It’s time to begin planning your marketing for the next 6-12 months as everything has changed!

We find that even the word ‘marketing plan’ for a small business can sometimes be seen as quite negative because a marketing plan gives the impression of something you do, stick in a drawer and forget about. This should NOT be the case.

So, what should your marketing plan look like and how can you put something together that is meaningful, actionable, target driven and practicable? Well, look no further as we believe a marketing plan should be able to fit onto a maximum of two pages!

Your marketing plan should include what we call your ‘previously proven’ techniques as well as some new techniques that you will be trialling.

Not all marketing techniques will work for every business (yes, really, we are saying that!), however, you do not know what will and will not work until you have given it a fair run (we advise 6 – 12 months). Therefore you should be confident in trying new avenues!

Focus your thoughts with a planning framework

So, you’re ready to put together your marketing plan but where do you start and how do you put something together?

Well, now is the time to put the thought in and then when you’re done it’s simply all about the execution!

We use a simple five-step framework when helping businesses plan their marketing activity and this covers the points below:

1. Who are my potential customers?
2. What marketing techniques are suitable to reach my customers?
3. Which techniques are suited to which customer?
4. Outline the techniques you will use, break them down by product / service and outline how you will implement them
5. Break it down into an actionable monthly, one page plan!