This is the key to giving a speech in a conversational tone. In the introduction tell your audience what you're about to say.

The first thirty seconds of your speech are probably the most important. In that period of time you must grab the attention of the audience, and engage their interest in what you have to say in your speech. Once your audience is interested and intrigued you can move forward and advance to the latter parts of your speech.

Now is the time to address each of the general points in your introduction, and apply the "meat" of the speech. You need to explore a few points in a profound way to show that you have done your homework and give the audience the feeling that you're just talking to them and not reading from a prepared speech. When an experienced speaker gives a speech, the feeling is as if he or she was talking about something with which he or she is very familiar. Diverting the subject is not a problem. He or she is in control over the whole scope of the topic. Aspire to give this feeling.

Most good writing, we are told over and over again, must have structure. A good speech is no exception. By providing your speech with a beginning, middle, and an end, you will have laid the foundation for a successful speech.

The finishing touch, the conclusion, will probably not make or break your general performance. Do not rush to the conclusion. Give the audience the feeling that you have exhausted all the possible interesting things you could have said, and then move to the conclusion. Make sure you finish with a considerable amount of confidence. It will send your audience home with a feeling that they have learned something.