Entrepreneurial marketing strategies for SMEs: The debate between a conventional sales force and network marketing

The lifeblood of any start-up or going concern is the ability to effectively sell and market its products or services to target customers. Products do not automatically skip and hop into consumers\u27 homes. Someone must proactively market these to consumers. Hence, the Entrepreneur/Marketer. The author of this paper holds this topic close to his heart because of his active participation in the fertilizer industry as well as the transition of his corporation in the adoption of different selling and marketing strategies, particularly that from an intensive, conventional sales force­driven company to a network marketing company. This paper aims to provide the reader with points of a perfect business. Each strategy, whether sales force management or network marketing, offers advantages and disadvantages. It is up to the reader to decide for himself. Entrepreneurs are known to shoot from the hip in terms of selling. Marketing today attempts to professionalize what the entrepreneur does or creates. It is my objective to shed some light in terms of the best practices that SMEs may undertake in terms of selling. After all, the entrepreneur is a salesperson. He sells himself, his company, and his products in that order