Back when her unpopular TV show, "The Apprentice," was on the air, Martha Stewart's company lost 40% of its value. As the face (and name) of the company, people were clearly turned off by the experience of her in the "you're fired" role.

Until then, we'd seen Martha striving for perfection in cooking, home decorating, entertaining, gardening and many other domestically oriented areas, all while cooing her catchphrase, "It's a good thing.

The most important thing to understand about lines of communication with your customers is that everything is one. Everything about you communicates, whether you want it to or not.

Are you sending messages, or leaking them? Are you carefully crafting exactly what you want your intended audience to hear when they come in contact with a particular aspect of your business?

I want you to get a great Return On Investment from your marketing, more bang for your buck.

Why do small business owners get such poor results from their marketing? You can sum this up in three reasons: They don't know what to do, or they don't know how to do it. Sometimes, even when they know both of these, they just don't do it!

Not marketing is bad for business.

Marketing is by far the most misunderstood aspect of small business.