HOW TO DEVELOP A WINNING MARKETING PLAN

Sales may be the most critical components of your business’s success, but in order to obtain those sales you have to market to the right people. Your business’s level of marketing can directly correlate to how much revenue is generated. According to entrepreneur.com, “You may have a fantastic product or service, but if customers are not aware it exists, there’s no point in continuing the line of work.” That being said, if you want to make sure your product is exposed to the right people then you need a thoughtful and relevant marketing plan.

A marketing plan focuses not only on winning over customers, but also on keeping those customers loyal to your product or service. Developing a marketing plan is very involved and strategic and usually includes highly concentrated research, including an evaluation of your business’s numbers, revenue goals and marketing objectives, among other things. A good marketing plan lays out everything you’ll use to achieve your revenue goals, and the steps needed to make it happen.

If you’re in the process of developing a new marketing plan, start out by answering the five questions below. Once you have these answers, you’ll be better able to outline your marketing plan for the year.

1. What are you wanting to promote? What value does your product/service have to customers?

You know why your product is great – but can you explain it to your customers in a way that shows value to them? Although this might seem like a simple area, it’s one where many businesses and marketers fall flat. In order to convince your customer to use your product or service, you have to communicate to them in a way that shows the value of your product or service to their life. How can your business help them solve a problem? Meet a goal? Enhance their life? If you can successfully answer this question, then you’re already well on your way to developing language for a marketing message – a crucial part of any marketing plan.

2. Who is your target audience?

Developing a detailed customer profile is a crucial component of any marketing plan. An easy way of doing this is to analyze your current customers and look for any noticeable patterns. Are they within the same income range? Do they have a similar problem that your product or service is the solution for? What age group do they fall within? Answering some of these questions and formulating a consistent persona will help you to narrow down your spectrum of prospects to a group that will be the most impacted by your marketing efforts.

3. What are your marketing goals?

In order to have an efficient marketing plan, you need to hammer out what you want to accomplish with your marketing campaign. Do you want to build brand awareness? Do you want to generate a high volume of sales leads? Do you want to convert leads to sales? Are you wanting to re-engage inactive customers? Once you have decided the most important priorities for your campaign you can start to see how you want to angle your messaging.

4. What is your budget?

This one is kind of a gimme. How much can you afford to spend on your marketing campaign? You don’t always have to spend huge amounts of money to have a successful marketing campaign. Some marketing channels are relatively inexpensive to run campaigns on. The most important thing is simply to consistently market to your audience. It is important to divide your funds into multiple marketing channels that will allow your message to resonate for the most amount of time.

5. What marketing tactics best fit my budget, goals and audience?

Once you have defined your target audience, set goals and mapped out your budget, you need to decide what marketing channels you are going to utilize in your campaign. Digital, traditional, direct? What is the best way to reach out and engage your audience where they are? Your marketing plan should target prospects at all stages of the sales cycle – and should target them on the channels most appropriate for each audience segment. In order to identify the right marketing mix for your overall strategy, you will need to know which channels your audience uses to find information.

Each channel has its pros and cons. For more on selecting the appropriate marketing channel for your business needs, check out the blog post “Which Marketing Channel is Right for My Business?”

Still feeling lost? If you want to create a successful marketing plan today, contact our full-service agency to learn more about Conduit, our marketing software tool, and receive a free demonstration.

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