Marketing Plans...A Map for Marketing Success
By EDC Guest Columnist Nancy Garberson, CEO of Marketing Communication Strategies
A marketing plan is an important aspect of every successful business; large or small, a plan of action is the only way to get things done. If you don’t plan, you’re doomed. The important thing is to assess your marketing, and move forward to reach for your goals through a strategic marketing plan. After all, you wouldn’t leave on a trip without a map to get to your destination…right?
Developing a plan can be an arduous task. If you have not been involved in the process before this might be a good time to get help; find an experienced marketer who is armed with the latest techniques to reach your customers and ensure that your marketing efforts make an impact.
Successful marketing starts with a clear marketing plan which includes a situation analysis, obstacles, opportunities, target markets, goals, strategies, tactics and a marketing budget. Your marketing plan should cover one year and needs to include weekly and monthly marketing schedules with a calendar that guides your daily marketing tasks.
Generally, the larger the company and the more aggressive the strategies, the longer the plan (smaller companies can manage with a dozen pages while a larger organization’s plan might be hundreds of pages in length). The marketing plan is a flexible tool meant to take advantage of opportunities that arise throughout the year, so consider binding your plan in something that can be opened and changed regularly.
Companies sometimes undervalue the impact a “marketing plan” can have on staff. Consider sharing the goals of the company and a vision of where the company is headed in the years to come. People don’t always understand financial projections, but they can get excited about a well thought-out marketing plan. Explain it with some enthusiasm and generate some excitement for the future. Your workers will appreciate being involved.
Since your business is important to you and your employees, make sure you have a map to guide you on your way! Your marketing plan is a turn-by-turn guide for your business growth. It’s more important than a vision statement. To put together a real marketing plan, you have to assess your company from top to bottom and make sure all the signs are helping you reach your destination.
When developing or updating your marketing plan, knowing where to start is often a difficulty. Successful plans may not look anything like what they did in the past; knowing what to keep and when to completely scrap a strategy or goal is key. Not only must each year’s marketing plan be imagined, but it must be redesigned.
Ready to map out your marketing plan? Here are a few tips to get started:
1. Define your target market. Who is your perfect customer? Build a working model, in writing, of whom they are, what are their needs, why will they need your product or service and why people would come to your company rather than someone else for that product? Make sure you provide an adequate demographic breakdown of that customer.
2. Does someone else already fill that need in your target area? Where is your target area? Who is already doing it? Can you provide something recognizably better? Can you compete? If not, figure out a way to make your product or service better than anyone else. Challenging, but not impossible.
3. What is the best way to reach your perfect customer? (Example: E-mail, Direct Mail, Television, Radio, Street Teams, Public Relations, etc.)
This decision will depend on both your budget and your target market. Also, since repetition is the key to marketing success, using one media to begin with will help you reach the same people multiple times. Customers must see you in multiple ways before they look to you for help!
4. What’s currently working? What isn’t? This is the flexibility you will build into your marketing plan. When something isn’t working there are loads of alternatives and the more limited your budget is – the more creative you get. Just don’t stop trying!
External resources, together with your internal company input and information, will be your base as you move forward. As you progress along the planning process and the specific information you need becomes clearer, keep moving forward, one step at a time down the road to success! Now is the time to map your success!
