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January 28, 2016 at 10:42 am #993840Up::0
I’m about to re-visit my marketing plan on the weekend.
Last year, I spent about 2-3 hours putting a plan together.
It was lacking excitement last year… fairly boring with the usual culprits… four P’s, competitor analysis, etc.
How long did yours take – and what did it include?
Is it worth it?
January 28, 2016 at 10:31 pm #1193754Up::0Hi Mark,
First of all, good work on revisiting your marketing plan and not let it sit their getting stale!
Before getting started, I would be thinking about what you want to achieve when writing this plan. All the basics (Four P’s, SWOT, Competitor Analysis) are only as good as what you get out of them. You’ve already been in business for at least a year, so I’m sure you know everything there is about your own business. There is no point filling in the gaps for the sake of it.
What you really want to plan out, is how you should go about marketing your brand for the next 6-12 months. SMART strategies with SMART tactics. You need to come up with the strategies you will be implementing and specifically outline the tactics you will be using to achieve them.
This is where the Competitor Analysis becomes really useful. What marketing strategies are your competitors implementing? Get ideas of them as a starting point. How can you do it better?
Marketing Plans I write usually take 2 weeks. It takes time and effort to write the strategies and tactics in enough detail that they can actually be implemented step by step (and don’t just sit there looking scary for the next 6 months!)
What to include? Well that will very much depend on your specific business but a good starting point for any business would be:
– Target audience
– Positioning
– Competitor Analysis
– Branding (logo, colour scheme, fonts, letterhead, marketing collateral, email signature, etc)
– Website (Best practices, conversion techniques, copywriting, user experience)
– SEO strategy
– Content Marketing
– Social Media
– Online Advertising and PPC campaigns
– Email Marketing
– Online DirectoriesJust a couple to start you off. You will need to decide what is appropriate for your brand.
Lastly. Is it worth it? Well unless you want to plunge into the next year without any marketing direction, everyone needs a marketing plan. Take your time with it. This is your chance to properly do your research about what your industry is doing and what new digital marketing tools are out there to help you. With clearly defined goals, and strategies to get you there, you will be able to implement a lot more efficiently then without.
Hope this has been helpful!
May I ask what is your business does?
January 29, 2016 at 8:05 am #1193755Up::0Hi Marky,
What Melanie said above plus…There are so many issues that may impact on the time it takes to compile a marketing plan.
Research is usually the factor that needs most time. Research is also the element that has the biggest impact on your plan’s likely outcome.
The more time you spend on research into:
- Your target new customers
- Existing customer
- Your competition and how they market their products
..the more effective the marketing plan you should be able to develop.
We have no info on your specific market but when it comes to the online research component of any small/micro business market, I’d like to spend a minimum of 8 hours on researching it before I even started to write up my marketing plan.
Regs,
JohnWJanuary 29, 2016 at 8:47 pm #1193756Up::0In my seminars one of the most exciting ways to get through the competitor analysis, SWOT analysis is to put a military spin on it.
Having spent time with the army I always incorporate an element of military style planning into it.
Instead of SWOT I like to include…
ENMLCA – Enemy Most Likely Course of Action
This section discusses what your primary competitor(s) typically do, how they react to things, and their most likely reaction (if any) to you, your business, any new initiatives you take, and any changes in the market.You then make a strategy to mitigate the risks and issues this scenario may create for your business.
ENMDCA – Enemy Most Dangerous Course of Action
This section discusses the worst case scenario where for instance (the competition reacts aggressively to your new marketing initiative, or copies your new service you start advertising).Again you must create a strategic plan to mitigate these issues so that you can continue to progress even if your worst case scenario happens.
Once you can address ENMDCA then ENMLCA is not really a big issue, and generally the plan for MDCA also pretty much covers MLCA too!
I’ve found this approach increases the effectiveness of the SWOT analysis because the result is a really well thought out plan of how you can exploit weaknesses your competition has, and also defend against your own.
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