Marketing Strategy and Planning
Is your blank sheet of paper – intended for either your marketing planning or your marketing activities – which, let’s face it, seemed such a good idea at the start of the New Year – still, well, a blank sheet of paper?!
A blank piece of paper is seen as a great opportunity and embraced by some, and downright scary for others! If you’re in the category of the latter, then hopefully the tips below will help:
- Identify your prime challenges and goals for the year ahead and then prioritise, to assist your decision making.
- Conduct out a SWOT analysis to fully understand your current situation for your target audience, by segment if you can, and your products or services – you’ll already be aware of a lot of this but you’ll find that writing it down in this way will really help crystallise your thinking.
- Consider your marketing objectives, ie, what is it that you wish to achieve over the forthcoming period, such as sales volumes and market share?
- Construct your marketing strategy (both on and offline) giving consideration to the following and, by the way, all of these are relevant whether you sell physical products or provide services:
- Product – features, benefits and development based upon your customer needs
- Price – value, profit, comparison to your competitors
- Place – how you make your product or service available to your customers
- Promotion – how you will communicate your products and services and persuade your customers to buy from you
- People – consider your customer service, training and internal marketing
- Processes – how good are your sales processes, they can offer value and give you a competitive advantage
- Positioning – are you delivering what your customer needs, do you stand out from your competitors?
- Physical Factors – are the ways in which you present yourself consistent?
- Packaging – not only colour and shape but language too
- Partnerships – are you influenced by any strategic alliances
- Calculate your marketing budget – the image below may help with this.
- Produce your timing plan to implement your activities. We all know that things are more likely to happen if they are written down and this will better help you to manage your time.
If the above still seems like gobbledygook (and yes the word is in the English Dictionary!) or you would like more information on how we can help you construct your marketing plan, then please give us a call.
If you would like to have a chat about your marketing requirements, please call Alison Page on tel: 07963 002065 or email: hello@alisonpagemarketing.co.uk. You can of course browse our website to see what our existing clients have to say about our work.